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Apple TV homesharing keeps dropping out ...

The homesharing on my Apple TV keeps dropping off randomly.
I have a mac with wired ethernet access, and the Apple TV uses my wifi connection.
The setup was OK, and YouTube and NetFlix are fine, but the homesharing will drop off at random times (I see the message "activate homesharing on itunes" under the Computers menu option). My mac is set to never sleep, and itunes is running continuously, so I know that isn't the problem. Wifi signal strength is 80% in the Apple TV menu.
Can anyone help ?

Mac, Mac OS X (10.6.7)

Posted on Apr 6, 2011 11:03 AM

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450 replies

Jun 16, 2011 12:19 AM in response to Enver Masud

me too.

very dissapointed with aptv2. its is suposed to be streaming my itunes in the kitchen, thats why we buy this stuff, it drops its connection to home share even though it is all on and all the time. fix please apple. p.s. i posted a question which suggested people may not wish to buy this until the fix is suplied, but apple took it down. we need a fix quick apple. this product is a lot of money and at this time does not do what it says it should do.

Apr 6, 2011 12:34 PM in response to Jeet K

Jeet K wrote:
The homesharing on my Apple TV keeps dropping off randomly.
I have a mac with wired ethernet access, and the Apple TV uses my wifi connection.
The setup was OK, and YouTube and NetFlix are fine, but the homesharing will drop off at random times (I see the message "activate homesharing on itunes" under the Computers menu option). My mac is set to never sleep, and itunes is running continuously, so I know that isn't the problem. Wifi signal strength is 80% in the Apple TV menu.
Can anyone help ?


You can test and isolate the wireless connection by connecting wired and see if the ATV2 still does it. You might also look at your router logs for wireless and see if the ATV2 is dropping all the time or is experiencing errors. If your DHCP timings are short, that could be an issue also.

Apr 6, 2011 3:30 PM in response to Jeet K

I'm having the exact same issue. APTV says I need to turn on Home Sharing in iTunes despite it already being on. I've hard rebooted the APTV by unplugging it...and that seems to temporarily fix it...but it will always return.

Called Apple today...walked through all settings both APTV and PC...and they came to the conclusion that it was my router (which is brand new). They suggested to make sure that the following ports are open...

TCP: 443
TCP/UDP: 554
TCP: 3689
UDP: 5353
TCP: 80

I haven't had a chance to try this yet...hopefully it will clear things up. This is really frustrating. Home Sharing is one of the main reasons I purchased the APTV.

Apr 6, 2011 11:00 PM in response to Jeet K

Jeet K wrote:
I'll try it with a wired connection.

Do you think iTunes could be the cause of this ? I have a large library (300GB) and I'm copying files around a lot.


It doesn't help, but the ATV2 only has 8 GB NAND memory so it can't/won't remember all of it, just what you access (music, movies, etc.). You might research what and if there are any library size limits. The ATV2 is really an iPod Touch, iPhone 4, iPad V1 parts iOS device. It has 256 MB of RAM, an A4 processor, and I/O ports added. It has the same Airport card as the three above. It will take a bit more time than a computer to process your library and talk to it over WI-FI 65 mbps and below.

It may work perfectly after a Restore. If you aren't comfortable doing it, I've seen posters saying the Genius Bar will if you make an appointment. They can verify the hardware is good also. Good luck!

Jun 5, 2011 1:28 PM in response to Jeet K

Apple TV 2 keeps dropping the wireless connection. Will play iTunes and iPhoto content one moment, and drop connection next moment. I have to fiddle with it, restart everything to get it going again — EVERYDAY. Have latest Mac OS, iTunes, Apple TV software running on a MacBook Pro. Problem may have started with latest Mac OS update. Before this, it seems the only problem I had was with Netflix streaming.

Sep 11, 2011 9:13 PM in response to Jeet K

Same issue after update. Easiest workaround is just to turn airport off and on again. Reconnects fine for another 30 min or so. Only times out when using homesharing itunes to atv2. Waiting for a fix with with next update. Ahh, pioneering. I'll try to be patient but a bug fix for this type of thing should be days, not weeks or months.

QA/QC apple. It's not like you lack resources or feedback.

Oct 3, 2011 9:40 AM in response to Jeet K

I'm in the same boat. I've had absolutely no problems up until recently. I have 2 Mac computers and both computers can detect eachother's shared library but they keep disappearing from off my 2 ATV 2s. I don't think it's a router thing because I can still access internet content (ATV 2 detects the networks and can still use it) but the shared libraries just disappear. I don't know if the issue is with itunes of ATV 2 but I'm thinking its software related because both ATVs are crapping out. I've had the ATVs for months with absolutely no problems and now I can't hardly use them.


I'm quickly falling out of love with ATV because its like our entire movie collection is randomly unavailable to us and we have to keep resetting the unit to get back functionality...but only for a short time.


Is anyone still experiencing this issue? Anyone found a permanent work around?

Oct 3, 2011 11:08 AM in response to joeb1knobi

joeb1knobi:


I had this problem right from the start with ATV2. It seemed to be something to do with my router. I replaced it with an Airport Extreme, and since then it's worked pretty well. I would get one from the Apple store and tell them you want to try it out. If it doesn't work then at least you know it's not a router problem.

Oct 3, 2011 11:28 AM in response to Jeet K

I'm not convinced its a router problem. Both of my units were working fine ever since I got therm and it's only been in the last few days, since I had them updated, that they started dropping libraries. There have been no changes to my router.


Also, both ATVs can still stream off the internet even when they have dropped the libraries and both of my computers can detect eachother's libraries. It seems like its an issue with the ATVs but I'm having a tough time thinking its a hardware issue since both ATVs are having the same problem.

Apple TV homesharing keeps dropping out ...

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