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Home sharing on iDevices not loading large library

I store my entire music library (3TB of ALAC files) on a Mac Mini connected to my Time Capsule. I can home share the library flawlessly on my laptop, but it absolutely refuses to load the library on my iPhone or iPad. I'm using all the latest software (iOS7, iTunes 11.1) with an iPhone 5 and iPad 3.


When I try to share my library, the circle starts to load, but never gets past halfway. I've tried EVERYTHING, i.e. signing out of home sharing and quitting iTunes, restarting the Mac Mini, restarting the iPhone, unplugging the Time Capsule and plugging it back in, and several other tips I've found around here and elsewhere online, but nothing seems to work!


I have other apps (such as Audiotap) that will do the trick, but they leave a gap between tracks, so I would prefer to get home sharing working properly. Thanks in advance for any help.

iPhone 5, iOS 7

Posted on Sep 19, 2013 10:44 PM

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Posted on Sep 27, 2013 9:09 AM

Hello Lee,


I have the exact same problem. I have two iPads, one running iOS6 and the other iOS7. iOS6 is able to load the library as expected but not the iPad running on iOS7. The problem has to do with the size of your library.


Have a look at your "iTunes Music Libary.xml" and the "iTunes Library.xml" files on the machine running iTunes. Most likely they are over 20MB in size. Therein lies the problem. Somehow the Music and Video app's both have problems parsing large xml files and in turn will timeout before completion.


You can easily test this. Sign on as a different user and create a new iTunes library, import a few items and start the Video/Music app on your iOS device. There is no need to restart, unplug etc. Home Sharing works as advertised when dealing with small libraries. By the way, the sorting problem is fixed in iOS7.

148 replies

Jan 31, 2015 11:44 AM in response to Lee Farber

Same problem as everyone else here as well....2 years later and Apple is still ignoring this problem....I have no hope left and no real alternative is available for my home that relies on 4 appleTV (plea is not playing well with appleTVs). If my iPad 2 can list my 4000 movies and 6500 TV shows quickly when using the Remote app, then the Music and Video applications should be able to do the same! I invested heavily in Apple since 1995 and had a wonderful media sharing/network system in my home, since iOS6 it has been problems after problems up to the sad state we are in today...I am stuck because I invested so much (would have to replace computers, airport extreme, time capsules, appleTVs, iPads, iPods, iPhones) but I no longer advise anyone to buy AppleTVs or iPads.

Feb 3, 2015 7:15 AM in response to Laurent Seroude

I gave up after over a year of this. Just yesterday I installed Plex sever on my Mac mini and paid the 4.99 for the android app for my TV and again for all my iDevices. It works well. It's becoming harder to make the argument for all my Apple purchases. I converted from PC-land some years ago because I liked the idea of "It Just Works". Well it doesn't anymore. I have 3 Macs, 2 iPads, 4 iPhones and 2 Apple TV's in my household. Not to mention a Airport Express supplying them all with wireless signal. All I wanted was for it to work.


Whatever. It is what it is. Try Plex. Feels very Zune-like in it's layout and function but I always liked that software so I'm not knocking it. If you want to watch your movies it'll do the job well.

Feb 4, 2015 4:40 AM in response to OzziesMAC

PLex reads movies by title.... And I include year in parentheses after movie title. Then, you would only need special formatting for a TV series. E.G......... I list my Seinfeld's for example as S01E01 And create a folder for each season.That is Season Zero One, Episode Zero One, and so on for each particular chronology in the series. Plex also quickly loads and plays my iTunes Music library and playlists flawlessly at home or remotely wherever I have WiFi access. YouTube tutorial will walk you through the setup. Awesome software.

Feb 4, 2015 5:41 AM in response to OzziesMAC

Same as with iTunes for example. It takes time to title all the stray songs, match cover art work, and of course, parse through a massive library of songs and create playlists. Some people are sloppy and lazy and unorganized. Others go through the monumental task of cleaning up their library........then......then.....as they add new content, consistently take the time at that moment, to keep it organized, so they don't get behind and end up with a large mess again. There are no shortcuts in life. People that have cool home media setups put some time and effort into building and maintaining it. Kind of a hobby....... a labor of love.

Home sharing on iDevices not loading large library

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