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Why isnt home sharing working?

I am new to Home sharing and want to transfer some music between my macbook pro, Macbook air and Ipad mini. I have turned on homesharing on all three and made sure that I have the same Apple Id, and that Sharing the libraries is turned on on both Macs. But no libraries show up in my itunes.

How do I check to find out if the computers are recognizing each other? I only have one network and have turned the router on and off and turned everything on and off several times. Please explain any fixes in detail as I am not computer savvy and won't know where things are.

Thanks so much!

Katarina

ps. I have read tons of earlier posts and applied everything that i understood how to apply with no luck.

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.5)

Posted on Sep 27, 2013 8:08 PM

37 replies

Sep 30, 2013 3:10 PM in response to Winston Churchill

yeah, I did everything you suggested. and nothing shows up as shared. there is no category of shared that shows up in the sidebar. only remote disc, and that does not seem to have anything in it. So for some reason file sharing does not seem to work on the two computers either.

Sep 30, 2013 3:14 PM in response to Katarina Wittich

Other than restarting your Router and working through the knowledge-based articles below, I'm not sure I have any further suggestions.

Troubleshooting Home Sharing

Troubleshooting Wi-Fi networks and connections

Recommended Wi-Fi settings

Sep 30, 2013 3:46 PM in response to Winston Churchill

I've already done everything in those articles, I think. definitely have done the router a couple of times. will take the computers to my friends house and see if they work there.

very frustrating! but thanks for your help.

Sep 30, 2013 3:58 PM in response to Katarina Wittich

Also, depending of course on your distance from one, you may wish to take them into Apple Store. By taking them in there you can be certain that they are being tested with an optimised network and the people testing them for you have an exceptionally good knowledge of the computers that you have.

Sep 30, 2013 4:19 PM in response to Winston Churchill

yup. but just went to my neighbors and it works fine on their wifi. so its my router. so easy on theirs!!!

thanks so much for your help.

Sep 30, 2013 4:25 PM in response to Katarina Wittich

I don't want to dishearten you, however it could be your router settings or you may be experiencing interference. I think my next suggestion would be to contact your ISP and tell them what your problem is, they may even be able to make the changes at their end and restart your router for you.

kb8wfh

Level 1

23 points

Sep 30, 2013 4:40 PM in response to Katarina Wittich

I doubt there is anything the ISP will be able to do other that potentially mess things up worse. Chances are, you have a router that has certain ports closed or blocked that you need for internal home sharing. I have seen this before. I think it is likely all you will need to do is get into the router and open certain ports necessary for itunes sharing protocol. Port 3689 seems to be a common one that the service needs to have open.

Here are a couple of links to similar issues you may find useful....

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2250969?start=0&tstart=0

http://forums.appleinsider.com/t/36600/accessing-shared-itunes-through-router

http://www.salingfamily.net/trav/osx/itunes.html

Sep 30, 2013 4:50 PM in response to kb8wfh

How do you go into the router and open ports? those posts are very advanced and I am not sure how they are doing the things they suggest.

on my friends router both file sharing and home sharing work like a breeze. Here on my router neither one works. My firewalls in both computers are off both at home and at my friends.

Is there a firewall in the router that needs addressing???aaargh!!!!

Sep 30, 2013 4:52 PM in response to Winston Churchill

I will try calling. hope they can help!

Sep 30, 2013 5:06 PM in response to Katarina Wittich

You shouldn't turn the firewall off on the router, that would be quite dangerous, I doubt you should need to do any port forwarding either.

If you are in any doubt I would call your ISP, if they can't change the settings in your router remotely, they should be able to talk you through what to do. I'd be far more comfortable talking to the people who know your router than following instructions that may or may not be required for a device that may or may not be similar to yours. Besides which forwarding port 3689 isn't going to solve your file sharing problem even if it the solution to your home sharing problem.

It would be nigh on impossible for someone like I to help, because there are so many different brands with different settings and even different names for the same thing.

Just in case your ISP isn't familiar with Macs and home sharing, I've included a table of all the relevant ports that might be needed.

Port	Type	Protocol	Used By
53	TCP/UDP	DNS	DNS
80	TCP	HTTP	AirPlay, iTunes Store
123	TCP/UDP	NTP	Network Time
443	TCP	HTTPS	AirPlay, PhotoStream, iTunes Store
554	TCP/UDP	RTSP	AirPlay
1900	UDP	SSDP	Bonjour
3689	TCP	DAAP	iTunes, AirPlay, HomeSharing
5297	TCP	-	Bonjour
5298	TCP/UDP	-	Bonjour
5350	UDP	NAT	Bonjour
5351	UDP	NAT	Bonjour
5353	TCP/UDP	MDNS	Bonjour, AirPlay, HomeSharing
8000-8999	TCP	-	iTunes Radio Streams
42000-42999	TCP	-	iTunes Radio Streams
49159	UDP	MDNS (Win)	Bonjour, AirPlay
49163	UDP	MDNS (Win)	Bonjour, AirPlay

Sep 30, 2013 5:14 PM in response to Winston Churchill

I am still on hold after demanding to speak to someone more experienced since this guy keeps saying it has to be that I don't know how to set it up on my computer, no matter how many times I tell him it works fine at my neighbors so obviously I have it set up correctly.

Amazing! thanks for all that info. unless I get someone more skilled there is not going to be any help from them at all!

Sep 30, 2013 5:22 PM in response to Katarina Wittich

One of the problems these sort of people have is they talk to people all day long who haven't tried anything themselves but may claim that they have and try to tell the operator what they think the problem is.

They may well have taken someone's word in the past, that they have already tried the first thing that they suggested and then spend an hour with them before finding out the truth and that the first thing they did suggest would have solved the problem an hour ago. I can understand why they want to go through everything themselves.

It may take a while but be patient.

Sep 30, 2013 5:27 PM in response to Winston Churchill

yeah, sadly he put me on hold for fifteen minutes and then disconnected me.

So I am trying again. but not terribly hopeful.My ISP here in L.A. is notoriously terrible. I am on hold now again.

Sep 30, 2013 5:45 PM in response to Katarina Wittich

I am afraid I am going to have to leave you with it for now, it's 2 AM nearly here and I'm tired.

Sep 30, 2013 5:58 PM in response to Winston Churchill

thank you so much! I really appreciate all your help. The woman I am working with now is really trying to resolve it and has reset the modem and is pinging it now and says there are no ports shut and nothing that should be doing this, so she is completely baffled as well.

Why isnt home sharing working?