Apple TV home sharing through external hard drive.
Is it possible to take my movies that are on an external hard drive and hook it to a router so that my computer does not have to be on to home share?
AppleTV 2
If you intend to use home sharing, that is done through iTunes. The content can reside on your external, but it would need to be pointed to iTunes. The computer would need to be on for it to be available for Apple TV.
The scenario you are looking at would involve looking for a 3rd party app and using an IOS device to transmit the content to Apple TV, and it may not be reliable.