Jon Rossen

Q: Apple TV 4 thinks Home Sharing is OFF when it is ON

I used to have 2 Apple TV 3rd gen. units and everything was working fine on my home network.  They connected to my LAN via wifi and everything was operating as expected including Home Sharing.

 

I replaced one of my 3rd gen. Apple TVs with a new Apple TV 4.  It has the same network settings etc. that the old unit it replaced had.  I'm seeing that every time I start it up and want to access my media library it thinks that Home Sharing is not on, but it is ON and iTunes is running.  I then have to go to my computer and turn Home Sharing off then turn it back on.  Sometimes that doesn't work and what does is quitting out of iTunes then restarting.  So, to be honest, I guess I'm not sure if toggling Home Sharing from ON/OFF/ON is what fixes or quitting iTunes then restarting it while Home Sharing is on fixes it.  The bottom line is that this is incorrect behavior and am wondering how to fix it.  I should add that once I take care of this glitch, Home Sharing works fine.

 

I guess I should state that I'm running iTunes on Windows 7.  But most importantly, it doesn't appear that the issue is my router or my OS or computer or general network settings.  My other Apple TV (one of my original Apple TV 3 gen.) is on this same network and functions correctly with regards to Home Sharing.  In other words, at the same time, while my Apple TV 3 can see my media library on my Windows 7 PC, my Apple TV 4 is telling me that Home Sharing is off.  This obviously points to Apple TV 4 as being the culprit since 2 Apple TV 3s have worked fine on this network with this same PC, and one Apple TV 3 continues to do so.

 

The only thing I can think of doing as a last resort is to do a RESET.  Just wondering if anyone has run into this and whether they fixed it.  Thanks very much for any pointers!

Apple TV

Posted on Jun 14, 2016 6:40 PM

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Q: Apple TV 4 thinks Home Sharing is OFF when it is ON

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  • by Diana.McCall,

    Diana.McCall Diana.McCall Jun 16, 2016 3:37 PM in response to Jon Rossen
    Level 4 (3,584 points)
    Apple TV
    Jun 16, 2016 3:37 PM in response to Jon Rossen

    I believe I've seen a number of threads like this one, related to loss of Home Sharing, AirPlay, even network, connection after ATV 4 sleeps. I find it hard to imagine these are hardware issues, since the hardware is so compact. CNET has a teardown of the box, and there's very little in it; remember it includes a power supply. They seem to me like software issues, possibly timing related, and hence untestable. ATV has more responsibilities than iOS devices when it sleeps. These tasks have to be overlaid on what is basically an iOS framework, which sounds tricky to me.

  • by clintonium,

    clintonium clintonium Jun 27, 2016 11:20 AM in response to Jon Rossen
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Apple TV
    Jun 27, 2016 11:20 AM in response to Jon Rossen

    I will say it is global in that it also affects me. My setup is a bit different, I had Apple TV 2s and 3s and replaced them all with 4s. The Apple TV 2s and 3s were all wired in (ethernet) and so are my Apple TV 4s now but the Apple TV 4s have this home sharing issue. I can get it working after I try a myriad of things (restarting iTunes, unplugging ethernet cables, resetting the Apple TV 4s but when I put them to sleep for the night I wake to find that they lose home sharing again. Stinks, they really are beautiful devices but there definitely has to be something wrong with the Apple TV 4 and home sharing.

  • by Jon Rossen,

    Jon Rossen Jon Rossen Jun 27, 2016 11:32 AM in response to clintonium
    Level 1 (6 points)
    Apple TV
    Jun 27, 2016 11:32 AM in response to clintonium

    Thanks for the info; sounds like your symptoms are exactly what I'm seeing as well.  Interesting in that your setup is using Ethernet, so that's one more use case that has been tested.  I wouldn't expect that to make a difference anyway, but it's good to know.  I've been restarting iTunes each time the ATV4 has awoken from sleep mode.  Sort of a pain but easily done.  Hopefully this can / will be fixed in next tvOS update.

  • by DJ.Rumpy,

    DJ.Rumpy DJ.Rumpy Jun 30, 2016 9:48 AM in response to Jon Rossen
    Level 1 (14 points)
    Apple TV
    Jun 30, 2016 9:48 AM in response to Jon Rossen

    I've given up at this point. They've let this linger for weeks without any sort of fix forthcoming. My setup is much like the original poster, with a mix of gen 2's, 3's, and a 4, both wired and wireless, and all experience the same issue. My family, who I convinced to buy them too is also experiencing the same issue. A media server is not a hard thing to do. There are numerous freeware solutions out there that do this easily without too much fuss.  I finally had to resort to buying an amazon fire tv stick since it's cheap, and just run Plex on my mac to get the same functionality. Everything with the new ATV's is geared towards buying content, while ignoring those of us with large digital libraries. I can't believe I own something with Android on it. It's ugly, and slow, but at least it works every time I turn it on.

     

    Very disappointed in Apple on this one.

  • by Jon Rossen,

    Jon Rossen Jon Rossen Jul 2, 2016 4:08 PM in response to DJ.Rumpy
    Level 1 (6 points)
    Apple TV
    Jul 2, 2016 4:08 PM in response to DJ.Rumpy

    Thanks for the reply and the info.  One thing to point out though:  You seem to be having this issue with all of your ATVs (2,3,and 4), but for me it only happens with the ATV 4.  I presently have an ATV 3 on the same network as the ATV 4 and the ATV 3 has no problems with Home Sharing.  Before I had the ATV 4, I had my current ATV 3 on the network along with my older ATV 2 which I no longer use.  At that earlier time this Home Sharing issue did not exist.  So, to sum up, from my vantage point, this issue is an ATV 4 issue only and is not global to all ATV models.

  • by Jon Rossen,

    Jon Rossen Jon Rossen Jul 24, 2016 4:10 PM in response to Jon Rossen
    Level 1 (6 points)
    Apple TV
    Jul 24, 2016 4:10 PM in response to Jon Rossen

    Fortunately, for some unknown reason, I'm now seeing that this problem doesn't exist anymore.  I have no idea why.  Nothing has changed in my network configuration or setup.  I should also add that although I did recently apply the latest tvOS update, I was seeing that the issue with Home Sharing had gone away even before that update was applied.  So, to sum up:  I'm now not seeing any problems with Home Sharing.  When I have iTunes on with Home Sharing enabled and, and then my Apple TV 4 awakes from sleep mode, Apple TV can see my library at that point.  There is no need anymore to quit iTunes then restart it.

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