I have an apple tv 3rd gen and want to watch movies from itunes library without having to have a computer open or on. I was thinking about getting a LaCie Fuel to store my itunes library on. Does anyone know it this will work?

1. The Apple TV has no way of directly accessing a wireless drive.

2. It could potentially work by accessing the LaCie from the iPad or iPhone with the drive's own App (if it has one) or another 3rd party app and airplaying the content to the Apple TV.

However, DRM protected content like movies bought from the iTunes store, would not play outside of iTunes or the TV App on the iPad or iPhone and the TV App would not be able to directly access the drive.

If bought from iTunes it may be easier to just stream the movies directly to the Apple TV from the iTunes Store.

3. It seems like a lot of work just to keep a computer turned off.

If anything, the easier thing to do, might be to get a cheap media center pc that uses little power and can be turned on and used to access the movies from. You can use an external hard drive to store the movies.

https://9to5mac.com/2015/06/02/how-to-build-a-cheap-itunes-media-server/

The Best Media Center Mini PC for Under $100

CaptZman wrote:

Thanks for all the input. The LaCie does create its own wifi, which means I have to go into settings on the apple tv and set the wifi connection to the lacie in order for it read it. I have read other articles and videos showing this. I guess I am just wanting confirmation that it can work before I spend $99 on the lacie. My computer ***** and my internet is to slow to stream from itunes store. My ipad is only 64 gb and I don't want to store them there. I have more movies than it will hold. They say the lacie works perfectly with itunes and generates it own network. In a perfect world, I would like to just go without my desktop altogether. I don't need it. I can do everything I need on my ipad and phone.

It won't. While the Apple Tv may be able to connect to the LaCie's Wifi network, there's no way for it to read its contents directly.

The Apple TV simply cannot do that.

Your computer can store the iTunes library on the LaCie, which I wager that is what they mean when they say it will work with iTunes, but the Apple TV has no way of reading the content of the drive on its own.

The thread you point to, clearly states the usage of a third party App on an iPad not the Apple TV. You don't need to download the media to the iPad it can read it from the drive and airplay it to the Apple TV.

The 3rd gen Apple TV does not support any Apps. It has the channels it has and that is it.

Again, you can place the iTunes library on the LaCie and some third party apps may be able to access it but again as explained in the thread you linked to, DRM protected content will not play through the third party Apps.

It will not work plug an play and you will need to do a lot of tinkering and understand how the process works before you can get it to partially work. Music will work, without much issue as long as they are not Apple Music subscription tracks. Movies and shows bought from iTunes are DRM protected and will not work.

You can't use a network drive with your Apple TV 3 under any circumstances, even if dubious software implies you can.

The Apple TV 4 allows 3rd party apps, which do connects with network drives in various ways.

It won't matter if you convert the movies or not, home sharing which is the only option you have on the Apple TV will only work through the iTunes application on a running computer.

You haven't posted anything but I suspect your article refers to an Apple TV 4.

Yes, you can use a network drive with the Apple TV 4 but not with the Apple TV 3 which is what you asked about.

You wouldn't necessarily need the one you mentioned as any would do, indeed if it created it's own wifi network, that may well be an issue for the Apple TV as it can't connect to two networks at once and would need to connect to your main network for WAN (outside) connectivity.

CaptZman wrote:

So it wouldn't work for an ipad wifi only either right?

As said, it should work with an iPad. As it can have an App that can read files from a networked or wifi drive. The iPad in turn can Airplay the read content to the Apple TV. The 3rd gen Apple TV cannot read the contents of the drive directly in any way.

We cannot discuss ways of circumventing DRM protection here.

You can think its possible all you want. It won't change the fact that it isn't possible without some other intermediate device.

I don't believe you have any real option with the Apple TV 3, if you want to access anything other than iTunes on a computer I recommend going for the Apple TV 4.

CaptZman wrote:

Now we are getting some where. So you are saying I can download my itunes library to wifi drive and my ipad can read it unconverted (straight from itunes) and airplay it to my apple tv gen 3 correct?

The iPad can read the content from the drive via a 3rd party App yes and AirPlay it to the Apple TV as long as its not protected.

DRM Protected content will not work outside of iTunes or the TV App on the iPad, however the TV App on the iPad will not be able to read the content from the external drive at all. No option there to point it to the external drive.

So while the iPad will see the unconverted protected content through the third party App, it will not play.

So the third party App used to access the content will be limited to non protected content for playback.

CaptZman wrote:

Would this work using the hdmi cable from apple straight to the tv as well?

I don't understand the question. The connection from the Apple TV to the TV is one and unchanged. How else would it be connected to the TV if not through HDMI?

CaptZman wrote:

Why is that? Does it not have readers built into the ios to communicate with itunes?

The Apple Tv can communicate with iTunes. But iTunes won't be running on the external drive. You just have a collection of files that belong to an iTunes library. But no iTunes application running for the Apple TV to communicate with.

The iPad can access an iTunes Library that is being shared from a computer by contacting the iTunes application that is running on a computer. i.e the Computer needs to be on and iTunes running on it for the iPad to access the iTunes Library.

With 3rd party apps that can access the files in a network drive, it can see and play content as long as its not DRM protected.

The iPad can not just read the iTunes library files from a network drive and produce a list of media from that on its own.

As I have already stated, it won't work. The Apple TV needs iTunes.

if you get the 4g or 4k versions where you can get apps you have more options like plex and vlc player

if they will work with this LACie fuel or need a full-blown NAS is something you need to investergate

Converting protected content is not allowed, it may be possible with some types of content but not all. However, we are not allowed to discuss methods of circumvention in these communities and any attempt to do so will be removed.

Winston Churchill wrote:

You may have formats in your iTunes library that the iPad can't read regardless of them being protected or not, if you copy them to this drive you are interested in, iTunes will be able to play them but your iPad won't.

That's more up to the App that is accessing the drive. True it may or may not be able to play all formats found on the wireless drive. i.e wmv, or mkv, etc... Protected content will not play regardless of format.

CaptZman wrote:

hdmi to lightning that attaches ipad straight to TV, no apple tv at all.

No difference. It will work the same way AirPlayed to the Apple TV, or played through the Lightning to HDMI adapter directly to the TV.