Mac Mini and Snow Leopard server....HT heaven?

[dufferdan]

So, if I have a Mac mini with Snow Leopard Server software, can I run my Apple TV off the server and access all my music and media and such without my main mac tower running? ie will the server run iTunes in the background?

The PS3 and DLink 323 NAS is not doing it for me, and the option to rent/buy 720P movies is a nice plus to the Apple TV. I just bought one tonight and will set it up for a test run tomorrow.

But this server thing I saw at the Apple store has me very interested.

Thoughts welcomed.

[hkaye]

I have an AppleTV and I like it. I can rent 720p movies from Apple, play videos from youtube, watch trailers, etc.

I've also hacked my AppleTV and put XBMC on it and connected an external 1TB USB drive to store all my media. I use XBMC to play all my other media.

I also have Boxee on the AppleTV, but it's not that useful as most of the internet content is for the US only. Would be nice if Boxee some day connects to canadian tv network streams. I can watch alot of stuff right off the Global, CTV, etc. networks on my laptop, would be great to do it off the AppleTV.

The hack is free and the USB drive was $120.

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Anyways, back to your question. OS X server is OS X, so you can run any Mac program you want on OS X server, including iTunes.

[dufferdan]

I just hooked it up to try it out at home first and I think I may keep it here and get a separate one for the cabin. Very slick, picture quality looks decent on my 768P 58" Panny plasma. Just need to get the 5.1 audio to work.

The iTunes library , ripped at 256 kbps AAC sounds less than great via my Pioneer Elite 54TXi receiver, but it won't be a music player to any great degree.

Honestly, if I could stream Canadian network TV over it, that would be the cat's azz as far as I am concerned and I wouldn't even worry about getting satellite out in the boonies. Saturday nite hockey is all I want.

[hkaye]

"Honestly, if I could stream Canadian network TV over it, that would be the cat's azz as far as I am concerned and I wouldn't even worry about getting satellite out in the boonies. Saturday nite hockey is all I want."

Yeah, too bad Boxee has mostly US content. There's a lot of Canadian content on the internet. For example, Hockey night in Canada -

http://www.cbc.ca/video/#/Sports/Liv...ight_in_Canada

I haven't tried HNIC live streams to see the quality (mostly because I get CBC in HD over the air with my antenna). But it's nice to see the broadcasters utilizing the internet more and more to deliver their content.

Now just need a way to view this on Apple TV - aka a Canadian version of Boxee.

[Nuje]

I don't know about the Mac Mini, but the Apple laptops (going back at least to my early 2007 Macbook), have 5.1 available via optical-out from the headphone jack.
While it functions as a normal headphone jack, if you put a mini-Toslink adapter in there (at the end of your normal Toslink cable), plug into a receiver - bing, bang, boom: DD 5.1!

[dufferdan]

Does the server run iTunes on it's own, or does it require a keyboard and monitor to act like a computer?

[hkaye]

I don't have a OS X server, don't really have a need for it. I've run several linux servers that are in data centers. Servers generally run without keyboards/mice/monitors and you access them remotely. In my case, my servers are in a data center in Houston and I've never even seen them.

How you access a server remotely (without a keyboard/monitor) would be personal preference. I use a terminal and SSH into the server to do all the work. Some people like VNC, remote apple desktop, timbuktu or just use the built-in leopard screen sharing.

Leopard screen sharing is easy. Go to System Preferences and under the Sharing tab, turn on Screen Sharing. You'll see an URL that you can access that mac with, something like:

vnc://192.168.1.100

On another Mac, using Safari you can type in that URL and access the Mac remotely. Or you can use the Finder and select Go->Connect to Server and access the mac as well.

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Besides running iTunes on the mac mini server. What other features of OS X server are you going to use? If you just want to serve up iTunes without having your Mac Tower on, wouldn't a normal Mac Mini suffice?

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You could just set up a normal mac mini. Go to Preferences, select Accounts . Click on Login Options and make sure your account is set to Automatic login.

Then Click on your Account, select Login Items and then add iTunes to the list of items that open automatically when logged in.

Now the Mac mini is set to boot up with iTunes running.

[digme]

@hkaye , have you looked for boxee plugins ?

[hkaye]

I've given up on boxee. It was fun to play with on the AppleTV box but I really didn't like the interface. As well, I suspect most of the tv websites will migrate to silverlight. I don't think AppleTV is powerful enough to run silverlight, and I won't be installing silverlight on my Macs until Microsoft has a proven track record with the product when it comes to security.

Right now I use Sapphire to play media on AppleTV. The UI fits in with the AppleTV UI and is very light weight and plays my media quite well. I keep XBMC around just in case Sapphire can't play a media file.

[dufferdan]

Originally Posted by hkaye

I've given up on boxee. It was fun to play with on the AppleTV box but I really didn't like the interface. As well, I suspect most of the tv websites will migrate to silverlight. I don't think AppleTV is powerful enough to run silverlight, and I won't be installing silverlight on my Macs until Microsoft has a proven track record with the product when it comes to security.

Right now I use Sapphire to play media on AppleTV. The UI fits in with the AppleTV UI and is very light weight and plays my media quite well. I keep XBMC around just in case Sapphire can't play a media file.

No to jack my own thread, but I have to say, I was damn impressed with the CTV Olympic coverage streamed from the CTV website, which I believe runs via Silverlight. On my 42" 1080P plasma it looked damn fine, maybe a tad soft, but more than watchable.

So, I gather from what you say that an Apple TV is a little light when it comes to being able to handle Silverlight streams. Any knowledge of development of this technology and streamlining the feeds so it can be fed with less horsepower? I would way prefer to be able to use the ATv to stream CTV, TSN and other channels instead of hooking up a laptop, which is cumbersome to do every time I go to the cabin.