“Repurposing an old Mac into a home media server is a great idea. A nerdy, tedious, somewhat overrated, great idea,” Shawn Blanc blogs.
“For years I was wanting to convert all my DVDs (where by ‘all’ I mean a whopping 35) into digital versions which could be accessible via my Apple TV,” Blanc writes. “I’m glad I never bit the bullet and bought a Mac mini, because about a month ago the video card on my wife’s MacBook Pro started going out. The screen shows random red lines and flickers — it’s just bad enough that she can’t use it on a daily basis, but still good enough that I could repurpose it into our new file and media server.”
Read more in the full article here.
[Attribution: The Loop. Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Brawndo Drinker” for the heads up.]
My file server is dropbox. My media server is itunes.
How big is your drop box? My itunes library is 1.5TB in size.
FWIW I have a MacMini connected to my TC plus a monitor in a nearby room. It acts as a media server, backup station etc and can serve music and video to all macs and os devices in the house. The TVs also have Apple TVs which are perfect for getting content.
How much of that 1.5TB of media in your iTunes library did you pay for?
What difference does it make, what it cost him?
Illegal downloads steal money from those who produce it. You can’t have a society based on freeloaders.
That’s pretty Stupid accusing a person stealing content because his iTunes library 1.5 TB. My personal iTunes library stands at 6.5 TB right now and I have paid for every single piece of media that’s in it. My brothers is that 15 TB right now and he has paid for every single piece of media that Is in it. You should stop judging people by your standards and listen what people say
Sorry, I guess you are right and I should realize that no one downloads illegally. There is no piracy problem on the internet.
Most of that 1.5 TB could be movies ripped from his own DVD collection, I know my 2 TB library is mostly ripped movies.
A lot of it could be stuff borrowed and ripped, stuff obtained for free and ripped…
My iTunes library is only 144Gb, but a fair bit is ripped from albums loaned to me, and just as much is free stuff ripped from sampler cd’s given away with quality music magazines as part of their album reviews.
All perfectly legal. If I had more disposable income, I can promise you there’d be a hell of a lot more in there.
Wrong.
If you ripped a CD or DVD that someone *loaned* you (or you rented from Redbox, etc), then you did so illegally. It’s only legal to rip it if YOU own it.
Similarly, if you rip your CDs and DVDs then subsequently sell the physical product, legally you are no longer entitled to those ripped copies because your “license” to have them left with the original physical disc.
None of my library or pieces of media In my library Are loaned media. I own all of my 6.5 TB. I don’t Rent movies and rip them to my library at all
I know there are people out there that do that but they’re only fooling themselves and will eventually be caught
What if I lost my cds… do I have to trash my music files?
I hung a 3TB external drive off my iMac and moved all of iTunes there. I then use an Apple TV on my TVs.
I did the same thing and can’t figure out what is supposed to be so complicated about making itunes a server for apple tv. Also, I disagree with the lower quality comments in the full article. It may be driven by the HandBrake settings, my video quality is just fine.
Actually if you bypass copy protection then it is illegal to rip your own dvd’s. That’s why apple allows you to rip cd’s, they don’t have any copy protection.
I don’t believe it “should” be illegal though and my own iTunes library is around 6tb.