All right, not new to Macs, but relatively new to 10.4, and completely new to the joys of wireless networking ...
Here's the set-up: Intel Mac Mini operating as a media centre downstairs. Intel C2D 20" iMac upstairs with 500Gb LaCie external drive.
The purpose of the external drive is to act as a store for all our music and various films/TV programmes. The reason it's not plugged in to the Mac Mini is because it's far too noisy. I was going to return it for that reason, but then hit on the idea of networking it instead and saving myself about £20 in return postage.
So ... iTunes on the Mini is set to use the LaCie drive for its library, and the drive is checked in Log-in Items on the Mini's default account.
The Mini has administrator access to the iMac, and the iMac auto-boots at least 30 minutes before the Mini starts up (the external drive is always on).
Which, as far as I can tell, means that the Mini should automatically log on to the LaCie drive at startup. Except that it never does. Even more bizarrely, when I then go upstairs to iMac and open a Finder window and click on 'Network' in the sidebar, I get three folders (Users, Applications, Libraries - I think) rather than the 'Servers' icon, and icons for the available servers.
A reboot usually solves this, and the iMac will normally then see the Mini. The Mini, however, will still not see the iMac. I have an alias of the LaCie drive on the Mini's desktop in hope of using that to force the Mini to see the network drive, but this doesn't work either.
At present, it seems to require a random number of reboots of both machines in no particular order to achieve what appears to me to be a fairly basic networking task: both machines on; the external drive mounted on the desktop of the Mini over Airport.
Am I missing something blindingly obvious, here?
Thanks!
Jim
Here's the set-up: Intel Mac Mini operating as a media centre downstairs. Intel C2D 20" iMac upstairs with 500Gb LaCie external drive.
The purpose of the external drive is to act as a store for all our music and various films/TV programmes. The reason it's not plugged in to the Mac Mini is because it's far too noisy. I was going to return it for that reason, but then hit on the idea of networking it instead and saving myself about £20 in return postage.
So ... iTunes on the Mini is set to use the LaCie drive for its library, and the drive is checked in Log-in Items on the Mini's default account.
The Mini has administrator access to the iMac, and the iMac auto-boots at least 30 minutes before the Mini starts up (the external drive is always on).
Which, as far as I can tell, means that the Mini should automatically log on to the LaCie drive at startup. Except that it never does. Even more bizarrely, when I then go upstairs to iMac and open a Finder window and click on 'Network' in the sidebar, I get three folders (Users, Applications, Libraries - I think) rather than the 'Servers' icon, and icons for the available servers.
A reboot usually solves this, and the iMac will normally then see the Mini. The Mini, however, will still not see the iMac. I have an alias of the LaCie drive on the Mini's desktop in hope of using that to force the Mini to see the network drive, but this doesn't work either.
At present, it seems to require a random number of reboots of both machines in no particular order to achieve what appears to me to be a fairly basic networking task: both machines on; the external drive mounted on the desktop of the Mini over Airport.
Am I missing something blindingly obvious, here?
Thanks!
Jim