My situation - help me out please?

[fstfrwrd]

alright, my situation:

I got an iTunes library full of ripped DVD's (stored on external) using handbrake (with the AppleTV preset) resulting in 2 or 3GB high quality rips.
I store these movies on an external 1TB Iomega Ultramax disk, connected to my mac with Firewire.

now i want to buy an apple tv to watch these movies on my TV, streamed from my macbook's itunes library.

now my question is very simple.
is this possible?

 

[ntrigue]

Yes. If it appears in iTunes, it appears in Apple TV.

 

[fstfrwrd]

a) I don't need any other peripherals like airport extreme or anything, right?

b) does it matter if i take the 40gb or 160gb version because i won't be storing anything on the appletv, just streaming from my macbook?


EDIT: another question

c) all my movies are in the .mp4 / .mov / .avi formats. if they work 100% in iTunes, do they work 100% on the AppleTV as well? i don't want to spend that kind of money if i won't be able to watch everything perfectly.

 

[Alrescha]

As long as the Apple TV and your Mac can talk to each other over the Ethernet you don't need to buy anything else. This presumes you have a router, switch, access point, or you wire the two devices together.

If you stream, it doesn't matter how big the Apple TV hard drive is.

Your last question is different than your first post. If you have movies created with Handbrake using the Apple TV preset, they should play. On the other hand, your Mac with iTunes (and therefore Quicktime) can play media that the Apple TV cannot. This page describes what the Apple TV can play:

http://www.apple.com/appletv/specs.html

A.

 

[Alan Taylor]

a) I don't need any other peripherals like airport extreme or anything, right?

b) does it matter if i take the 40gb or 160gb version because i won't be storing anything on the appletv, just streaming from my macbook?


EDIT: another question

c) all my movies are in the .mp4 / .mov / .avi formats. if they work 100% in iTunes, do they work 100% on the AppleTV as well? i don't want to spend that kind of money if i won't be able to watch everything perfectly.

a) no

b) no

c) no. They have to be .mp4

 

[fstfrwrd]

so when I use VisualHub to convert .mkv files to 'AppleTV' files (which is I preset as well) it exports them as .mov files ... will they play on AppleTV then or not?

because it would be pretty ridiculous if it wouldn't play a file, created with the AppleTV preset ..

 

[dynaflash]

The atv can play .mov files

 

[wPod]

a)you can use any router to network the 2 for sharing

b)the 40 gb is fine if you are just streaming. i have a 400+gb movie colection and it works fine streaming to my 40gb

c)the handbreak TV preset is great. I use it exclusively to rip movies and have no troubles with it.
if you have other formats from other sources,
aTV Flash is a great little app that lets you play most formats on your TV (although i dont think it has been updated for the TV 2.1 software, but it comes with free upgrades for a year)

 

[wilk0076]

Keep in mind that, if you plan on streaming, the Macbook will have to be turned on the whole time you are watching media.