hello - just bout a new iMac (27" Retina) - need recomemdation for an external (3 GB) drive hooked up to my new iMac to serve our whole house system for iTunes (movies & TV). Maybe a raid that duplicates the primary? The location will be in kitchen- so noise is a consideration - thanks in advance for the help
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New iMac - need external iTunes drive recommendation
- Thread starter belarocks
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i think you need a nas. any basic nas would do look for a drive with at least 3 tb and make sure it supports drives that are bigger then 3tb. make sure it has 2 drives. a lot of units like WD and Seagate only ship with one drive. some nas units are set up at the factory to be 2 separate drives so you will have to reformat it as a raid . like a readynas 102. anything on one drive will be cloned to the other.
they are very quiet.
a couple points about nas is
get a nas with up to date firmware and support. they changed time machine a couple versions of os x a while ago , and you need an up to date nas so it works with the new time machine
even a really old ready nas duo like the one i own works with new time machin, because netgear is a very good company that regularly updates their firmware. but the processor is slow and it cant run plex and it has a 2 tb limit
itunes server. some nas can be their own iTunes server. but this might be limit playback to iTunes running on the computer, and not iOS devices or the apple tv. so you will probably have to run iTunes on a mac to serve whats on the nas
a lot of people likes plex. a lot of units can run plex on the nas itself ( primarily devices that use intel processors ) , but that won't work with anything you bought from iTunes that has drm
some older nas units can only support 2 tb or less
they are very quiet.
a couple points about nas is
get a nas with up to date firmware and support. they changed time machine a couple versions of os x a while ago , and you need an up to date nas so it works with the new time machine
even a really old ready nas duo like the one i own works with new time machin, because netgear is a very good company that regularly updates their firmware. but the processor is slow and it cant run plex and it has a 2 tb limit
itunes server. some nas can be their own iTunes server. but this might be limit playback to iTunes running on the computer, and not iOS devices or the apple tv. so you will probably have to run iTunes on a mac to serve whats on the nas
a lot of people likes plex. a lot of units can run plex on the nas itself ( primarily devices that use intel processors ) , but that won't work with anything you bought from iTunes that has drm
some older nas units can only support 2 tb or less
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a lot of people forget that iTunes has 2 different iTunes server functions
theres the iOS way, which only works to a iOS device, and each computer has to be signed onto your iTunes account. i think the just changed this so now you can't serve music to an iPhone !!!??? heh
there's the old way ( preferences - share my music on my network ). this is what i think the nas units I've used use.
this does not work for sharing to an iOS device. i don't think it works with apple tv. but the best feature about the old way is as long as the music has no DRM you don't even your clients (other computers) signed onto your iTunes account at all you can have a bunch of computers, and it won't cost you an iTunes slot
a lot of people think that the old way is obsolete and only for older devices. but it has its advantages
theres the iOS way, which only works to a iOS device, and each computer has to be signed onto your iTunes account. i think the just changed this so now you can't serve music to an iPhone !!!??? heh
there's the old way ( preferences - share my music on my network ). this is what i think the nas units I've used use.
this does not work for sharing to an iOS device. i don't think it works with apple tv. but the best feature about the old way is as long as the music has no DRM you don't even your clients (other computers) signed onto your iTunes account at all you can have a bunch of computers, and it won't cost you an iTunes slot
a lot of people think that the old way is obsolete and only for older devices. but it has its advantages
I use a regular 2.5" USB 2TB disk that have my whole iTunes library on it. Works fine to stream to Apple TV, iPhone, girlfriends Mac etc.
Thats the easy route and i've never had issues with it.
I of course have a backup of that drive.
If you want more redundancy (without having to manually back everything up like i do) then get a Synology NAS and run two 3-4TB disks in Raid 1. Store everything on there.
Thats the easy route and i've never had issues with it.
I of course have a backup of that drive.
If you want more redundancy (without having to manually back everything up like i do) then get a Synology NAS and run two 3-4TB disks in Raid 1. Store everything on there.
I have a Mac Mini for an iTunes server. It just runs iTunes 24/7 with home sharing so I can access it on my 2 AppleTVs and MBA. I have three 3TB Seagate Desktop Backup Plus drives, but I think this model is discontinued. They are pretty fast, the Blackmagic test clocks them around 170MB/sec. These drives are kind of nice because they each include a small dock and the drive snaps in and out.
I use one as the primary drive with my iTunes library and the other two are backups that I rotate periodically, storing one of them in a separate location. I use Carbon Copy Cloner with a script that runs every night. Since they are clones, in the event that my primary drive fails I can just snap one of the backups into the dock and be up and running right away.
I use one as the primary drive with my iTunes library and the other two are backups that I rotate periodically, storing one of them in a separate location. I use Carbon Copy Cloner with a script that runs every night. Since they are clones, in the event that my primary drive fails I can just snap one of the backups into the dock and be up and running right away.