This used to be the case, but no longer really is. SMB has been optimized a lot in the past few years.
I get wire speed (gigabit) moving files across my network with SMB.
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VLC for Apple TV Now Available on tvOS App Store
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This used to be the case, but no longer really is. SMB has been optimized a lot in the past few years.
I get wire speed (gigabit) moving files across my network with SMB.
I believe that it's within your rights to have a single copy of the original item.
It'd done pretty well in beta. Nice to see it finally hit the App Store for everyone else to try.
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Not if you have Plex. Unless you come across something that it refuses to play and you don't want to convert it to another format, there's little reason to install it.
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Not if you have Plex. Unless you come across something that it refuses to play and you don't want to convert it to another format, there's little reason to install it.
I'm in the same boat. I've been re-purchasing what I can via iTunes, primarily for the HD upgrade over DVD standards. So much easier, especially with little ones, not having to search for the Little Mermaid, or Cinderella DVD. Plus having it available on demand on all your iDevices is a no-brainer.
I'll give it a try. Have had the HDMI plugged into the Apple TV more than the mac mini lately. Argh I just want the ability to search my entire home movie collection with Siri (I know this may be asking a lot but it would be so cool) and I want to be able to output DTS, DTS-HD and Dolby TrueHD audio through the apple tv. Heck, if I could just get the latter I would move completely away from my mac mini running kodi and strictly use the Apple TV.
I'm sure that happens a lot or even most of the time, but I use Plex to watch ripped content on output devices incapable of disc playback. It's also a good method for viewing recorded OTA content and self-created content such as home videos, GoPro, etc.
I don't have a single torrented movie file in my just-sub-terrabyte movie library. All those movies are ripped from DVDs and BluRays (which isn't exactly 100% abiding by EULAs, but IMHO ethically sound). They are then completely tagged and catalogued using Ivy and/or Subler (I've gone back and forth between the two), although of course Plex does a good amount of tag-discovery automatically if they weren't already tagged.
Frankly, streaming from the computer a room away in my house should be a lot higher quality and less laggy than streaming from Apple's servers in the cloud (with Plex in general it is). Combined with wide availability of cheap physical media which can easily be ripped to local storage, and the cheapness of local storage, it is a good way to go. That said, the ripping tools often enough get forced-subtitles wrong (nothing like watching a movie and people start talking in a foreign language and you aren't sure if there are supposed to be subtitles showing what they said...), the ripping/converting process takes a few times as long as the movie to complete, and Plex's interface while fancy and nice is not in the same realm of usability as the native Apple interface.
Do people use Plex to manage their torrented files? I'm sure they do. But don't pretend that the only interest in Plex (and I guess VLC, alhough I find VLC's interface abhorrent personally) is for illegally-obtained content.
Does the AppleTV version have the same support all audio codecs or does it have the same restrictions that VLC for Mobile implemented with v2.5.0 on March 27, 2015 (No support for AC-3, E-AC-3, and MLP multi channel)? I am still using v.2.3.0 because most of the shows and movies I have are .MKV with AC-3.
AirPlay isn't the most efficient way to do these things.
Video player, on your computer, decodes and plays back video file -> AirPlay encodes your entire screen and sends it over WiFi -> Apple TV decodes AirPlay stream.
Whereas with VLC or Plex,
Computer streams video file over WiFi -> Video player, on Apple TV, decodes and plays the video file.
So instead of decode/encode/decode, you just have decode.
My only problem with iTunes is that it is not written as a server. iTunes is first and foremost a GUI app for playing "stuff". For it to run, the user needs to be logged on and active and the app needs to be up.
With Plex we still don't really have a good "background service" (daemon for OS X) solution, and the user running it needs to be logged in and the app running. But, there are two main differences:
- The app runs with no visible UI other than a menu bar addition (where you can quit it if you need to). A string of Cmd-Q presses won't close it, because it never ends up at the front. This makes it much less likely to be shut down.
- The app runs even when you fast-user-switch to another account. So, we can have our "family" Mac mini start up with a super-restricted "Plex" user with this service running and a big message on screen saying to fast-user-switch over to the user's local account instead of logging out of the Plex account. Doing the same with iTunes doesn't "close" iTunes, but does make it unavailable (at least, most of the time; it seems like there are some circumstances when the iTunes app will respond to network requests, but I haven't figured out the specifics of it).
I do this too, except I chose to get iFlicks instead of VideoDrive which also seems like a great option.
However, unless Apple updates the HomeSharing UI soon, or someone comes up with a better app to access HomeSharing content, I might have to switch over to using Plex. The Apple way is usually the simplest and prettiest way, but this case we are in I believe is the glaring exception.
Sort of. It really depends on the app and content. AirPlay will work in two modes. One is that the video is decoded on the device and every pixel sent across the wire to the screen, as you describe. This is really intended more for things like games and other on-device-generated content, not streaming services. In fact, if a streaming service does this officially it is "doing it wrong". But, it also does allow one to stream from services which don't really support AirPlay (at least from a Mac; from iOS if the app doesn't support AirPlay you are just out of luck).
However, AirPlay also has a mode (commonly used by services like Amazon, Netflix, etc, which support AirPlay from iOS devices) where what is sent across are credentials and a URL, then the Apple TV simply streams from that URL with those credentials while listening for playback controls coming from the iOS device.
People think that Chromecast came out with this second mode. They are incorrect. AirPlay has included and pushed it for streaming video since it was introduced (what Chromecast does differently is allow any device to connect and send playback controls, so if the device sending playback controls leaves the building playback just keeps going).
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Yes, it is a DMCA violation to rip Bluray disks (circumventing copy protections). That's not nearly the same level of violation as torrenting the files (which involves both downloading content you don't have any license to view as well as publishing that content to others who don't necessarily have a license to view it).
A fairly good analog is comparing speeding (a common crime, although unlike speeding ripping a Bluray has no potential for actual damages) to breaking into a racetrack to drive around. There are different degrees of crime in life, and for the most part living within ethical boundaries (ensuring that the person who owns the content is fairly compensated for you viewing it is a big one) is more important than living within the letter of a particularly poorly-concieved law. IMHO, of course.
In any case, yeah, unless you're using Plex and VLC only to watch your own home movies or video content which has been licensed to the public domain, there is some violation of something going on there. Just don't lump that in with torrenting unpaid-for content.
none of the files i tried so far seem to have any sound. so i guess it has the same restrictions.
I used plex for a while, and for small rips of your media it was fine, I tried to play some some 10gb + mkv rips and it would stop all the time and buffer, really poor experience with BR rips.
I actually tried infuse as it's the only one to support DTS, as far as I know it, plex has no support.
He infuse player is so much better than the plex player, have not found a file that it has struggled with, plex is hopeless with large files....I run a synology 1511 with a plex server.
The one thing VLC can do that other apps (including Apple's) don't is playback at a higher speed. In my experience a lot of content (especially documentaries) is ridiculously slowly paced and narrated. With VLC I can crank playback speed up to 1.4x or so and get something running at a decent speed.
This is for VLC on OSX, connected to my TV. I've no idea about the iOS/aTV version, but I'd hope it retains that feature.
Well, why did you have to go and jinx the thread. All I see now are positive posts.
Jinx-gate.
just because without a "gate" we are not talking about the real Apple.