[edmiston]

After reading the PS Audio rave about the ATV + Ipod touch system, I decided to leap in.  I have an Olive server, but am frustrated by it's noise level and the fact that although it has a remote, from across the room you can't possible navigate the screen, so you still have to get your lazy butt off the chair, which defeats the purpose.  The ATV arrived yesterday, the iPod touch should arrive tomorrow.
Now first off, let me freely admit to being a computer moron.  I have a last generation iMac in the kitchen with a 160g hard drive and a Mac Book which I think has an 80g hd.  I bought the ATV with 160 gig and plan to use apple lossless.  My plan was to fill the hard drive of the ATV a little at a time from the laptop.  I specifically asked the Apple sales person if synching the ATV to the computer would erase files on the ATV that were not on the computer's hard drive, and she assured me it would not.
So, my iMac "sees" the ATV, and I spend time putting my first collection of music on the iMac hard drive, which transfers it to the ATV, no prob.  However, the combo drive on my iMac is very noisy (it was replaced once for this, now the second one is noisy but is of course out of warranty).  The drive also refuses to read several of my discs.  So off to the laptop I go, which reads the discs no problem.  However, the laptop does not "see" the ATV.  I call Apple, and am informed that the ATV can only link to one computer, so I would have to uninstall it on the iMac to install it on the laptop, and doing so erases all the content on the ATV hard drive!  I am also told that, contrary to my first Apple query, that when you synch the ATV to your iTunes library, the ATV will erase all content that is not in the iTunes library to which you are synching, no way around it.  So, in essence, I have to have a duplicate collection in another iTunes location if I ever want to add any more music to the ATV or blammo!, all old stuff gone.  Now if I had a big hard drive on my other computers, I wouldn't care, but since my biggest hard drive is no bigger than the one on ATV, I wouldn't have room for anything else, so I suppose the only solution is to get an external hard drive just for iTunes content.  Now I know this is old hat to you computer guys, but for me it is one more avenue of peril and a complication I had not anticipated.  If I am missing some obvious solution, please point it out.  The Apple guy I spoke to today didn't know jack about ATV and had to scramble for every answer, so he didn't exactly fill me with confidence.

Thanks,

Mark

[Crimson]

Hello,

The ATV syncs to a computer exactly like an iPod i.e. it syncs with a specific computer's iTunes library/playlist. If you resync with a particluar library/playlist which has had songs removed/replaced, the syncing process will duplicate this on the ATV. Similarly, if you were to sync an ATV with one computer, then sync it with a second, all content on the ATV from the first computer is replaced with that from the second computer. It's unfortunate that the Apple sales rep told you differently. The Apple tech rep was correct in saying that you can only sync to one computer at a time.

You can, however, have an ATV receive a stream from multiple computers/libraries. From the ATV's main menu, go to Settings >Computers> Add Shared iTunes Library. From here you can link (not sync) to an iTunes library. You can continue adding different libraries in this manner. Then, from the main menu, when you go to Music you'll have the added option Shared Music from the additional libraries that you linked to. The caveat in this setup is that the computers that house the libraries that you've linked to must be on and running iTunes.

[edmiston]

But as I recall with my ipod, you could set synch to auto or manual, and with manual, you could drag songs from your itunes library and add them to your ipod, without affecting the other content of your ipod.  In other words, you could selectively add to your ipod without truly synchronizing all content.  I thought you could do this with ATV, that is just pick music you wished to add to your ATV.  Apparently not so.  Rats.  Oh well, I just added some internet radio stations to the playlist and it is very cool.

Mark

[Crimson]

But as I recall with my ipod, you could set synch to auto or manual, and with manual, you could drag songs from your itunes library and add them to your ipod, without affecting the other content of your ipod.  In other words, you could selectively add to your ipod without truly synchronizing all content.  I thought you could do this with ATV, that is just pick music you wished to add to your ATV.  Apparently not so.  Rats.  Oh well, I just added some internet radio stations to the playlist and it is very cool.

Mark

You are absolutely correct, and the same applies to the ATV, as long as you are syncing to the same library. You cannot add songs to either an iPod or an ATV from a different library without wiping what is already on them.

[edmiston]

My point is that in iTunes, under preferences>devices, you can disable the automatic sync for ipods and iphones, which allows you to manually add new content to your ipod, without wiping out content on your ipod that does not happen to be on the computer from which you are transferring the new tunes.  You cannot do this with your ATV.

[RichardS]

Hi Mark
Not to in any way dampen your enthusiasm for the Apple TV (I hope you get it worked out) but there are ways to make the Olive work better for you, if you decide to pursue this route. I got a Nokia 770 a while back and it works great as a remote so I never have to get up off my fat ass. It accesses the info on the Olive drive on-screen, so you can scroll through the artists, genres, etc. Also, consider applying some damping material to the top cover, or place something heavy on top. I've got an Apple desktop sitting in my audio room but prefer the Olive. I've got three Musicas now, one modded by RWA, and am very happy with them. Good luck with the Apple, though.

[jhm731]

The Apple TV has no power down function, when not in use, should it be unplugged?

If it unplugged will you lose data/setting?
 

[DARTH AUDIO]

I'm currently using the ATV as my music server and have had zero problems. In fact I returned the Wadia i170 transport in lieu of the ATV. I always leave mine on, but you can put it in "Timeout" by holding the play/pause button for 6 seconds. Hope this helps

[DARTH AUDIO]

BTW, you can unplug it without losing data and settings.

[Crimson]

The Apple TV has no power down function, when not in use, should it be unplugged?

If it unplugged will you lose data/setting?
 

I've had mine since it was introduced and, except for a few electrical storms and vacations, have had it powered up 24/7 with no issues. It does run hot, so make sure it has adequate ventilation.

[jhm731]

Thanks for the info.

I set mine up using the HDMI connection on my LCD, loaded 20g of music off my PC, and set up my iTouch remote.

I unplugged and moved it into my listening room, hooked to my Digital Lens, powered it up, and  neither my PC
or iTouch could see it on the network.  Had to go through set up again and had to reload the music data.

New question- when you add music to your iTune library and sync the Apple TV, will load just the additions or does need to reload the whole library? 20g took a long time to load.

[DARTH AUDIO]

Thanks for the info.

I set mine up using the HDMI connection on my LCD, loaded 20g of music off my PC, and set up my iTouch remote.

I unplugged and moved it into my listening room, hooked to my Digital Lens, powered it up, and  neither my PC
or iTouch could see it on the network.  Had to go through set up again and had to reload the music data.

New question- when you add music to your iTune library and sync the Apple TV, will load just the additions or does need to reload the whole library? 20g took a long time to load.

Interesting? I unplugged my ATV 3 days ago and when I plugged it back in all my music & settings were the same.

Only the new music will be sync'd

Don't feel bad, I downloaded 70G and it took 3 days!! Maybe 4??

[jhm731]

Thanks for the info.

I set mine up using the HDMI connection on my LCD, loaded 20g of music off my PC, and set up my iTouch remote.

I unplugged and moved it into my listening room, hooked to my Digital Lens, powered it up, and  neither my PC
or iTouch could see it on the network.  Had to go through set up again and had to reload the music data.

New question- when you add music to your iTune library and sync the Apple TV, will load just the additions or does need to reload the whole library? 20g took a long time to load.

Interesting? I unplugged my ATV 3 days ago and when I plugged it back in all my music & settings were the same.

Only the new music will be sync'd

Don't feel bad, I downloaded 70G and it took 3 days!! Maybe 4??

I don't understand why the data transfer rate is so slow.

It doesn't take an hour to transfer 1g to an iPod.

[DARTH AUDIO]

Wireless transfer.. That's what I was told? It really wasn't that big of a deal.

[pcfchung]

Wireless transfer.. That's what I was told? It really wasn't that big of a deal.

There seems to be a big difference between syncing wirelessly and through an ethernet cable.
I synced over 100g of music to Apple TV (wired) in a few hours.

[SwedeSound]

I've been thinking about using ATV as a music server as well, but I am searching for a way to store a rather large (1,000 cds or so) collection in lossless format. I love the iTunes interface and would like to keep using it, but the biggest ATV is just 160 GB. Is there a way to boost the ATV's capacity with an external hard drive hardwired via the USB 2.0 port? I don't trust my wi-fi connection to stream hi-rez audio (and my home PC is getting rather old). Instead, I'd like to load my music onto a high-capacity server (1TB?) and then link it straight into the ATV then send that signal via optical cable to an external DAC and then into my stereo. Or am I just dreaming?

-Jason

[Crimson]

I've been thinking about using ATV as a music server as well, but I am searching for a way to store a rather large (1,000 cds or so) collection in lossless format. I love the iTunes interface and would like to keep using it, but the biggest ATV is just 160 GB. Is there a way to boost the ATV's capacity with an external hard drive hardwired via the USB 2.0 port? I don't trust my wi-fi connection to stream hi-rez audio (and my home PC is getting rather old). Instead, I'd like to load my music onto a high-capacity server (1TB?) and then link it straight into the ATV then send that signal via optical cable to an external DAC and then into my stereo. Or am I just dreaming?

-Jason

Apple doesn't support the USB port (yet), although there are hacks out that are dependent upon which version of firmware is installed. You may want to look at making your wifi more robust, as I have no issues with wireless streaming of full-rez files.

[SkyBlue]

http://www.weaknees.com/appletv/apple-tv-upgrade.php

These guys can replace the hard drive in your ATV with a 250gb for $199. I have most of my music residing on a Mac Pro, I only copy my playlists to the ATV because the HD is only 40gb.  I have the ATV attached via toslink to a Musical Fidelity X-DAC v3 -> Denon 3802 as a pre -> Musical Fidelity X10v3 tube buffer -> Nuforce 9.02 monoblocks ->ProAc Studio 110 monitors.