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Mac mini server upgrade hard drive tv#

Live TV & DVR (add a tuner and antenna to record free over-the-air broadcasts).A Server Dashboard for keeping track of what you watch and how much bandwidth you use.

Mac mini server upgrade hard drive Offline#

Mobile Sync for watching your media offline on smartphones and tablets.This provides additional features, including: You may see an enticement to buy a Plex Pass. What the Plex Media Server app does for you

Mac mini server upgrade hard drive for mac#

Setting Up Plexġ ) Download a copy of Plex for Mac (64-bit) from the downloads page.

Mac mini server upgrade hard drive install#

After a clean install of macOS 10.15 Catalina, we got to work setting up Plex. We had a spare USB keyboard and mouse, and connected to an already-existing monitor. This external drive works great with any Mac mini! It matches the looks of the mini and sits directly underneath the computer. To provide sufficient storage for photos, music, videos, and more, we added an 8TB OWC miniStack. A large “hatch” on the bottom of the device makes memory and storage upgrades easy to accomplish. The Mac mini is one of the few remaining user-upgradeable Mac models. The specifications? A 1.4 GHz Dual-Core Intel Core i5, 4GB of RAM, and a 120GB SATA SSD.

We used a mini with fairly modest hardware to create our media server. eBay lists many Mac minis, and used Mac stores do a bustling trade in these popular Macs. Fairly recent Mac minis are listed on Apple’s refurb page. Where can you find a used Mac mini? OWC often has pre-owned minis available. The minimum operating system requirement is macOS 10.9 Mavericks, so even an early 2009 Mac mini can fit the bill. You don’t need a new operating system to turn a Mac mini into a media server. We chose one with the ability to run modern versions of macOS (10.15 Catalina and 11 Big Sur in particular). For the purpose of this article, we looked no further than the OWC website to find a Mac mini. There’s another very compelling reason to use a Mac mini – older models are inexpensive. Why use a Mac mini instead of a Mac with a built-in screen? You probably have a large-screen TV to watch your content on, and the mini can use that as a “monitor”. Stream online content and make use of the media you've already bought and paid for. You can stream online content and make use of the media you’ve already bought and paid for. With fast internet service and purchased physical media, a media server running Plex offers the best of both worlds.

Have you made a large investment in music CDs and movies or TV shows on DVD or Blu-Ray? Don’t buy that again in a streaming format – use that investment by copying the physical media content to your server.

With a local media server, there’s no delay or concern about bandwidth. That could make streaming movies, TV shows, and music almost impossible.

You might be living in an area with very slow Internet service.

Why build a media server when an Apple TV can provide just about every type of media you’d want? There are a few good reasons: These are illegal and should not be used or installed. NOTE: Several of these alternatives provide third-party add-ons that allow free streaming of paid video content. Others that you may wish to consider include Emby, Kodi, Stremio, and Universal Media Server. Why Plex? It’s the most popular media server app for macOS. In this article, we’re using a Mac mini as the hardware and Plex as the application to organize the media. Media servers range from servers that provide video on demand to smaller personal computers or NAS (Network Attached Storage) for the home. Wikipedia defines a media server as follows:Ī media server is a computer appliance or an application software that stores digital media (video, audio or images) and makes it available over a network. Read along to see how we were able to transform a 2014 Mac mini into a home media server. Macs have good longevity and older units are usable for a variety of purposes other than day-to-day work. The old 21.5-inch iMac becomes a FaceTime “videophone” for Grandma. An old MacBook becomes a school laptop for one of the kids.

Old Macs never die, they just get reused. From top, an Apple SuperDrive, the 2014 Mac mini, and an 8TB OWC miniStack drive