Mac storage question

[midwestfisherman]

I have a Mac Mini w/ a 320GB hard drive, I was wondering how it would work if I move my music and movie files to an external HD and totally off of the Mini's drive. I'm worried about any lag when streaming music and/or movies to other devices i the house.

 

[silverpig]

What kind of wireless network do you have?

Music will be fine guaranteed. You can stream 720p on wireless-g, depending on the bitrate. Wireless-n will definitely handle 720p. If you have a 5 GHz dual band wireless n (wireless a now?) you can probably do 1080p.

 

[midwestfisherman]

I have the Apple Extreme Base Station.

 

[boomhower]

What kind of external connection? Streaming over wireless will depend on the source file. I stream 1080P over wireless but it is encoded for the purpose and a reasonable bitrate, your not going to be streaming BR rips over wireless.

 

[MotionMan]

I have a Mac Mini w/ a 320GB hard drive, I was wondering how it would work if I move my music and movie files to an external HD and totally off of the Mini's drive. I'm worried about any lag when streaming music and/or movies to other devices i the house.

Are you talking about using the external drives on a network device or via USB directly to the Mini (then out to the network)?

I have the former for my backup drives and latter for my iTunes and iPhoto (on my Mini).

MotionMan

 

[midwestfisherman]

Motion I was thinking external drives connected via USB directly to the Mini.

 

[MotionMan]

Motion I was thinking external drives connected via USB directly to the Mini.

You should not see any lag. I have not.

MotionMan

 

[midwestfisherman]

Thanks Motion. I wanted to check with someone who has done this before I spend the money on the drives. Appreciate the feedback.

 

[alizee]

You should not see any lag. I have not.

MotionMan

Seconded. I would recommend spending a couple extra dollars for a FireWire interface in addition to the USB. Better sustained reads, especially when accessing multiple things (reading/writing at the same time).

 

[manly]

Motion I was thinking external drives connected via USB directly to the Mini.

alizee is right, FireWire 800 is about twice as fast as USB 2.