Share iTunes library with remote iOS device via VPN

Sep 07, '12 07:30:00AM

Contributed by: vsilves

In Mac OS X 10.7, installing the Server app, enabling the VPN service, and connecting remotely with an iOS device using VPN did not provide Bonjour discovery of any home shared iTunes libraries.

A number of Bonjour redirector apps were available but none of them worked for me. So, I could not watch the movies in my home iTunes library while away from home.

Now, in Mac OS X 10.8, everything "just works." I did a fresh install of Mac OS X 10.8, installed the Server app, setup the VPN service, added my movies (stored on a Time Capsule) to iTunes (without copying the movies to the server; no need to duplicate what's already in Time Capsule), and enabled home sharing. When I connect to the server from my iPad (using a VPN connection) the native iOS "Videos" app shows my home library and I can play my movies from anywhere. It's nice to be able to play any of my movies when I'm at school or work.

My ISP only gives me a 50 Kbps upload speed, so movies play for a while, then stop, hit play and they play for another bit, then stop again. I can see this working well with maybe as little as 100 Kbps.

[kirkmc adds: I haven't tested this. Though 100 kbps isn't enough for HD movies. It's hard to know exactly how much bandwidth is needed. When I stream to my my Apple TV, it uses over 3 MBps, but that's because it's getting as much data as it can to buffer a movie.]

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