Streaming video from Windows Home Server to Macbook Pro


I spent this afternoon trying to stream video from my Asus Windows Home Server to my MacBook Pro. I watch a lot of training videos, so that ability to stream to any PC in the house is vital. Windows makes this easy - on my Windows boxes my home server immediately shows up as a Digital Media Server, allowing streaming of videos, pictures and music.

I use VLC to consume video on Mountain Lion. Despite my media being shared on my home server no media devices were available to VLC, though VLC supports UPnP and SAP out of the box. It turns out that Windows Home Server supports UPnP but due to a bizarre bug/configuration, the requisite port forwarding registry settings are not always present. Fortunately, wegotserved has a great tutorial on enabling UPnP and it took literally 5 minutes (I rebooted to be safe...) to get streaming to my Mac working.

http://forum.wegotserved.com/index.php/tutorials/article/17-configure-upnp-for-windows-home-server/

I only wish the Microsoft hadn't retired Home Server. It is an invaluable component of my home network and one that only seems to grow in utility over time.

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