Mac mini problems playing movies

[a.dent]

I know these will be straightforward questions for the knowledgeable here so here goes.

 

1. When I try to play an iTunes movie from my Mac mini to my Denon AVC-A1HD and JVC 9500 it refuses to play. I'm guessing it has something to do with copy protection but I'm not sure.

2. The same movie will play perfectly well from Dendy but only if I use Chrome, not  Safari. Is this again a copy protection problem?

3. I bought a cheap HDMI splitter hoping that would solve the problem and in the beginning it helped but now only works intermittently.

4. I notice threads here talking about products like the HD Fury. Should I invest in such a product and if so specifically which one?

5. There are intermittent dropouts in the picture when I play any movie from Dendy or even stored on an attached USB from the Mac mini. These dropout happen every few seconds and last about 1/10 second but are very annoying. Even Netflix through the Mac mini suffers the same problem.

So to summarise, I have two separate problems. The refusal to play iTunes movies and the intermittent video dropouts.

 

Thanks for any help.

 

Andrew

 

[a.dent]

Obviously too many questions in the one post. Any advice would still be appreciated.

[Ralph]

I'll chip in:

1  I  have no idea what is "dendy" (I could google it but hey!)

2  What configuration is the mac mini ? Age / ram / Hard drive type & capacity / OS / ...

3  Where is the movie stored, internally , externally (if so how connected)

4  How is the Denon connected ? Hdmi +  ?

 

Being more practical, have you run any "housekeeping" programs on the MacMini ? Apps that clear cache etc.

 

Let's see if we can resolve this.

 

[BATMAQN]

Mac Mini shouldn't be giving trouble for Netflix unless you're doing it wirelessly then maybe.

 

The usb stick may be faulty even the usb ports may be faulty which probably means the logic board may be on the way out.

 

A full fresh install of the OS may help things work better it may be corrupted lots of kernel panics may be occurring.

 

Try using VLC for movies much better playback than iTunes.

 

If you're having multiple issues it may actually be a faulty logic board but you should first do a backup and then I would try a full reinstall of the OS see if that fixes some of these issues you're having.

 

Is the Mac mini getting overly hot?

 

The dropouts may be a faulty router?

[a.dent]

Thanks for the replies @Ralph and @BATMAQN.

Dendy is like iTunes movies but 10c cheaper and an Australian owned distributor. I hope it keeps a little more tax in Australia!

Mac mini is i7 with 250Gb SSD and High Sierra.

Movies stored on external HDD play but picture drops out every few seconds. I use VLC.

Denon AVR connected with HDMI.

Ethernet only, no WiFi.

VLC has the same dropouts but plays. iTunes just refuses to play iTunes movies at all through the AVR.

All other programs work perfectly so not a hardware problem. i.e. Roon, Audirvana, Pages etc.

There are two separate problems. The iTunes copy protection problem refusing to play via the old AVR and the separate video dropout problem via VLC etc. I have no real idea how to fix either.

[BATMAQN]

Possibly a faulty HDMI cable? How long is it?

[a.dent]

26 minutes ago, BATMAQN said:

Possibly a faulty HDMI cable? How long is it?

Tried 3. All the same.

[Ralph]

What if the movie is copied to the HDD and then played ? -  It could be a lag in USB.

Is the external drive a USB 2 or USB3 ?

 

 

[TP1]

On 16/12/2017 at 5:35 AM, a.dent said:

I know these will be straightforward questions for the knowledgeable here so here goes.
 
1. When I try to play an iTunes movie from my Mac mini to my Denon AVC-A1HD and JVC 9500 it refuses to play. I'm guessing it has something to do with copy protection but I'm not sure.
2. The same movie will play perfectly well from Dendy but only if I use Chrome, not  Safari. Is this again a copy protection problem?
3. I bought a cheap HDMI splitter hoping that would solve the problem and in the beginning it helped but now only works intermittently.
4. I notice threads here talking about products like the HD Fury. Should I invest in such a product and if so specifically which one?
5. There are intermittent dropouts in the picture when I play any movie from Dendy or even stored on an attached USB from the Mac mini. These dropout happen every few seconds and last about 1/10 second but are very annoying. Even Netflix through the Mac mini suffers the same problem.
So to summarise, I have two separate problems. The refusal to play iTunes movies and the intermittent video dropouts.
 
Thanks for any help.
 
Andrew
 

 

 

I have had no problems playing movies from the Macmini in ITunes although I prefer to use Apple TV - it just does it smoother and PQ seems better. They seem to have the copy protection thing running smoother than on the computers. 
I know this is very basic but output settings in ITunes , setup, midi etc all seem to affect the playback ability of the Mac mini. Attached USB will not be the issue .

Btw, VLC with Mac mini is my favourite although I don't think it will play copy protected material . Vlc also has an iPad app,

I must also mention the significant improvement in PQ when upgrading the Mac mini with a linear PSU using the UpTone Audio conversion kit. They made it originally for audio playback but the improvement in PQ is immediately noticeable.

 

 

Edited December 24, 2017 by Tasso

[a.dent]

I'm going to try one more time asking for advice for this inability to play iTunes movies.

I updated OSX and this now comes up when I try to play an iTunes movie.

 

I tried a cheap HDMI splitter to see if that would help. No go. I tried routing the HDMI signal through my Oppo 103 but still no joy.

Could someone please suggest a component to get rid of this HDCP message?

Cheers

Edited January 22, 2018 by a.dent

[stereonut]

I know the High Sierra upgrade can cause all kinds of problems with existing software. On my Mac it seemed to bugger up quite a few preference settings.  You might find some help on Mac Rumours or similar?

Good luck. 

[a.dent]

Just an update for anyone who is interested. When Tasso was around checking out my JVC 9500 yesterday he suggested I turn off screen sharing (I was using screen sharing to control the Mac mini running iTunes movies). Well that fixed the problem straight away. No more HDCP incompatibility pop-up.

I would never have thought something so simple could have been causing the problem and why hasn't Apple fixed this before?

Now back to Apple remote on the iPad.

[TP1]

On 01/02/2018 at 9:20 AM, a.dent said:

Just an update for anyone who is interested. When Tasso was around checking out my JVC 9500 yesterday he suggested I turn off screen sharing (I was using screen sharing to control the Mac mini running iTunes movies). Well that fixed the problem straight away. No more HDCP incompatibility pop-up.

I would never have thought something so simple could have been causing the problem and why hasn't Apple fixed this before?

Now back to Apple remote on the iPad.

 

I suspect Apple might do this because the screen sharing is over wifi and is therefore not protected by HDCP.

[Jventer]

Great to hear the problem is sorted.

And also great to hear it was a SNA member that helped.