iTunes Home Sharing with Apple TV2 and Win7 PC

I have an issue where the Apple TV2 does not like to see the library specifically on my Windows 7 PC. It shows up under the "Computers" list on the Apple TV, but when I select that library, it takes forever to load, or it goes back to the menu list or sometimes it will load. I find that it will load routinely if I restart iTunes on the Win7 PC, but that is annoying to do when it is located upstairs. The Apple TV2 recognizes the other 2 libraries on the network (iMac and Macbook Pro). The Win7 library has the bulk of the movies, music, etc that we use daily.



My setup:

3GB Time Capsule

iMac

Macbook Pro

Win7 SP1 PC (uses Eset Smart Security 4)

2 iPhones

2 iPads

I have set the ESET firewall to "learning" mode and it recognized Bonjour, etc and I clicked on "Always Allow". I do not get any more warning windows so I assume ESET has finished learning everything about Apple TV and its connections.

Any thoughts on how to keep the Win7 PC library always ready to go without restarting iTunes everytime

 

1, make sure that you have the Trusted zone configured properly and the IP addresses of the computers are in TZ.

2, make sure that all Windows 7 services are allowed in the IDS setup

 

Can you explain those things in specifics or how-to?

I'm not adept at Firewall settings but I can follow along well.

Thanks!

 

see
http://kb.eset.com/esetkb/index?page=content&id=SOLN2351
and
http://kb.eset.com/esetkb/index?page=content&id=SOLN2888

 

May also help to allow the required ports in both directions for all ports used by Apple TV:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2463

And the following KB Article to open these ports within ESET Smart Security. The Article is for version 4 but the location of the steps is the same in version 5 as well:

http://kb.eset.com/esetkb/index?page=content&id=SOLN2149&ref=wsf

 

Ok, I got almost all the ports entered in the Rules area. I cannot figure out the port "type" for the following:

• TCP port 3689 is used to communicate with iTunes while using the iTunes Library Sharing feature.
  
• UDP port 5353 is used by Apple TV for automatically finding computers with iTunes on your network using Bonjour.

These don't autopopulate in the "Name" drop-down menu. I just typed in the port numbers without giving them a name. Is that ok?

 

Yes that will be just fine.