How to Play iTunes Purchased or Rented Movies With Roku 3

Posted by Fatima Cook on 13/08/2014 3:14:01 PM.
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Brief Introduction to Roku

roku 3, various media channels

As one of the most popular digital media players in United States, Roku helps us easily enjoy the newest and hottest movies, TV shows, musics from hundreds of free media channels and network, including YouTube, Netflix, Hulu Plus, Spotify, etc. Besides, we can rent or buy our favorite movies from paid channels as well, like Amazon Instant Video, RedBox and so forth on Roku player. By downloading a Roku player app on iOS devices (Roku is compatible with iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch running iOS 6 or later), we can also easily stream the photos, music and videos from our iOS devices to Roku with a few taps.

Due to its great features and performance, Roku is regarded as the biggest competitor to Apple TV among the top media streaming boxes. However, Apple always makes everything so proprietary that sometimes it's difficult for people to enjoy their purchased movies and TV shows in iTunes library with more channels. For example, we can't directly stream the iTunes purchased videos to watch on our TV or home theater system via Roku, or Plex server, or Chromecast, but only via Apple TV. To some extent, that might be the last hurdle keeping Roku from being a total Apple TV killer.

Solution to Watch iTunes Movies via Roku?

Currently more and more people attempt to stream iTunes movies to HDTV via Roku, so we wrote this article to provide you a solution for that. You may take a look at the question post in Roku forum by jefffetrow, who asked: "I have a few places in my house that have TVs, but no cable boxes. I have a Roku and an Apple TV on a couple, for different reasons. Mostly, the Apple TV is for streaming all the Home Sharing movies and TV shows I have on a 5TB hard drive, connected to a Mac Mini, whose only job is video streaming. I'd love to eliminate the need for both boxes, and would happily switch to Roku 100% of the time, if only I could get it to see/play all the media in the shared iTunes Library. Has anyone made their Roku see/play shared iTunes libraries? And if so, can you tell me how? Thanks in advance!" - From Roku Forum

It is worth mentioning that we are not allowed to stream any iTunes movie or TV show with non-Apple devices because the iTunes movies are all encrypted by the DRM protection. To play the iTunes movies via Roku freely and easily, we can bypass the annoying DRM protection firstly. And in this situation, TunesKit iTunes DRM Remover could be the best choice to bypass the iTunes DRM protection. Here we will take TunesKit iTunes DRM Removal for Mac as an example. It is the world's No.1 DRM removal application for iTunes movies/TV shows on Mac OS X by easily stripping off iTunes DRM protection and changing iTunes DRM-ed M4V videos to unprotected MP4 format with few clicks. The most valued feature is that TunesKit will preserve the original quality 100% by keeping the original subtitles (CC also), audio tracks, AC3 5.1 surround and HD resolution.

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How to Play iTunes Movies/TV Shows with Roku 3

Note: To use TunesKit for Mac successfully, you have to run the Mac OS X 10.8 or later and install the newest iTunes on the computer; TunesKit is a home edition for personal use only instead of commercial use.

Step 1Add M4V movies from iTunes library

You can click "Add Files" icon to import the iTunes movie files to TunesKit directly. But if you don't set your iTunes library in the default path, you have to drag and drop the files to TunesKit instead.

add itunes movies

Step 2Click "Convert" button to start removing the DRM protection

If you want to select the output subtitles, audio tracks for the output video, you can also set it manually by clicking the settings icon before the conversion. Once click the "Convert" button, TunesKit will start to convert iTunes DRM M4V to MP4 very soon.

Step 3Stream iTunes movies to Roku 3

Method 1. If you are trying to stream the iTunes movies to Roku 3 via iOS devices, you have to sync the iTunes movies to iOS device at first, then download Roku player app on your iOS device, and connect your iOS device to the same network with your Roku player, then stream the iTunes movies directly via Roku player app (https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/roku/id482066631?mt=8).

Method 2. If you are trying to stream the iTunes movies to Roku 3 from Mac computer, then you have to install Plex server for help. Below are the detailed tutorial as reference:

Step 1. Install Plex server on your Mac. Once the Plex server is installed successfully, it will detect all of the movies, television shows, and music on your Mac.

Step 2. Install Plex server on Roku 3. First you'll need to download and install the Plex Channel on your Roku. Because it's not a default channel currently, so we have to do this manually on Roku website under your Roku account.

Step 3. Configure Plex on the Roku. You have to configure the Plex server before steaming the videos on Mac. Then you can better watch the iTunes movies on Roku 3.

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You can also follow the video tutorial as below to learn how to remove DRM from iTunes movies with TunesKit and stream the converted DRM-free iTunes movie files to Roku 3 from computer via Plex media server.

 

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