Storing content on an external drive

Background: I "dock" my macbook pro when I'm home and attach it to 1.5TB of external storage (via usb and firewire).
What I'd like to do: I'd like to keep all of my music on my computer, but store all of my movies on the external AND have iTunes list all of these files in its library. That way, when I get my new Apple TV, I can stream movies from the external instead of having 100+ GB of movies I don't need on my computer's HDD.
Will this work? Any alternatives? Basically I want to stream video to my apple tv without storing the content on my internal HDD.

jmaliakal wrote:
Will this work?
yes.
if the movies are currently on your internal HD, do this:
● connect the external to your Mac
● go iTunes > preferences > advanced and change +iTunes media folder location+ to the external
● select all movies (highlight them), right-click (or ctrl-click) and choose +consolidate files+ from the pup-up menu.
iTunes will copy the files to the external and, when done, you can delete the original files from your internal HD using the finder.
be sure to point +iTunes media folder location+ back to your local iTunes folder if you want to add content locally. also, make sure the external is mounted on your desktop before you fire up iTunes if you want to play content from the external.
for the avoidance of doubt, an instance of iTunes must be running for TV to fetch content from the external HD - TV cannot get it from the HD directly ...
JGG

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