My Thoughts on Apple TV

re: My Thoughts on Apple TV

Brent Evans — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 20:07:09 GMT

I agree with you Chris. I just don't see what is worth the $299 for Apple TV. It's a TV device without the TV functionality...

http://brentevans.blogspot.com/2007/03/apple-tv-i-dont-get-it.html

re: My Thoughts on Apple TV

Brad — Sun, 28 Jan 2007 05:58:59 GMT

"Using the Media Center Extender functions, you get access to all of your music, videos, and photos. While you can’t playback anything purchased from the iTunes Store, you do get extended file format support (mainly MPEG-2) and the added ability to have PVR support (OTA HD, Analog, CableCARD w/ new Vista PC) and even a DVD Jukebox."

Wait a minute - did you say DVD Jukebox?

I used to own a Sony XL1 Digital Living System, which had a 200 disc DVD jukebox. There was no way to serve those DVD's over the network.

Are you saying that with Vista MCE running on a XL1, XL2 or XL3, I would be able to watch DVD's loaded in the jukebox on a XBox360?

re: My Thoughts on Apple TV

Tim Coyle — Sun, 14 Jan 2007 16:55:42 GMT

I agree with you Chris that the Apple TV is not as good as the Xbox 360 when comparing them as a total end solution. The Xbox 360 with IPTV, Media Center extender abilities, and the Xbox Live Marketplace is a better solution. But the Apple TV might meet the entry level media extender market that the Xbox 360 might not be able to get i.e. non-gameing HDMI loving techies

re: My Thoughts on Apple TV

isotonic — Sun, 14 Jan 2007 03:18:00 GMT

I agree with many of your points, but I'll point out that you can add any movie to your iTunes library - it's not limited to content you've purchased through iTunes. And with a (Mac) droplet called Movie2iTunes it can be pretty much any file type.

The Droplet accepts mov, mpg, mpeg, mp4, avi, wmv, swf files. A file reference in the QuickTime media link format is created (about 2 KB per movie) and the reference file is then added to the iTunes library.

I'm sure there is a Windows equivalent.

The big questions for me are:

1. Can I stream videos from my computer, or do I have to transfer them to the 33GB (usable) Apple TV HD first? I haven't seen a definitive answer to this.

2. Can I mount the Apple TV hard drive on my computer to manually add codecs, even if it requires a hack?

If the answer to both is 'yes' then this thing is just what I've been waitng for. If not, forget it.

re: My Thoughts on Apple TV

Al Nyden — Fri, 12 Jan 2007 20:41:35 GMT

I agree with everything you've said about Apple TV, BUT, my big problem is that I haven't found another solution that I'm happy with.

Streaming to my XBOX 360 is nice (I don't have media center), but look at the drawbacks.

- No album art with music.

- If you stop watching a video you have to start at the beginning. (Terrible for movies).

- Will only stream WMA videos.

Ultimately I think streaming media to a TV will always have tons of limitations. Connecting a small PC to a TV is more expensive but a better solution. Maybe someday if Media Center supports Directv, I might try to put something together.

re: My Thoughts on Apple TV

Marty — Fri, 12 Jan 2007 14:42:57 GMT

If it passes the wifey sniff test (aka-- stays up 24/7) it will make it. My wife made me get rid of MCE on the living room because it wasn't stable enough.

Whether or not it does all the things that MCE can do doesnt matter.

regarding 1080i-- its a non factor, go into best buy and count the number of sets that only handle up to 720p. the general public is happy with this resolution. (even if its not the best resolution thats available).

re: My Thoughts on Apple TV

Larry McQueary — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 22:16:32 GMT

Chris, being both an Apple fanboy *and* an MCE fanboy, I have to agree with you. I feel let down by Apple. They have in past done such a great job assessing the market and understanding the core feature set that will appeal to the masses and create very popular products (many of which I own or have owned). I just can't understand who the AppleTV is supposed to appeal to -- people who want to watch pixellated DRM'd movies and TV shows from the iTunes Store on their 50" HDTV? I think it will mainly appeal to folks who have little to no experience with *any* kind of PVR/DVR or home media center technology. If they've used TiVo, MCE, MythTV, SageTV, or BeyondTV, they won't be very interested in this product with its current limitations.

And you've nailed it -- As always, I am fairly certain that there will be a V2 that will probably nail it, but it's so far behind MCE/Vista/Pika that they're really playing a catch-up game.

I truly hope they do it, however, because I am getting fed up with Microsoft's lack of support for various popular encoding technologies in the extenders (as you've opined before). I'm annoyed at having to use Transcode360 as much as I do!

re: My Thoughts on Apple TV

Aaron — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 22:01:23 GMT

It's funny that Apple can release something as weak as Apple TV and roughly at the same time they can release something as exciting as the iPhone.

re: My Thoughts on Apple TV

DWAnderson — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 18:09:55 GMT

I couldn't agree more. And when you include the power that MCML will bring to Vista Media Center the inadequacy of Apple TV becomes even greater.

See http://thunor.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!71C238B5E0E3724D!157.entry

re: My Thoughts on Apple TV

Keith Franklin — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 17:11:03 GMT

Also just in case people dont realize it. An 360 can stream content from Mac's. If you have other types of content that Windows Media Connect or Media Center doesnt support with the 360 you can use TVersity to transcode content on the fly for the 360.

Suffice it to say compared to a 360 Apple TV is like an 8 track player.

re: My Thoughts on Apple TV

chrisl — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 16:21:54 GMT

Opps! Thanks for the catch. Edited.

iTunes Marketplace?

Northruption — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 16:19:26 GMT

I think you meant the down-loadable movie content on xbox live, right?

"For $100 more, you can get the Xbox 360 Premium ($399) and access the iTunes Marketplace which is providing HD Downloads already in addition to access Media Center and/or Windows Media Connect."