The amount of apps in the Windows Phone Marketplace
Microsoft's Windows Phone Marketplace has now reported to have passed 25,000 apps by one site tracking comings and goings within it. (source: WindowsPhoneAppslist, July 2011)
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This thing is merely meant as a streamer guys. Seriously. You guys must not get it. Here's the plan. You have one centralized server with all of your media on it. Then, you get a very lightweight system that does nothing but stream all of that data to your TV to watch. Photos, TV, movies, etc. All this thing is acting as is a thin client to a distributed home AV system. I don't care about a hacked up xbox that doesn't stream this stuff cleanly like the AppleTV does. I want something that just works out of the box.
Well, Brian - since you probably don't HAVE a "hacked up xbox" to compare it to, I'll let you know - the "Hacked up Xbox" will stream content from any location I can get to over a network, local or otherwise, in full 720P. So when YOU get it - that this thing is an overpriced and purposefully crippled joke of a product - feel free to type some crap again.
What you described is EXACTLY what I've had for 3 years, except in addition to the meager formats that AppleTV allows I can do all Divx/Xvid flavors, Direct play of SVCD and DVD image files, Matroska, Quicktime, RealMedia, H264, and more. It tells me the weather, has a newsfeed reader, and retains the ability to play great games too. All for $100 less than the Apple offering. All at the same resolution the apple product does. And all with a host of advanced features that the Apple product doesn't even offer.
I don't care about the product specs at all. If they are fast enough to do the job intended, that's good enough for me. However, people shouldn't think because you slap a piece of fruit on the top that a device becomes magical and groundbreaking. While a leader in many ways, Apple is playing catchup in the MEdia CEnter department.