New 160GB Apple TV a prelude to HD?
By Ben Drawbaugh 
posted May 31st 2007 1:34PM
posted May 31st 2007 1:34PM
posted May 31st 2007 1:34PM
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I was a little shocked to learn that the Apple TV wasn't exactly HD. I surely would have thought that nearly anyone who purchased one of these was purchasing it for use on their HD set.
swiiiiing and a miss.
I'm curious to see what Steve will say around mid June
I saw Apple TV when it first came out and wow, what a disappointment. I'm a diehard Mac guy, but I thought it was seriously lacking.
The Apple position seemed to be "Man, isn't this cool?" as opposed to "Man, isn't this good?"
And HD--or even near HD experience--is a must for something like this considering tech is making leaps and bounds toward sharper,brighter, faster with everything.
The AppleTV has been an awesome device for what it was intended to be, and has made me enjoy my DVD collection as much as the iPod made me re-discover my music collection.
Garbage in, Garbage out. Like anything else. If you watch HD media on your AppleTV, it looks great! In time, iTunes will have all the HD you'll want. But you gotta remember, Apple's having to drag that 300 ton weight behind them (the Entertainment Industry and Studios) to get there. Patience.
Did your DVD player break? What stopped you from watching them before the Apple TV?
Microsoft didn't seem to have a problem with the entertainment industry with offering HD downloads with the XBOX 360.
If you haven't used something as elegant and empowering as an iPod, then you wouldn't understand how much easier it makes things to have your entire collection at the tip of your fingers. The AppleTV does just that for your video media collection as much as the iPod does for your music.
I am not interested in a noisy game console in my living room. No matter what it can do.
Interesting article (below) in relation to Apple TV and movie downloads, from a recent report on NETFLIX -
http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6446146.html
-Netflix working on Internet to TV 'solution'
(McCarthy suggests set-top box will be used to stream company's Watch Now movies)
By Jennifer Netherby -- Video Business, 5/23/2007
MAY 23 | Without giving many new details, Netflix chief financial officer Barry McCarthy seemed to all but confirm that the online retailer plans to use some type of set-top box to stream movies from its Watch Now Internet movie service to the TV.
Speaking at the Goldman Sachs Eighth Annual Internet Conference in Las Vegas Wednesday morning, McCarthy said Netflix has been working on a solution to deliver Internet movies to the TV for two years.
Asked for specifics, he said we wont discuss our box strategy until later this year or early next year.
McCarthy said some type of device is needed to deliver movies to the TV and said he didnt think a PC would be the hardware consumers choose. McCarthy said that because Netflix streams its movies, it can use a cheaper type of box that requires only a wi-fi chip, rather than a more expensive box that has a hard drive for storing movies.
During its earnings call in April, CEO Reed Hastings said the company was working on a number of partnerships to deliver Internet movies to the TV.
McCarthy predicted that Internet movie services would continue to create proprietary set-top boxes, such as Apple TV, which delivers movies and other content only from Apples iTunes.
McCarthy said a universal box that would allow consumers to choose which Internet service to download movies from would be nirvana, but he added, I just dont see it unfolding that way.
Because of that, he said, adoption of Internet set-top boxes would be much slower than the adoption of DVD.
Netflix will spend $40 million on its digital business this year and likely even more next year, he said.
Asked about the threat that video-on-demand would pose if studios begin releasing movies the same day on VOD as they are released on DVD, McCarthy said it would likely be little threat to Netflix. Most, 70%, of movies Netflix rents are catalog titles, not new releases, he said.
Also, he said VOD is still small and hasnt caught on with consumers. He blamed that partly on the lack of content available on VOD. But he said that once thousands of movies are available on VOD, the cable industry is likely to have problems allowing users to easily navigate through those choices to find what theyre looking for.
[END]
I think the AppleTV is definitely an elegant way to interface with the TV. But pretty much everyone who has a computer all ready has the capability to interface with a TV for a fraction of the cost. I don't get why it's such a big deal.
Right now, I have an HD to TV set-top box that connects and plays netflix "Watch it now" movies. It's called a laptop--one of my old ones with a vga to vga connection that still outputs pseudo-high def (based on connection speed) to my LCD HDTV. Oh yeah, I have an Apple TV except it's a hard drive connected to my wireless network and don't have to purchase movies on itunes to use it. PLUS, it interfaces with my DVR.
Nice try Apple. I still like you.
Cheers
Meegan ; )