Quote:
Originally Posted by HeartsOfFire
So....
Comparing this 'new' AppleTV to my own, the only difference is... it's black?
Without 1080p video, I am not impressed.
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It's also a lot smaller (it's about the size of a puck) It is also a lot cheaper. Lets face it, the older versions of Apple TV were not exactly flying off of shelves. This version is not for the "power user". It has no local storage, everything is streaming. 720p max. HDMI and optical audio are the only connections. It's pretty much an iTunes extender for your TV. It will be able to stream audio and video off of other iDevices. If you have a movie on your iPhone you can wirelessly stream it to the Apple TV.
Like everything Apple does it is geared towards ease of use and locked into the Apple universe. HDMI only + Apple DRM ensures wary content providers that the Analog hole is closed. Specific codecs ensure that you can't just stream your bittorrent collection from your computer without lengthy conversion. It is designed solely to put money in Apple's pocket through TV and Movie rentals. The 720p max video is due to the hardware itself. The A4 processor that is now used in most Apple devices (iPhone 4, iPad, new iPod Touch, new Apple TV) is not powerful enough to handle 1080p decoding. If I am not mistaken most if not all rentable HD content on iTunes is 720p content so this is a no brainer for them.
In the end it comes down to the magic $99 / $120 price. It's almost an impulse purchase at that price. Hell I know whats what and even I am tempted to buy it just so I can have my iTunes library on my TV and surround system.