New tech company 'Apple' set to showoff new mp3 player, internet TV box

[Russic]

Originally Posted by Roast Beef

That's some pretty weak video capabilities. This is one severely crippled device. Other websites I have looked at say that the TV rental is only available in the US. Canada only gets Movie rentals. Weak.
With Netflix coming to Canada and a PS3 with PS3 media server running what exactly is the appeal of this device? Where are the apps? Apple had a great opportunity to take over the living room with this device. But in it's current form, it's a $99 device to watch Apple's drm'ed media on your TV.

Big disappointment if the tv rentals don't come north, but not unexpected. whatever crazy laws we have up here seem to ensure we're crippled when it comes to things like this.

PS3 media server is absolute garbage in my eyes. The inability to mark watched or unwatched shows drives me insane. It also won't play 2 minutes of my HD movies without stuttering. The apple tv is wildly underpowered, but for chrissakes if it can stream the file flawlessly why can't the ps3? I know everybody loves it and I'm definitely in the minority here, but I'm looking foward to dropping $130 just so i can get back to using my PS3 for games only.

If you're fine with the media server than there is very little reason to pick this up. It's more versatile and will play different formats.

Something i really like is that when i go on a trip with the kid i can load up my iPad with movies, take the apple tv, plug it into a different tv and be able to stream anything from my ipad to the tv.

Originally Posted by HotHotHeat

I'm honestly clueless as to why apple won't do 1080p over apple tv. Astounding.

Maybe the studios won't let them?

My guess is either that or in order to meet the $99 price goal they had to go without. I've been watching 1080p blurays and 720p tv for a few years now, and if im developing something like this i would choose a lower price point. I suppose it could also be the file sizes i suppose.

[photon]

Wow, that game looks amazing on my phone.

[You Need a Thneed]

Originally Posted by HotHotHeat

I'm honestly clueless as to why apple won't do 1080p over apple tv. Astounding.

Maybe the studios won't let them?

1080p streaming is still mostly impractical with the Internet bandwidth that currently exists. That's why.

Currently, almost no one would be able to stream high quality 1080p regularly.

[Roast Beef]

Originally Posted by Russic

PS3 media server is absolute garbage in my eyes. The inability to mark watched or unwatched shows drives me insane. It also won't play 2 minutes of my HD movies without stuttering. The apple tv is wildly underpowered, but for chrissakes if it can stream the file flawlessly why can't the ps3?

The thing with the PS3 server is if it is a file format the PS3 can't natively play then the computer does the transcoding. It transcodes to a very high bitrate mpeg2 format that is highly compatible with the PS3. It is also fairly easy for most computers to transcode to this codec in real time. The drawback is because it is such a high bitrate it can overwhelm wireless networks and cause stuttering and errors. It's not perfect but it works pretty seamlessly with my setup.

The iPad to iTV streaming is pretty cool and I can see that being a useful feature for many people. I guess my biggest issue is that they didn't take it to the next level. If this thing had apps that used iDevices as remotes and gamepads I would be all over this thing. I still might pick one up though because I would like to have an easy interface to my existing iTunes media on my TV. For 120 bucks its almost an impulse purchase.

I hope those other TV's you would want to plug it into have HDMI inputs because HDMI and optical audio output are the only connections the Apple TV has.

[Devils'Advocate]

Okay, so what exactly does the new iTV do that my existing Apple TV doesn't do?

What is the purpose of iPad to iTV streaming if you can just do video-out from the iPad?

[sclitheroe]

Originally Posted by Devils'Advocate

Okay, so what exactly does the new iTV do that my existing Apple TV doesn't do?

What is the purpose of iPad to iTV streaming if you can just do video-out from the iPad?

- It doesn’t do much more. What is DOES do, is do it approximately $200 cheaper. This is an important step in getting more of these devices into homes, and getting more media companies on board with episodic content rentals. They still called it a hobby in the keynote - they aren’t ready to take that next step to Apple TV’s with apps and whatnot.

- I don’t think you can do video out on protected content via the cable kit on any iOS device. The streaming is an important element from a content providers perspective because it preserves the integrity of the DRM environment.

The streaming capability also means that you can move media between TV’s and houses easily - anywhere there’s an AppleTV, you can play media stored on your iPhone or iPad, including video you just shot with its HD camera. This is a much more elegant solution than carrying around cables and hooking and unhooking stuff.

[Flames0910]

Man $100? Killer pricepoint.

[photon]

Originally Posted by You Need a Thneed

1080p streaming is still mostly impractical with the Internet bandwidth that currently exists. That's why.

Currently, almost no one would be able to stream high quality 1080p regularly.

Heck even the 720p streaming is heavily compressed, you are probably right about that.

But for the people who have the content on their local networks it still would be nice to support 1080p and better audio.. and more codecs...

[HotHotHeat]

Apple loves to frustrate Canadians.

"iTunes 10 coming soon to Canada"

Why in the world wouldn't they be able to offer us software??

[FanIn80]

Originally Posted by HotHotHeat

Apple loves to frustrate Canadians.

"iTunes 10 coming soon to Canada"

Why in the world wouldn't they be able to offer us software??

It's like that everywhere (US too). The signage is up, but it just hasn't been released yet.

[MickMcGeough]

Originally Posted by HotHotHeat

I'm honestly clueless as to why apple won't do 1080p over apple tv. Astounding.

Maybe the studios won't let them?

1080p theoretically requires double the bandwidth of 720p. Since that's not entirely plausible to stream online, and streaming is the "big thing" with Apple TV, they decided to keep costs down by not supporting it at all. At least that's my guess.

It's not a huge deal for me because the only thing I watch in 1080p are blu-rays.

[Mazrim]

Originally Posted by FanIn80

It's like that everywhere (US too). The signage is up, but it just hasn't been released yet.

Steve might be sweating bullets, since he said it would be available today.

[sclitheroe]

Originally Posted by MickMcGeough

1080p theoretically requires double the bandwidth of 720p. Since that's not entirely plausible to stream online, and streaming is the "big thing" with Apple TV, they decided to keep costs down by not supporting it at all. At least that's my guess.

It's not a huge deal for me because the only thing I watch in 1080p are blu-rays.

I don’t understand why people would want heavily compressed 1080p streams to begin with. Wouldn’t users demanding 1080p resolution want a full standard Bluray bitrate?

[FanIn80]

Originally Posted by Mazrim

Steve might be sweating bullets, since he said it would be available today.

Nah. Every iTunes release is like this. It ain't no thang.

Originally Posted by sclitheroe

I don’t understand why people would want heavily compressed 1080p streams to begin with. Wouldn’t users demanding 1080p resolution want a full standard Bluray bitrate?

This is what I was going to say.

Usually, the people who absolutely have to have 1080p are pretty picky about the quality, which ultimately eliminates streaming over the internet right off the bat... so why this is an issue escapes me.

Now... streaming 1080p over your local network is a different story... but even that isn't going to get the same kind of quality as you would directly from a blu-ray disk.

For the record, I find the 720p HD offerings on the Apple TV to be more than sufficient. It's a great balance between quality and overall experience. A movie starts playing in mere seconds, and it very rarely ever stutters. In fact, I can't remember the last time I had a rental on my ATV stutter or stop playing altogether. I can't imagine being able to make those claims if I was streaming a 1080p file over the internet.

[Reggie Dunlop]

iTunes 10 is now downloadable on Apple.ca

[QuadCityImages]

Even as a known Apple-hater, that Nano is awesome. Not quite awesome enough for me to buy one, but I also have little need for a small mp3 player anyway. But still, that is an impressive little gadget.

Everything else is kind of eh. The new iPod Touch continues to be an iPhone without the (crappy) phone part, although it is interesting that they stuck with the curved look rather than the flat sides of the iPhone 4. The Shuffle is a Shuffle, a $20 mp3 player for $50. I have no idea why he said every model was getting a refresh and proceeded to pretend that the iPod Classic doesn't exist. The social networking on iTunes is just what people said, one more thing someone wants you to socialize on. I don't see that taking off.

The AppleTV is probably the most disappointing. The price is awesome, but $.99 rentals aren't that great (especially since Amazon just announced $.99 purchases today) and where the heck are the apps? I was sure that the AppleTV would be an iPod Touch for your TV, but its actually less. It does less than the old AppleTV. I guess for $99, what do you expect... that's practically checkout candy-type impulse purchase money.

Edit: Also, who is buying iPods these days? Apparently a lot of people, but with every phone having mp3 player capability, why carry an extra thing? I can see the jogging argument, but its not like everyone is that athletic... (especially in the US)

[sclitheroe]

Originally Posted by Reggie Dunlop

iTunes 10 is now downloadable on Apple.ca

It’s not actually - it downloads iTunes 9.2.1, even from pages that say Download iTunes 10.

Edit: hit the download link again, and this time I get iTunes 10. I guess their load balancers haven’t fully replicated out yet.

[DownInFlames]

Yeah, if it shows 9.2.1 just refresh until 10 shows up.

[Reggie Dunlop]

Originally Posted by sclitheroe

It’s not actually - it downloads iTunes 9.2.1, even from pages that say Download iTunes 10.

Really?

I downloaded 10 an hour ago.

[Russic]

Originally Posted by Roast Beef

The thing with the PS3 server is if it is a file format the PS3 can't natively play then the computer does the transcoding. It transcodes to a very high bitrate mpeg2 format that is highly compatible with the PS3. It is also fairly easy for most computers to transcode to this codec in real time. The drawback is because it is such a high bitrate it can overwhelm wireless networks and cause stuttering and errors. It's not perfect but it works pretty seamlessly with my setup.

The iPad to iTV streaming is pretty cool and I can see that being a useful feature for many people. I guess my biggest issue is that they didn't take it to the next level. If this thing had apps that used iDevices as remotes and gamepads I would be all over this thing. I still might pick one up though because I would like to have an easy interface to my existing iTunes media on my TV. For 120 bucks its almost an impulse purchase.

I hope those other TV's you would want to plug it into have HDMI inputs because HDMI and optical audio output are the only connections the Apple TV has.

That's interesting about the media server, I didn't know that. Definitely explains the issues I'm having. Our setups are different, so I see your point.

It is sad to see them do away with the component ports, but I suppose whatever helps them hit the $100 price point.