Apple TV

Reviews: Multimedia

Apple TV

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Anthony Fiti
Kurtis
Apple
Apr. 2, 2007

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What's Lacking

While I do give Apple some slack since this is their first version of the Apple TV product, there are a bunch of things that I would consider to be missing. And no, one of them is not DVR (aka TiVo) functionality. Classic DVRs like the series 2 TiVo are on their way out because they cannot do HD, and they can't record digital cable without hooking the S2 TiVo up to it and using an IR blaster. So the only choice is the box through your cable company. The Series 3 product isn't mature enough yet - too many problems with cable cards is the single reason why you won't see Apple enter that market anytime soon.

The most glaring omission from the product is a way to purchase content directly from the iTunes store from your couch. There are pros and cons for this, the biggest con is needing a computer nearby to facilitate any transaction, or be willing to go into the next room or upstairs to buy that movie you want to watch. In comparison, my Xbox 360 from Microsoft is sitting right next to the Apple TV and it can buy television episodes and movies without a computer. However you have to use their point system to purchase the content (you buy points in blocks, and then spend them, instead of charging a credit card each time a purchase is made). Also, the 360 supports HD content, and I happened to have purchased the first South Park in HD and it looked nice.

The Apple TV device does not support most HD formats. Apple's store isn't selling any HD either, so you're forced to either rip DVDs illegally, or create your own home videos with a HD camcorder and encode them to H.264. Part of this also is the lack of horsepower in the unit - it can only decode 720p, or 1280x720, at 24fps (which is what movies are filmed at), if you want 30fps (television broadcast) then you have to cut down the resolution again to 960x540 (also known as 540p or HRHD or high resolution high definition), a reduction of 40% in terms of the pixel count.

One final note about the iTunes Store is that with movies, you're tethered to your computer, iPod or Apple TV. With music, you've always been able to burn a CD and then take that with you to your car or wherever you could play a CD. With movies and other video products, there is no way to watch them outside of the Apple ecosystem - you can't burn them to a DVD and take them to your car's rear seat entertainment system.

Volume control is another missing feature - I kept trying to hit the plus and minus buttons on the Apple remote and not hear the volume go up or down. I had to then reach for my TV remote and control the volume that way. It would be nice if the Apple TV could adjust its output volume upon request from the remote - it is a computer after all - but it doesn't seem like that's how they chose to attack that problem.

The remote is simple. A little too simple for me. If I'm watching a movie, TV show or video podcast and I want to know where I am in the video, I have to hit pause and unpause to pull up the progress indicator, there is no info button on the remote to pull up the onscreen controls.

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Page 6 of 7

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Page 1: Introduction
Page 2: First Looks
Page 3: Setup
Page 4: Initial Experience and Struggling with Streaming
Page 5: Testing
Page 6: What's Lacking
Page 7: Conclusion

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2 User Comments

1 - Posted by Kurtis on April 1, 2007 - 11:46 pm

Digg please:
http://digg.com/apple/Apple_TV_Full_Review_at_TheT...

2 - Posted by on December 31, 1969 - 6:00 pm

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