First Look: Apple TV 2.0 and iTunes Movie Rentals (photos, video)

[AppleInsider]

After suffering a year of media mockery and consumer indifference, Apple TV is poised to leverage its tight integration with iTunes to jump to the front of the line in living room media rentals. The best news: existing early adopters will gain all the new features via a software update without needing to replace or upgrade their existing hardware.

Steve Jobs originally floated Apple TV under the temporary moniker iTV back in the fall of 2006. In many ways, the device seemed to be a placeholder designed to inspire confidence in the company's ability to maintain parity with competitors' online movie sales. In parallel with the announcement, Apple upgraded iTunes video to "near DVD" quality, added Dolby Surround sound, and started into the movie sales business initially with only Disney as a partner.

After its official release following last years' Macworld Expo, Jobs described Apple TV as a hobby and later as a 'fourth leg' that he hoped would help hold up the company's platforms. Jobs told USA Today, "We have the Mac business, which is a $10 billion business, and music -- our iPod and iTunes business -- which is $10 billion. We hope the iPhone is the third leg on our chair, and maybe one day, Apple TV will be the fourth leg."

While the iPhone quickly established itself as a powerful force in the mobile industry, Apple TV didn't seem to get much attention at all. After appearing briefly in a TV ad showing a user moving iTunes video from his computer to an iPod to the living room TV, the device seemed to slip from Apple's radar and spent the better part of 2007 collecting dust in conspicuously low trafficked corners of Apple's otherwise busy retail stores.

What's New in Apple TV: Movies

The new software updates promise to solve a lot of the problems associated with consumers' lack of enthusiasm for Apple TV. For starters, there are now rental movies offered in both standard def and high-definition formats. Apple's movie studio support in iTunes has also expanded over the last year from one studio to all of the major movie studios, meaning there's far more content to choose from.

Even more importantly, Apple has upgraded the unit's software to both enhance the user interface and to make it far more powerful. The initial version of the software left it acting like a repeater for a desktop computer's iTunes library. Now, users can rent and buy movies, as well as buy music, music videos, and TV programs directly from the iTunes Store using the simple remote control. While music and video purchases can be synced back to a desktop iTunes library, just like the new WiFi Store on the iPod Touch and iPhone, video rentals ordered on Apple TV can't.

You can rent movies directly from iTunes for playback on iPods, but those can't be synced to the Apple TV. Therefore, you have to choose whether a rental you order is something you want to watch on TV or anywhere else, before you actually rent it. Given that rentals are $3.99 and $4.99, that decision isn't as deeply ponderous as it might initially seem to be.

A new menu system (below) presents Apple TV features in two columns: the first lists Movies, TV Shows, Music, Podcasts, Photos, YouTube, and Settings. Under Movies, it presents downloadable Trailers, your Rented Movies, a listing of Top Movies, Genres, and All HD titles, a Search, and a selection of My Movies.



Within any of the submenus, the movie title selection and browsing interface (below) is almost entirely graphical, with rows of title art that spin past similar to Cover Flow. The difference is that rather than only featuring one item from a selection as the Cover Flow does in iTunes or the Finder, Apple TV presents more than a half dozen options at once in each row, and quickly zips through additional titles when you scroll to the right. Families of content or genres of titles appear at the top.

Navigating the menus of movies is easy and fast.





A simple search feature (below) allows you to quickly find what you're looking for by typing just a letter or two, similar to the search features on iPods.



After selecting your movie (below), you can watch a preview trailer, or rent it in SD for $3.99 or in 720p HD quality, usually with 5.1 Dolby Digital audio, for a dollar more. The currently selected movie also presents recommendations of other related films you might want to consider. Once downloaded, a rental movie can be kept on file for a month. Once you start watching it, the title can be played any number of times within 24 hours before it expires.

The Apple TV's new HD playback delivers impressive video quality. Presented on what appeared to be a 50" Pioneer display, SD rentals looked very decent and the HD content was very good. Fast forwarding and pausing movies was smooth and crystal clear. The only obvious flaw seemed to be a snapping sound that would occasionally be played when video playback was exited for the menus.



What's New in Apple TV: Playback Enhancements

In addition to adding movie rentals, Apple TV also sports similar content search and direct download features for free YouTube and Podcasts, and purchased iTunes content including music, music videos, and TV shows. Downloading TV is so easy that the new software finally makes Apple TV a truly viable replacement for cable TV for users who only watch a handful of shows.

Playback controls are also significantly enhanced. In AppleInsider's earlier reviews of Apple TV, Some time spent with Apple TV -- an in-depth review, we counted its touchy remote playback control as an annoying flaw. Based on limited testing on the show floor, it appears the software update will dramatically improve things in that regard.

Pausing playback with the simple IR Apple Remote was instantaneous, and fast forward or review responded quickly and accurately, rather than suffering the current delays that make it difficult to review or skip through content without unintentionally overshooting the target. When playing a movie, the playback indicator now displays the chapter title, another nice bonus.

On page 2 of 2: What's New in Apple TV: Audio; What's New in Apple TV: Other Features; How Apple TV Compares; Apple TV Versus Vudu; Apple TV Versus Blu-Ray.

What's New in Apple TV: Audio

As noted in Something in the Air: Anticipating Macworld 2008, the Apple TV hardware arrived last year with support for 5.1 audio and HD video, it just needed a software update and content that took full advantage of its innate capabilities. The new software now enables pass though of Dolby Digital sound for output over HDMI or the unit's Toslink optical audio outputs, so movies with high quality sound tracks can be played back through a receiver supporting Dolby Digital encoding and output to surround sound multi-channel speaker systems.

Previously, the best audio Apple TV could deliver from iTunes content was the older Dolby Surround, which mixes multiple channels of audio over a stereo pair. That's the same technology used by the Nintendo Wii to enhance surround audio; now Apple TV can deliver the same audio quality as a high quality DVD player.

Another new audio feature is support for AirTunes (below). Using an Airport Express Base Station, Apple TV can now wirelessly stream audio out to the same speakers used to distribute music from iTunes.



What's New in Apple TV: Other Features

The new software update will also support viewing photos from Yahoos!' Flickr and Apple's .Mac Web Galleries, in addition to existing support for iPhoto. Although not confirmed by Apple representatives, the new Apple TV software is almost certainly based upon Leopard.

Among other things, this upgrade appears to have inherited Leopard's parental controls for content playback, including TV and movie ratings, and music or podcasts tagged as explicit.

How Apple TV Compares

With the new software update, Apple TV moves to challenge competing movie rental devices like the Vudu, the Amazon UnBox partnership with TiVo, and Microsoft's Xbox Live online service.

Last year, the lack of HD content and rental features relegated Apple TV to use as a simple media extender for iPhoto graphics and iTunes music, TV, and movies. Despite the weaknesses of its TV box, Apple managed to swallow 91% of the video downloads business, which included 99% of the paid TV downloads and 42% of all movie downloads.

That left Apple the largest movie download vendor in 2007, with twice the share of second place Movielink (21%) which has been in business since 2002, and well ahead of Cinemalink (15%) and Vongo (15%). All other movie download sources fought over the remaining 7%, according to data published in the last quarter by NPD reflecting sales from early 2007, as presentedin Apple TV Digital Disruption at Work: iTunes Takes 91% of Video Download Market.

Over the last two years, Apple's iTunes video downloads haven't matched its music sales (now passing 4 billion tracks), but have been growing at a faster pace. Between January 2006 and 2007, Apple doubled its iTunes cumulative song sales from one billion to two billion, but more than doubled video sales from 15 million to over 50 million downloads. This year, Jobs reported sales of 125 million TV shows and 7 million movies, significantly more than a 200% increase.

Apple TV Versus Vudu

Now that Apple has both rentals and HD content lined up, it shouldn't have any problem maintaining a strong showing in the video download business. The discounted price of the Apple TV hardware to $229 will provide stiff competition to the $399 Vudo, which only rents or purchases downloadable movies, and does not interface with a computer for photos or music. Vudu does now sell selected TV content.

The Vudo does offer higher resolution 1080p movies however. Whether Vudu can deliver a noticeable improvement still remains to be seen, as existing HD Vudu content is commonly so heavily compressed that the difference in top native resolution, 720p to 1080p, visibly doesn't matter. The difference between 720p content and 1080p content is typically only visible on sets over 50", particularly when viewed from a ten foot distance.

For download devices like Apple TV and Vudu, 720p can offer high quality video at reasonable compression settings; the additional pixels of 1080p requires more compression to deliver over the Internet, which results in either no obvious improvement or far longer download times. Vudu attempts to solve this issue by turning their box into a peer-to-peer network node, so that your Internet connection is used to speed the download of movies to your neighbors. Apple's iTunes uploads are all centrally downloaded using servers Apple pays to use. Vudu subscribers also have to have a very fast Internet connection; the company recommends having 2 to 4 MB service for SD and HD downloads, respectively.

Apple TV Versus Blu-Ray

The superiority of 1080p is more evident on less aggressively compressed HD content such as Blu-Ray HD disc. Consumers, however, haven't responded enthusiastically to to the heavily DRMed new HD disc formats, with HD-DVD going down in flames in the last few months and Blu-Ray only maintaining a niche audience with slower growth than the considerably cheaper alternative offered by upscaling DVD players.

While Apple's new HD iTunes content can't rival the specification numbers of a directly read optical disc, the convenience, rental options, and new jump in quality will make it a compelling alternative to Blu-Ray, particularly for users with HDTVs under 50", as noted in Why Low Def is the New HD.

Apple TV and movie downloads are also considerably less expensive, although iTunes isn't going to be selling any HD movies, only offering them for rent. Because Apple TV offers so much beyond movie rentals, it can also serve as an accompanying content source for users who buy Blu-Ray players such as the Sony Playstation 3.

Once Apple releases the new Apple TV update, scheduled for the end of the month, AppleInsider will present a closer look at the new features.

[ View this article at AppleInsider.com ]

[Ireland]

I notice they are using Pioneer plasma displays.

It's official, when Apple makes their televisions they'll be "plasma".. thank f**k.

[kaioslider]

Well, as far as I'm concerned Apple got it right this time. Just ordered my AppleTV. I think I'll be getting one for my folks for their new HD TV too, less for the movies - in their case - as for easy viewing of their photos and music from their mac.

[luna23255]

I just want to say you're awesome for picking The Simpsons movie as a picture example.

[razorpit]

You know I wish the rental system was set up in such a way that you could only rent a few movies at a time (2-3) a la Netflix and keep them as long as you would like then return them "digitally" one at a time once you are done with them. I don't like the whole 24 hour thing once you start watching it. To me this doesn't seem very consumer friendly. There has been more than one occasion which my wife and I started a movie Friday night and had to wait until Sunday to finish it up.

[digitalclips]

Does anyone know when we might see the new rental system in iTunes? Or is it there and I am missing it! I do have the software update.

[gordy]

I'm looking forward to this upgrade; however, it appears that AppleTV is playing second fiddle for the second year in a row...first to iPhone and now to MBA.

With onTV movie rentals and TV purchases, I am now seriously considering ditching cable. I wish Apple would give this product the spotlight for once, it's really great. AppleTV 2.0 has dropped from the Apple home page.

[dan.blanchard]

One thing that no one seems to be mentioning is that you won't be able to get HD version of TV shows. All of the preview movies only show HD options on the movie side, and that really pains me. I was really hoping to get rid of my cable TV subscription and just get season passes to the shows I like, but I have an HDTV for a reason, and am not going to watch HD shows in SD. There are, of course, places on the intratubes to find free downloads of HD shows, but since Apple TV cannot play MKV files at 720p—even when it's hacked, it just doesn't have the horsepower—I was hoping to save a lot of transcoding time and be able to do things the legal way. Oh well. At least the HD movie rentals mean Comcast will never get any money from me for on-demand content again.

[gordy]

I noticed there were no HD TV options, but I don't have HD cable, so it didn't matter in my final analysis. My only HD content is OTA, FWIW.

[freakboy]

Originally Posted by dan.blanchard

One thing that no one seems to be mentioning is that you won't be able to get HD version of TV shows. All of the preview movies only show HD options on the movie side, and that really pains me. I was really hoping to get rid of my cable TV subscription and just get season passes to the shows I like, but I have an HDTV for a reason, and am not going to watch HD shows in SD. There are, of course, places on the intratubes to find free downloads of HD shows, but since Apple TV cannot play MKV files at 720p—even when it's hacked, it just doesn't have the horsepower—I was hoping to save a lot of transcoding time and be able to do things the legal way. Oh well. At least the HD movie rentals mean Comcast will never get any money from me for on-demand content again.

yeah i had the same thought. If I could get PBS and BBC streams, I could pretty much get rid of cable. I'd pay some serious money for that. Having *any* HD content to boot would be great. It'd be 100x better than cable: watch good shows when you want. I hadn't had cable for a long time and I have to say I'm really dissapointed. The interface on the cable box is ludicrously unresponsive, the "in demand' features take so long to preview, they're useless.

There is a huge opportunity for someone to create a 'cable over internet' service that just lets people drop their cable in return for just stations they want to watch. Off the top of my head, of the 100s of stations on cable, I could think of 9 I'd actually want. (PBS, BBC, CBS,NBC,ABC,FOX,ESPN, TNT(? maybe) SCIFI. If i could get that service on demand, i'd pay 40$ a month for it. In a HEARTBEAT. It would be cheaper and better than cable is now.

[EMoeller]

I bought AppleTV last year and every time I have a party it comes on to play the playlists I compose for the party. It is never long before everyone wants to play with it and it turns into great fun with everyone taking turns browsing my album collection and sometimes ordering iTunes for the party. Apple missed a huge opportunity to market this from the iTunes rather than the video media side.

Great news that I am not obsolete - Apple does it again with a free software upgrade to keep its hardware at the top.

I have also just started using Nullriver's MediaLink with my PS3 and I must say for a first stab it provides a lot of cross functionality between my Powerbook G4 and the PS3. It will be interesting to compare the two (AppleTV and MediaLInk via PS3) once the new Apple software comes out.

http://www.nullriver.com/index/products/medialink


Regards,

Eric

[Ireland]

Originally Posted by dan.blanchard

One thing that no one seems to be mentioning is that you won't be able to get HD version of TV shows. All of the preview movies only show HD options on the movie side, and that really pains me. I was really hoping to get rid of my cable TV subscription and just get season passes to the shows I like, but I have an HDTV for a reason, and am not going to watch HD shows in SD. There are, of course, places on the intratubes to find free downloads of HD shows, but since Apple TV cannot play MKV files at 720p—even when it's hacked, it just doesn't have the horsepower—I was hoping to save a lot of transcoding time and be able to do things the legal way. Oh well. At least the HD movie rentals mean Comcast will never get any money from me for on-demand content again.

Well HD movies are a way bigger deal. Most people would be quite comfortable watching a TV Show in standard def.

Kind of pissed they didn't add a high end model with a DVD slot. I would like an Apple TV, but the last thing I want is "another" device under the TV. Yet another example of Apple's selective listening. I like the way Steve always thanks the customers, but then just ignores them on various things. Get a PC

[solipsism]

Originally Posted by dan.blanchard

One thing that no one seems to be mentioning is that you won't be able to get HD version of TV shows. All of the preview movies only show HD options on the movie side, and that really pains me. I was really hoping to get rid of my cable TV subscription and just get season passes to the shows I like, but I have an HDTV for a reason, and am not going to watch HD shows in SD. There are, of course, places on the intratubes to find free downloads of HD shows, but since Apple TV cannot play MKV files at 720p—even when it's hacked, it just doesn't have the horsepower—I was hoping to save a lot of transcoding time and be able to do things the legal way. Oh well. At least the HD movie rentals mean Comcast will never get any money from me for on-demand content again.

And HD movies can only be rented and only rented via the AppleTV. It is my opinion this has to do with the iPods inability to play HD content.

[suhail]

Great! This is a HUGE step from the previous ATV, I can't wait. This news is way more important to me than the MacBook Anorexia.

[Galley]

Prices on refurbished Apple TVs have also dropped. The 40GB model is $179.00 and the 160 gigger is $279.00. I ordered a 160 this afternoon, and it shipped this evening.

[JeffDM]

I think it's good that Jobs said that the industry, Apple included, missed the mark so far. If today's announced improvements are as claimed, Apple might have a hit here.

[GeekLawyer]

Originally Posted by Ireland

Kind of pissed they didn't add a high end model with a DVD slot. I would like an Apple TV, but the last thing I want is "another" device under the TV. Yet another example of Apple's selective listening. I like the way Steve always thanks the customers, but then just ignores them on various things.

Apple didn't even put a DVD drive in its new gotta-have-it laptop. There's a reason for that. Pieces of plastic are just about done as a means of delivering bits and bytes of content. Eight tracks, cassette tapes, floppy disks: over. DVDs: done. I won't commit to a BD player because I know their run will be even shorter than DVD's media dominance.

As for the AppleTV being just another device under the TV... wow. Not by a long-shot. It's such an elegant piece of hardware that it sits on the platform with the HDTV. Anyway, who knows that the future will bring? For people who just need to have a DVD player, maybe the MBAir is giving us a preview of how our AppleTVs might someday play DVD content through the use of Remote Disc technology? That would be an outstanding idea for AppleTV2.1...

In my mind, the announcements concerning the iTunes/AppleTV universe were the highlight of the keynote and make me feel good about the direction of third-wave content delivery at Apple.

[gordy]

Time to order a 160...the 40 can move to the bedroom.

Oh, and optical media is dying a slow death. I told that guy that DVD/HD-DVD/BR would never hit AppleTV.

[JeffDM]

Originally Posted by EMoeller

I bought AppleTV last year and every time I have a party it comes on to play the playlists I compose for the party. It is never long before everyone wants to play with it and it turns into great fun with everyone taking turns browsing my album collection and sometimes ordering iTunes for the party. Apple missed a huge opportunity to market this from the iTunes rather than the video media side.

Great news that I am not obsolete - Apple does it again with a free software upgrade to keep its hardware at the top.

I have also just started using Nullriver's MediaLink with my PS3 and I must say for a first stab it provides a lot of cross functionality between my Powerbook G4 and the PS3. It will be interesting to compare the two (AppleTV and MediaLInk via PS3) once the new Apple software comes out.

http://www.nullriver.com/index/products/medialink

Thanks, I'll have to try that as a stop-gap. It's affordable enough too that I wouldn't think it's a wasted expense.

[teckstud]

Sadly, AppleTV has become basically an empty digital jukebox whose sole purpose is to give money continually to Apple via iTunes. It could have been so much more. But unfortunately there is no browser, no streaming DVD's from your computer, no taping of on-air programming, ripping my own DVD's, and on and on. I know it's those damn greedy movie studios and the government again that are forcing me to spend money on iTunes. Oh well- it could have been a video revolution.

[solipsism]

Originally Posted by teckstud

Sadly, AppleTV has become simply an empty digital jukebox whose sole purpose is to give money continually to Apple via iTunes. It could have been so much more. But unfortunately there is no browser, no streaming DVD's from your computer, no taping of on-air programming, ripping my own DVD's, and on and on. I know it's those damn greedy movie studios and the government again that are forcing me to spend money on iTunes. Oh well- it could have been a video revolution.

Speaking of streaming DVDs, now that we know Apple has the ability to share an optical drive with Remote Disc they should have added that as a new feature.

[gordy]

This whole thing we call media wouldn't be here if it weren't for the 'greedy movie studios', so, what's your real point? Browser? Why? DVDs? Why? DVR? Huh? AppleTV has always worked...now it works on a whole new level.

[mrpiddly]

no browser

That would be fun with the apple remote. [sarcasm]

no streaming DVD's from your computer

why would you want to? Most people have some device hooked up to their tv that supports dvd playback. Going from the computer to the tv would be pretty worthless, but going from the Tv's dvd player to the computer might be interesting.

no taping of on-air programming

good point, that is probably my most desired feature. But thinking about it, i already have a DVR. I guess if apple let recorded tv shows sync back to the computer it would be good, but that would also would be competition for them.

ripping my own DVD's

???

[jonnoh2]

Originally Posted by digitalclips

Does anyone know when we might see the new rental system in iTunes? Or is it there and I am missing it! I do have the software update.

I was wondering about that too. Did you notice there was a "Top Rentals" box on the iTunes Store home screen as well?

[teckstud]

Originally Posted by mrpiddly

That would be fun with the apple remote. [sarcasm] You could via either a bluetooth keyboard or keyboard in the interface like the youtube one. You could shop Amazon or some where else for something beside iTunes content.



why would you want to?
Because you could eliminate it and have one less device. And the ATV has no drive- most computers do.
Most people have some device hooked up to their tv that supports dvd playback. Going from the computer to the tv would be pretty worthless, but going from the Tv's dvd player to the computer might be interesting.



good point, that is probably my most desired feature. But thinking about it, i already have a DVR. I guess if apple let recorded tv shows sync back to the computer it would be good, but that would also would be competition for them.



???

You can ripp your CD's to iTunes but not your DVDs. Again you have to use either handbrake or of course buy it again from iTunes! But the government won't let iTunes do it but will let Handbrake.

[teckstud]

Originally Posted by gordy

This whole thing we call media wouldn't be here if it weren't for the 'greedy movie studios', so, what's your real point? Browser? Why? DVDs? Why? DVR? Huh? AppleTV has always worked...now it works on a whole new level.

Why because there are now more ways to pay for things on iTunes?

[wolfneuralnet]

I have yet to see whether this device will load VIDEO_TS files like Front Row currently does. Having access to those files on another machine would be great, or at least temporarily transferring them to the AppleTV. I can't stand having to convert them to another format - waste of time.

Very hard to figure some of this out from the descriptions we are getting from the Expo...

[JeffDM]

Originally Posted by teckstud

Why because there are now more ways to pay for things on iTunes?

What other VOD system does much better than that? Whether you go through Comcast, Microsoft's Xbox Live, VUDU, Netflix, they are all systems to get those companies more money. I really don't see why one box has to do absolutely everything, it's probably not going to happen anyway. You can get close with an HTPC, but you either input more work or more money to get everything. Apparently you can get a satellite tuner card for HTPCs now, but it must be with Vista Media Center and a compatible TV.

Fox announced the new movie DVDs that include an iPod compatible file already on them, so you get the best of both worlds at no extra cost.

[binarystorm]

I am waiting for iSight to be integrated into AppleTV with iChat and Skype integration. Mainly for video with distance family.

[suhail]

Originally Posted by Galley

Prices on refurbished Apple TVs have also dropped. The 40GB model is $179.00 and the 160 gigger is $279.00. I ordered a 160 this afternoon, and it shipped this evening.

nice! now you'll have to wait two weeks till the firmware is available.

[solipsism]

Originally Posted by binarystorm

I am waiting for iSight to be integrated into AppleTV with iChat and Skype integration. Mainly for video with distance family.

My AppleTV is about 3 feet off the ground behind glass. How exactly would an integrated iSight camera work?

[solipsism]

Rentals and new movies are available in iTunes

[Delfoniq]

The price for a refurbished unit is $199 not $179.

http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPL...nplm=FA711LL/A

BTW the rental feature on iTunes has been enabled .

[gordy]

Originally Posted by teckstud

Why because there are now more ways to pay for things on iTunes?

Nope, because you can now pay for them from AppleTV in the den--instead of iTunes. This, coupled with EyeTV 3 is really making Comcast seem less necessary in my world.

[Cory Bauer]

Originally Posted by teckstud

Sadly, AppleTV has become basically an empty digital jukebox whose sole purpose is to give money continually to Apple via iTunes. It could have been so much more. But unfortunately there is no browser, no streaming DVD's from your computer, no taping of on-air programming, ripping my own DVD's, and on and on. I know it's those damn greedy movie studios and the government again that are forcing me to spend money on iTunes. Oh well- it could have been a video revolution.

Honestly, if you want to watch your DVDs, use your freakin' DVD player. It takes 1-2 hours to rip a DVD, and probably longer if it was done via the Apple TV's paltry little processor; it takes 30 seconds to pull a DVD from your shelf and put it in your DVD player. Whatever time you save by having all of your films listed digitally is negated by the hundreds of hours you'd spend to get them there.

[Feynman]

.....the AppleTV would play video_ts files. I would buy one in a heart beat!

[Peruchito]

Originally Posted by solipsism

My AppleTV is about 3 feet off the ground behind glass. How exactly would an integrated iSight camera work?

i actually like that idea. you could connect one of those old isight cams, and video conference with the tv. or a wireless isight that can be accessed by any machine on your home network. would be great for me to put in the baby's room instead for the baby monitor.

[Feynman]

Originally Posted by Cory Bauer

Honestly, if you want to watch your DVDs, use your freakin' DVD player. It takes 1-2 hours to rip a DVD, and probably longer if it was done via the Apple TV's paltry little processor; it takes 30 seconds to pull a DVD from your shelf and put it in your DVD player. Whatever time you save by having all of your films listed digitally is negated by the hundreds of hours you'd spend to get them there.

Actually no it does not take 1 to 2 hours to rip a DVD. I have ripped my entire collection in complete RAW quality, uncompressed and it took me a couple weekends.

There are lots of reasons to justify doing this, convenience, not having to worry about scratching the DVDs, etc. All big factors when you have kids (which I don't yet).

Take for example the Walt Disney Treasures DVD sets. They are very limited. And how much do kids like to get their hands on things and just start hacking around? They rip stuff, bite stuff, al without even really realizing what their doing. Having all the DVDs digitally on an external drive allows you to never have to worry about these things.

[Cory Bauer]

Originally Posted by Feynman

Actually no it does not take 1 to 2 hours to rip a DVD. I have ripped my entire collection in complete RAW quality, uncompressed and it took me a couple weekends.

There are lots of reasons to justify doing this, convenience, not having to worry about scratching the DVDs, etc. All big factors when you have kids (which I don't yet).

Take for example the Walt Disney Treasures DVD sets. They are very limited. And how much do kids like to get their hands on things and just start hacking around? They rip stuff, bite stuff, al without even really realizing what their doing. Having all the DVDs digitally on an external drive allows you to never have to worry about these things.

It's a neat concept, and those are good reasons for doing it, but 99.9% of people aren't willing to spend days on end ripping their collection, so doubling the size and cost of the Apple TV to include a disc drive would be a poor choice on Apple's part. Moreover, Apple could kiss their studio support goodbye if they provided a free means of bypassing DVD copyright protection, not to mention a hefty lawsuit. Besides, the Apple TV only has a 40 or 160GB hard drive — with no means of adding more storage — so it's not like there's anywhere to put the movies you can't rip anyhow. By the time Apple included a Blu-Ray drive, 1TB of storage, and everything else that's already in the Apple TV, you'd be talking about a niche product that's more expensive than most people in that niche are even willing to spend. They'd say, "why would I spend $xxxx on a set top box when I could buy a home theatre pc that does all that and more for $xxx?".

[melgross]

Originally Posted by teckstud

Why because there are now more ways to pay for things on iTunes?

What's the difference how, where, or to whom you pay?

In the end, you pay. That's all that matters.

The only around it is to steal content. You're not suggesting that, so what's the problem?