I hope they improve the service soon. Previews work great, but have tried to rent a movie a few times and it failed every time. Long downloads, or it starts only to stop about 3 mins in. I even ran a network connection to the box, same issue. (Screaming network connection here at the home)
Love the concept, just thinking that the delivery systems are not quite ready.
If you're having problems with insanely long download times, check to see if you're using OpenDNS or GoogleDNS. If you are, revert to your ISP's local DNS servers and you're likely to be shocked at the improvement. The problem is in way Akamai uses location intelligence based on your DNS server name to point you to the closest/fastest entry point to their 'wormhole'.
I did this and download times dropped from 30 hours to 'ready to play in 2 minutes'.
I hope they improve the service soon. Previews work great, but have tried to rent a movie a few times and it failed every time. Long downloads, or it starts only to stop about 3 mins in. I even ran a network connection to the box, same issue. (Screaming network connection here at the home)
Love the concept, just thinking that the delivery systems are not quite ready.
Someone above pointed out the idea of checking your DNS server. Perhaps that would work for some people, but it doesn't help me. Something that did seem to help, though, is to rent in standard definition instead of HD. Obviously, there's a lot less data to stream in that case, and movies are ready to play more quickly and generally perform without a hitch thereafter. As a bonus, it costs a buck less. Of course, that won't help you for the cases where you WANT to watch in HD. Some people want HD all the time. I'm not so discriminating. If the movie is anything but a visual feast (e.g. Avatar, the Matrix, Lord of the Rings) I'm fine with standard definition.
I hope they improve the service soon. Previews work great, but have tried to rent a movie a few times and it failed every time. Long downloads, or it starts only to stop about 3 mins in. I even ran a network connection to the box, same issue. (Screaming network connection here at the home)
Love the concept, just thinking that the delivery systems are not quite ready.
I have mine on WiFi and it has never taken more than a minute (usually more like 30 seconds) for a HD movie to start streaming. Never had any interruptions during playback either.
We have a 16mb connection from AT&T U-verse which is in no way extraordinary today.
Well I'm an Apple user, I use one hell of a lot of Apple products and I've got a Blu Ray player.
Just because you use Apple products does not mean you won't own Blu Ray players etc!
Me too. I have a Mac, iPod, original AppleTV and I also have Blu-ray. AppleTV for ripped movies, Blu-ray for movies to own. I have a 2 TB hard drive and running out of disk space. For me, it is not a big deal Apple does not include Blu-ray because I can get it from someone else.
Apple just took the hard drive out of the Apple TV so I do not see them adding it back in. There is no particular reason to add an optical disk to the player, it just raises the cost of the device to way over $99 .
Does it? I recently bought a Sony S570 Blu-ray player that has networking and WiFi built in. I can stream Pandora as well as NetFlix and Amazon on-demand video and a whole bunch of other services Sony has hooked up with. The price? $138. To me, that's a much better deal than $99 for Apple TV (or $99 for another Apple Express thingee) and the thing that's really great about it is that I'm not locked into one content supplier.
And while I realize that Apple is primarily in the store business to sell hardware, I think it would make sense for Apple to make the iTunes store available on these types of devices.
Does it? I recently bought a Sony S570 Blu-ray player that has networking and WiFi built in. I can stream Pandora as well as NetFlix and Amazon on-demand video and a whole bunch of other services Sony has hooked up with. The price? $138. To me, that's a much better deal than $99 for Apple TV (or $99 for another Apple Express thingee) and the thing that's really great about it is that I'm not locked into one content supplier.
And while I realize that Apple is primarily in the store business to sell hardware, I think it would make sense for Apple to make the iTunes store available on these types of devices.
For people in the Apple bubble.. Own an iPhone or iPod or iPad or Mac then ATV is best for those kind of people.
For people in the Apple bubble.. Own an iPhone or iPod or iPad or Mac then ATV is best for those kind of people.
More like people in the iTunes store bubble. I have an original AppleTV but have never bought media from iTunes. AppleTV and Blu-ray does Netflix. Our AppleTV gets used more due to more movies but Blu-ray has better picture quality. Our family own a Mac, iPod, iPad and it's a close call on what is best.
Meanwhile, Blu-Ray players going for around the same price as Apple TV with similar internet capabilities in addition to backwards compatibility are really still doing quite okay...
Blu-Ray is an outstanding transition format. It covers DVD's of yesterday, Blu-Rays of today and streaming of tomorrow. It covers a lot of bases and truly offers the best audio and video experience of any format out there right now. It won't be going away anytime soon. Blu-Ray is a bona fide hit among consumers, being adopted at a rate faster than DVD players were ever adopted. Netflix is a huge part of that, again, for discs that work today and streaming for tomorrow.
Not so bad for a "bag of hurt..."
I still think Blu-Ray is a great product that only stands to gain more ground now that pricing has truly come down to consumer-friendly levels. Apparently I'm not the only one.
Well, that's 999,900 more sold than Google TV's...
Google TV really is a different type of product. The comparisons are a little silly. None the less, Google TV is still a terrible, awful product. If you want to talk about a real "bag of hurt," start talking Google TV.
Does it? I recently bought a Sony S570 Blu-ray player that has networking and WiFi built in. I can stream Pandora as well as NetFlix and Amazon on-demand video and a whole bunch of other services Sony has hooked up with. The price? $138. To me, that's a much better deal than $99 for Apple TV (or $99 for another Apple Express thingee) and the thing that's really great about it is that I'm not locked into one content supplier.
And while I realize that Apple is primarily in the store business to sell hardware, I think it would make sense for Apple to make the iTunes store available on these types of devices.
I have this player as well. Don't forget to add that you've also had Hulu Plus capability since day 1.
Not to mention built in DLNA capabilities that allow you to access music, pictures and video from your home network. Mine works great and I use it all the time. I didn't even have to set it up, it was just there when I turned the player on. I can also play .mkv files on it.
Meanwhile, Blu-Ray players going for around the same price as Apple TV with similar internet capabilities in addition to backwards compatibility are really still doing quite okay...
Having similar internet capabilities isn?t the same as having as useful or usable internet capabilities. Exhibit A: GoogleTV, which actually does a whole lot more if you create a spec sheet between the two products.
BTW, have you used a $99 Blu-ray player? If you do, note how long it takes to load a disc, the noise from the drive, the blocking, freezing at odd times, not to mention the incompatibility with newer discs and likelihood of HW failure. You get what you pay for.
Quote:
Blu-Ray is an outstanding transition format. It covers DVD's of yesterday, Blu-Rays of today and streaming of tomorrow. It covers a lot of bases and truly offers the best audio and video experience of any format out there right now. It won't be going away anytime soon. Blu-Ray is a bona fide hit among consumers, being adopted at a rate faster than DVD players were ever adopted. Netflix is a huge part of that, again, for discs that work today and streaming for tomorrow.
Bu-ray is great for the HEC, but not for the average ?PC?. It also doesn?t mean every fraking device should come with a Blu-ray drive.
BTW, Bu-ray isn?t a huge hit with DVD outselling Blu-rays and with streaming media far exceeding Blu-ray around the world, in both number of videos and total streaming of videos.
Get back to me when Apple TV hits 10% of those numbers. Until then, Apple's VERY smart to keep it a hobby.
So the single product AppleTV can?t be a success unless it sells 1/10th the units as all Blu-ray players sold around the world. How does that possibly make sense?
I still don't see why they don't include a blu-ray/dvd/cd player and internal storage. I suppose it's price point. But they could offer an "AppleTVPlus" or something for $299.
no blu/DVD because they set up all that download stuff and see that and streaming as the future. They tried the whole storage thing and it didn't sell plus DVR etc would require licensing of tech.
Despite what mr Wu says, one million units of this 'toy' in a quarter is still impressive. Especially if it continues at even half that rate. The point of this item is to push Apple's rentals etc. If they can show volume then they can get more networks on board push for a lower price or even a subscription of some kind (say like a season rental pass for $15 for SD instead of the $22 it would cost you one by one). Showing usage might also convince the nets to loosen up the rental restrictions. And who knows perhaps this would help them get their heads out of their butts and start crediting show buy back with proceeds from rentals and buys online rather than continuing to only look at the antiquated Nielsen system. Then fewer decent scripted shows would bite it two eps in.
Quote:
Originally Posted by AppleAddict2011
The folks buying it don't really expect a finished product.
Hardly. The folks buying this are 99.9% buying it because of what it is. They are not the ubergeek know it alls that hang out on boards like this proclaiming that everything sucks because it is not how they would do it, when they would do it at the price they would pay for it. The same geeks that don't get the concept that Apple et al are about money and sometimes that means making for the masses. And the masses seem to fine with the Apple TV just the way it is. They didnt get it because of what it could be in the future but what it is now.
Having similar internet capabilities isn?t the same as having as useful or usable internet capabilities. Exhibit A: GoogleTV, which actually does a whole lot more if you create a spec sheet between the two products.
BTW, have you used a $99 Blu-ray player? If you do, note how long it takes to load a disc, the noise from the drive, the blocking, freezing at odd times, not to mention the incompatibility with newer discs and likelihood of HW failure. You get what you pay for.
Bu-ray is great for the HEC, but not for the average ?PC?. It also doesn?t mean every fraking device should come with a Blu-ray drive.
BTW, Bu-ray isn?t a huge hit with DVD outselling Blu-rays and with streaming media far exceeding Blu-ray around the world, in both number of videos and total streaming of videos.
So the single product AppleTV can?t be a success unless it sells 1/10th the units as all Blu-ray players sold around the world. How does that possibly make sense?
The newer players do not take near as long to load discs as they used to. Blame that on Hollywood anyways as it has everything to do with the endless anti-piracy checks occurring on disc and player simultaneously. It's no worse than buffering of streaming media.
My Sony BDP-S570 loads discs nearly instantly now and I've never had issues with discs not playing on any player I've owned, including the very first Blu-Ray player on the market which I still have on a TV, the Sony BDP-S1. Nowadays, if you have wi-fi built in, you should be getting semi-regular firmware updates that cover these bases. Apple products are no exception to update rules.
Blu-Ray IS a huge hit. Just because DVD's still outsell Blu-Ray (almost 15 years of market penetration on players will help with that...). As said, Blu-Ray players are being adopted at a faster rate than DVD players were. Was DVD not a hit? And again, what's great about these players is that they cover yesterday with DVD, today with Blu-Ray and all that streaming your talking about. It's a great product that will aptly help to usher in the streaming-only age.
1 million units given Apple's rabid fan-boy base and this holiday shopping season certainly isn't a failure, and one could suggest it's a success in some ways, but it's certainly not meaningful in any way yet. I'm not trying to suggest that it's a horrible product. It isn't. But it's a strange product. It's at the same time not up to par with today's technological standards as well as being a bit ahead of its time. The market most likely to latch on to such a product today isn't interested in it as it's too limited in terms of handling files and outputting HD audio and video. There are some really cool ideas behind Apple TV, but it's just not set to be a mainstream hit anytime soon. Apps and gaming could very well change that though.
And I never said anything about every product containing an optical drive of any sort. Wrong guy.
I hope they improve the service soon. Previews work great, but have tried to rent a movie a few times and it failed every time. Long downloads, or it starts only to stop about 3 mins in. I even ran a network connection to the box, same issue. (Screaming network connection here at the home)
It may not have anything to do with iTunes or the AppleTV. Others have pointed out the whole DNS issue. But there is also the question of your ISP throttling large downloads. Some of them are doing it under the assumption that you are doing bit torrents etc. The notion that it could be a totally legal download escaped their brains when they set up their computers to jack speeds down on you.
There are some really cool ideas behind Apple TV, but it's just not set to be a mainstream hit anytime soon. Apps and gaming could very well change that though.
The AppleTV doesn?t have to be a huge hit, because it?s not the AppleTV against all Blu-ray players. The AppleTV is just single product. It?s the easiest way to stream Netflix, but outside of that it?s mostly just an iPod for your HEC.
As I stated, Blu-ray is great for the HEC, but Apple doesn?t sell HEC equipment except for the AppleTV. outside of portable devices that make no sense for an optical drive, it sells ?PCs?, most of which are notebooks which use 9.5mm optical drives that would $500+ for Blu-ray upgrade. However, I have a feeling that future Mac notebooks will be excluding the optical drive altogether.
Then there is there is their iTunes Store video and there lack of OS and professional app support for Blu-ray. There really is no reason to think Apple will ever include Blu-ray HW in their products.
That said, if Apple releases an SDK for the AppleTV this $99 device could be a huge hit for the 2011 holidays in a way that is currently unimaginable.
Quote:
And I never said anything about every product containing an optical drive of any sort. Wrong guy.
Maybe we could use the Magic Trackpad for that? The controllers could be on the screen and we use the trackpad to control,zoom etc.
Just a thought!
Why would you suggest using a MacOs device when the AppleTv is based on iOS and there are iOS devices that could be used. And likely will be at the point that Apple opens up the ecosystem for apps on the AppleTV. Apps will likely be designed for the tv as a kind of display and the iPod, phone, pad as the controller. But it will likely be a limited set as many apps would have no benefit from such a system. They are meant to be mobile etc
Quote:
Originally Posted by habi
But where is the content??? It could be a nice box to own IF there was any content here in EUROPE.
Thank the studios for that. Foreign broadcast, etc rights are a huge moneymaker. The studios negotiate piece meal so ey can make the most money. And since they, not Apple, Netflix have all the power in this game they get what they want while we are the losers in the end.
Comments
I hope they improve the service soon. Previews work great, but have tried to rent a movie a few times and it failed every time. Long downloads, or it starts only to stop about 3 mins in. I even ran a network connection to the box, same issue. (Screaming network connection here at the home)
Love the concept, just thinking that the delivery systems are not quite ready.
If you're having problems with insanely long download times, check to see if you're using OpenDNS or GoogleDNS. If you are, revert to your ISP's local DNS servers and you're likely to be shocked at the improvement. The problem is in way Akamai uses location intelligence based on your DNS server name to point you to the closest/fastest entry point to their 'wormhole'.
I did this and download times dropped from 30 hours to 'ready to play in 2 minutes'.
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles...oogle_dns.html
I hope they improve the service soon. Previews work great, but have tried to rent a movie a few times and it failed every time. Long downloads, or it starts only to stop about 3 mins in. I even ran a network connection to the box, same issue. (Screaming network connection here at the home)
Love the concept, just thinking that the delivery systems are not quite ready.
Someone above pointed out the idea of checking your DNS server. Perhaps that would work for some people, but it doesn't help me. Something that did seem to help, though, is to rent in standard definition instead of HD. Obviously, there's a lot less data to stream in that case, and movies are ready to play more quickly and generally perform without a hitch thereafter. As a bonus, it costs a buck less. Of course, that won't help you for the cases where you WANT to watch in HD. Some people want HD all the time. I'm not so discriminating. If the movie is anything but a visual feast (e.g. Avatar, the Matrix, Lord of the Rings) I'm fine with standard definition.
Thompson
I hope they improve the service soon. Previews work great, but have tried to rent a movie a few times and it failed every time. Long downloads, or it starts only to stop about 3 mins in. I even ran a network connection to the box, same issue. (Screaming network connection here at the home)
Love the concept, just thinking that the delivery systems are not quite ready.
I have mine on WiFi and it has never taken more than a minute (usually more like 30 seconds) for a HD movie to start streaming. Never had any interruptions during playback either.
We have a 16mb connection from AT&T U-verse which is in no way extraordinary today.
Matt
Well I'm an Apple user, I use one hell of a lot of Apple products and I've got a Blu Ray player.
Just because you use Apple products does not mean you won't own Blu Ray players etc!
Me too. I have a Mac, iPod, original AppleTV and I also have Blu-ray. AppleTV for ripped movies, Blu-ray for movies to own. I have a 2 TB hard drive and running out of disk space. For me, it is not a big deal Apple does not include Blu-ray because I can get it from someone else.
Apple just took the hard drive out of the Apple TV so I do not see them adding it back in. There is no particular reason to add an optical disk to the player, it just raises the cost of the device to way over $99 .
Does it? I recently bought a Sony S570 Blu-ray player that has networking and WiFi built in. I can stream Pandora as well as NetFlix and Amazon on-demand video and a whole bunch of other services Sony has hooked up with. The price? $138. To me, that's a much better deal than $99 for Apple TV (or $99 for another Apple Express thingee) and the thing that's really great about it is that I'm not locked into one content supplier.
And while I realize that Apple is primarily in the store business to sell hardware, I think it would make sense for Apple to make the iTunes store available on these types of devices.
Does it? I recently bought a Sony S570 Blu-ray player that has networking and WiFi built in. I can stream Pandora as well as NetFlix and Amazon on-demand video and a whole bunch of other services Sony has hooked up with. The price? $138. To me, that's a much better deal than $99 for Apple TV (or $99 for another Apple Express thingee) and the thing that's really great about it is that I'm not locked into one content supplier.
And while I realize that Apple is primarily in the store business to sell hardware, I think it would make sense for Apple to make the iTunes store available on these types of devices.
For people in the Apple bubble.. Own an iPhone or iPod or iPad or Mac then ATV is best for those kind of people.
For people in the Apple bubble.. Own an iPhone or iPod or iPad or Mac then ATV is best for those kind of people.
More like people in the iTunes store bubble. I have an original AppleTV but have never bought media from iTunes. AppleTV and Blu-ray does Netflix. Our AppleTV gets used more due to more movies but Blu-ray has better picture quality. Our family own a Mac, iPod, iPad and it's a close call on what is best.
Though the Apple TV "hobby" is starting to take off, sales of the $99 set-top box just aren't enough to have a major effect on Apple's bottom line.
Well, that's 999,900 more sold than Google TV's...
http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_techne...lu-ray-players
Blu-Ray is an outstanding transition format. It covers DVD's of yesterday, Blu-Rays of today and streaming of tomorrow. It covers a lot of bases and truly offers the best audio and video experience of any format out there right now. It won't be going away anytime soon. Blu-Ray is a bona fide hit among consumers, being adopted at a rate faster than DVD players were ever adopted. Netflix is a huge part of that, again, for discs that work today and streaming for tomorrow.
Not so bad for a "bag of hurt..."
I still think Blu-Ray is a great product that only stands to gain more ground now that pricing has truly come down to consumer-friendly levels. Apparently I'm not the only one.
http://broadcastengineering.com/hdtv...ext-year-0720/
Get back to me when Apple TV hits 10% of those numbers. Until then, Apple's VERY smart to keep it a hobby.
Well, that's 999,900 more sold than Google TV's...
Google TV really is a different type of product. The comparisons are a little silly. None the less, Google TV is still a terrible, awful product. If you want to talk about a real "bag of hurt," start talking Google TV.
Does it? I recently bought a Sony S570 Blu-ray player that has networking and WiFi built in. I can stream Pandora as well as NetFlix and Amazon on-demand video and a whole bunch of other services Sony has hooked up with. The price? $138. To me, that's a much better deal than $99 for Apple TV (or $99 for another Apple Express thingee) and the thing that's really great about it is that I'm not locked into one content supplier.
And while I realize that Apple is primarily in the store business to sell hardware, I think it would make sense for Apple to make the iTunes store available on these types of devices.
I have this player as well. Don't forget to add that you've also had Hulu Plus capability since day 1.
Not to mention built in DLNA capabilities that allow you to access music, pictures and video from your home network. Mine works great and I use it all the time. I didn't even have to set it up, it was just there when I turned the player on. I can also play .mkv files on it.
Meanwhile, Blu-Ray players going for around the same price as Apple TV with similar internet capabilities in addition to backwards compatibility are really still doing quite okay...
Having similar internet capabilities isn?t the same as having as useful or usable internet capabilities. Exhibit A: GoogleTV, which actually does a whole lot more if you create a spec sheet between the two products.
BTW, have you used a $99 Blu-ray player? If you do, note how long it takes to load a disc, the noise from the drive, the blocking, freezing at odd times, not to mention the incompatibility with newer discs and likelihood of HW failure. You get what you pay for.
Blu-Ray is an outstanding transition format. It covers DVD's of yesterday, Blu-Rays of today and streaming of tomorrow. It covers a lot of bases and truly offers the best audio and video experience of any format out there right now. It won't be going away anytime soon. Blu-Ray is a bona fide hit among consumers, being adopted at a rate faster than DVD players were ever adopted. Netflix is a huge part of that, again, for discs that work today and streaming for tomorrow.
Bu-ray is great for the HEC, but not for the average ?PC?. It also doesn?t mean every fraking device should come with a Blu-ray drive.
BTW, Bu-ray isn?t a huge hit with DVD outselling Blu-rays and with streaming media far exceeding Blu-ray around the world, in both number of videos and total streaming of videos.
http://broadcastengineering.com/hdtv...ext-year-0720/
Get back to me when Apple TV hits 10% of those numbers. Until then, Apple's VERY smart to keep it a hobby.
So the single product AppleTV can?t be a success unless it sells 1/10th the units as all Blu-ray players sold around the world. How does that possibly make sense?
I still don't see why they don't include a blu-ray/dvd/cd player and internal storage. I suppose it's price point. But they could offer an "AppleTVPlus" or something for $299.
no blu/DVD because they set up all that download stuff and see that and streaming as the future. They tried the whole storage thing and it didn't sell plus DVR etc would require licensing of tech.
Despite what mr Wu says, one million units of this 'toy' in a quarter is still impressive. Especially if it continues at even half that rate. The point of this item is to push Apple's rentals etc. If they can show volume then they can get more networks on board push for a lower price or even a subscription of some kind (say like a season rental pass for $15 for SD instead of the $22 it would cost you one by one). Showing usage might also convince the nets to loosen up the rental restrictions. And who knows perhaps this would help them get their heads out of their butts and start crediting show buy back with proceeds from rentals and buys online rather than continuing to only look at the antiquated Nielsen system. Then fewer decent scripted shows would bite it two eps in.
The folks buying it don't really expect a finished product.
Hardly. The folks buying this are 99.9% buying it because of what it is. They are not the ubergeek know it alls that hang out on boards like this proclaiming that everything sucks because it is not how they would do it, when they would do it at the price they would pay for it. The same geeks that don't get the concept that Apple et al are about money and sometimes that means making for the masses. And the masses seem to fine with the Apple TV just the way it is. They didnt get it because of what it could be in the future but what it is now.
Having similar internet capabilities isn?t the same as having as useful or usable internet capabilities. Exhibit A: GoogleTV, which actually does a whole lot more if you create a spec sheet between the two products.
BTW, have you used a $99 Blu-ray player? If you do, note how long it takes to load a disc, the noise from the drive, the blocking, freezing at odd times, not to mention the incompatibility with newer discs and likelihood of HW failure. You get what you pay for.
Bu-ray is great for the HEC, but not for the average ?PC?. It also doesn?t mean every fraking device should come with a Blu-ray drive.
BTW, Bu-ray isn?t a huge hit with DVD outselling Blu-rays and with streaming media far exceeding Blu-ray around the world, in both number of videos and total streaming of videos.
So the single product AppleTV can?t be a success unless it sells 1/10th the units as all Blu-ray players sold around the world. How does that possibly make sense?
The newer players do not take near as long to load discs as they used to. Blame that on Hollywood anyways as it has everything to do with the endless anti-piracy checks occurring on disc and player simultaneously. It's no worse than buffering of streaming media.
My Sony BDP-S570 loads discs nearly instantly now and I've never had issues with discs not playing on any player I've owned, including the very first Blu-Ray player on the market which I still have on a TV, the Sony BDP-S1. Nowadays, if you have wi-fi built in, you should be getting semi-regular firmware updates that cover these bases. Apple products are no exception to update rules.
Blu-Ray IS a huge hit. Just because DVD's still outsell Blu-Ray (almost 15 years of market penetration on players will help with that...). As said, Blu-Ray players are being adopted at a faster rate than DVD players were. Was DVD not a hit? And again, what's great about these players is that they cover yesterday with DVD, today with Blu-Ray and all that streaming your talking about. It's a great product that will aptly help to usher in the streaming-only age.
1 million units given Apple's rabid fan-boy base and this holiday shopping season certainly isn't a failure, and one could suggest it's a success in some ways, but it's certainly not meaningful in any way yet. I'm not trying to suggest that it's a horrible product. It isn't. But it's a strange product. It's at the same time not up to par with today's technological standards as well as being a bit ahead of its time. The market most likely to latch on to such a product today isn't interested in it as it's too limited in terms of handling files and outputting HD audio and video. There are some really cool ideas behind Apple TV, but it's just not set to be a mainstream hit anytime soon. Apps and gaming could very well change that though.
And I never said anything about every product containing an optical drive of any sort. Wrong guy.
AppleTV will never be considered a major slice of the pie if Apple doesn't factor the revenue from the resulting iTunes rentals into the equation.
I hope they improve the service soon. Previews work great, but have tried to rent a movie a few times and it failed every time. Long downloads, or it starts only to stop about 3 mins in. I even ran a network connection to the box, same issue. (Screaming network connection here at the home)
It may not have anything to do with iTunes or the AppleTV. Others have pointed out the whole DNS issue. But there is also the question of your ISP throttling large downloads. Some of them are doing it under the assumption that you are doing bit torrents etc. The notion that it could be a totally legal download escaped their brains when they set up their computers to jack speeds down on you.
There are some really cool ideas behind Apple TV, but it's just not set to be a mainstream hit anytime soon. Apps and gaming could very well change that though.
The AppleTV doesn?t have to be a huge hit, because it?s not the AppleTV against all Blu-ray players. The AppleTV is just single product. It?s the easiest way to stream Netflix, but outside of that it?s mostly just an iPod for your HEC.
As I stated, Blu-ray is great for the HEC, but Apple doesn?t sell HEC equipment except for the AppleTV. outside of portable devices that make no sense for an optical drive, it sells ?PCs?, most of which are notebooks which use 9.5mm optical drives that would $500+ for Blu-ray upgrade. However, I have a feeling that future Mac notebooks will be excluding the optical drive altogether.
Then there is there is their iTunes Store video and there lack of OS and professional app support for Blu-ray. There really is no reason to think Apple will ever include Blu-ray HW in their products.
That said, if Apple releases an SDK for the AppleTV this $99 device could be a huge hit for the 2011 holidays in a way that is currently unimaginable.
And I never said anything about every product containing an optical drive of any sort. Wrong guy.
Mea culpa.
Maybe we could use the Magic Trackpad for that? The controllers could be on the screen and we use the trackpad to control,zoom etc.
Just a thought!
Why would you suggest using a MacOs device when the AppleTv is based on iOS and there are iOS devices that could be used. And likely will be at the point that Apple opens up the ecosystem for apps on the AppleTV. Apps will likely be designed for the tv as a kind of display and the iPod, phone, pad as the controller. But it will likely be a limited set as many apps would have no benefit from such a system. They are meant to be mobile etc
But where is the content??? It could be a nice box to own IF there was any content here in EUROPE.
Thank the studios for that. Foreign broadcast, etc rights are a huge moneymaker. The studios negotiate piece meal so ey can make the most money. And since they, not Apple, Netflix have all the power in this game they get what they want while we are the losers in the end.
I'll take the profits out of the $99,000,000 in sales.
Apple?s hobby appears to have more revenue and profit than many of their competitors with their <Apple_product>-killers.