Amazon takes on Apple TV 4K with updated Fire TV featuring HDR, Dolby Atmos support

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Comments

  • Reply 21 of 68
    I understand the ATV can play games but it really doesn't fit beyond just an extra feature. If you want to play serious games, its the Xbox or PlayStation. If you want good casual games with friends, the Nintendo Wi has that covered. I own an ATV and find the gaming experience to be piss poor with the remote. I only use it to watch content. Usually I just recommend people buy the FireTV unless they want some specific Apple function. iTunes is nice but Amazon's movies are generally cheaper. Overall, I'd probably just get a Fire stick next time.
    propod
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  • Reply 22 of 68
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,717member

    cali said:
    Why the hell do these companies have to copy Apple design especially for their remotes? Pathetic.

    melgross said:
    Most people would rather have some Ads and save money. We know that already. $69 vs $149 is a major difference for many people. While Apple is pushing gaming, Amazon is not. How many people really care about the gaming aspect?

    I don’t believe Apple is pushing gaming. It’s still just a hobby for them. I wish they would take gaming seriously. 

    melgross said:
    jkichline said:
    melgross said:
    Most people would rather have some Ads and save money. We know that already. $69 vs $149 is a major difference for many people. While Apple is pushing gaming, Amazon is not. How many people really care about the gaming aspect?
    My kids love playing games on the TV and the new 4K res is awesome for that!

    Also, only 8GB of storage? Apple quadruples that out of the gate and the processor is orders of magnitude faster.  This thing can pretty much just handle streaming and decoding 4K video.  That's about it.

    No ethernet? That's an extra adapter expense.  Sorry, but for streaming I'm not going to hook it up via WiFi and have my cluttered radio space make my kid's shows choppy.
    So far, very few people are gaming on their aTV. I tried it, and so far, it’s a bomb. Apple’s aTV sales have dropped to forth place, whereas at one time they were first place. Apple’s movie and Tv sales and rentals have dropped a lot as well, where they were once in first place for that too. There’s a correlation there. Obviously, Apple’s Tv products and services are losing major ground to cheaper competitors, and to ones who are willing to make the content deals Apple isn’t.

    until Apple turns that around, nothing anyone says about their hardware, or software in that area makes any sense, if they’re defending it. Sales tell us everything we need to know about how much people like the products.

    so, I’ve got this on order. I’ve also got several controllers for my iPad and iPhone which work. But that testimonial, as well as yours, means little, overall, because of the declining sales.

    Because Apple is still tinkering and playing with this hobby. While Amazon, Goog, Roku etc. Are putting in 100% effort Apple is just dipping their toes in with maybe 20%. 

    if Apple took Apple TV out of beta they would have added:

    custom gaming chip.

    M-processor, 3D Touch and advanced Taptic Engine for gaming, fitness apps, health etc.

    AR camera array for shopping, FaceTime, games and other apps we can’t imagine yet.

    advanced IR aiming and an official nunchuck Style controller for gaming(again).


    With Swift, Metal 2 and A11Bionic, I know the day is coming soon when the “real” Apple TV is announced. I believe they’re waiting to mass produce a single chip that can handle iPad, iPhone, tvOS. We’re close but not there yet. 
    Going well back into the 1990’s, Apple made big, and very short lived foray’s into gaming. But they never liked it. Gaming was always something they had distaste for. Ironically, the reason why the “PC” became popular with the public wasn’t, as people think, because of work, but because of gaming. While Microsoft encouraged it, and did everything they could to get it going, Apple pretended it didn’t exist, most of the time. But, despite that, Macs were called toys. I suppose that had something to do with distrust of the genre. They were trying to be taken seriously.

    Apple is pushing gaming. Every developers conference, every major product intro, they talk gaming, and have games on stage. It worked for the iPhone. It’s one of the most popular gaming platforms. It hasn’t worked anywhere else. Not big time. They’ve been pushing gaming since the 4 came out, and they’re pushing it with the new 5.

    its fine to call everything that isn’t doing well as a hobby. But I’d bet that since the iPhone did become a major game platform they are taking it very seriously. But they don’t understand what they need to do. Enabling real controllers was a good first step. But requiring the aTV controller was a bad step. I get why. They don want people to have to buy a controller. But gamers will buy a controller. Do you see all of the gaming mice, trackballs, keyboards, sticks and other devices out there? That’s gaming, not the controller Apple supplies. At least, this year I expected something that would be better at it, but no.

    the aTV is not in beta.

    the SoC Apple uses can do all of what you’re saying right now. It all has to do with cost and profit. I was shocked when they said that the A10x was going into this at this price. It’s decent enough for good game play at 1080p. That’s a lot lower than my iPad Pro 12.9” 2017. They even put a fan in. I don’t see a performance problem.

    tenchi211propod
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  • Reply 23 of 68
    nhtnht Posts: 4,522member
    melgross said:

    Apple’s aTV sales have dropped to forth place, whereas at one time they were first place. Apple’s movie and Tv sales and rentals have dropped a lot as well, where they were once in first place for that too. There’s a correlation there. Obviously, Apple’s Tv products and services are losing major ground to cheaper competitors, and to ones who are willing to make the content deals Apple isn’t.

    until Apple turns that around, nothing anyone says about their hardware, or software in that area makes any sense, if they’re defending it. Sales tell us everything we need to know about how much people like the products.
    There are 21.3M montlhy aTV users according to eMarketer in comparison to 38.9M Roku, 36.9M Chromecast and 35.8M Amazon.

    http://variety.com/2017/digital/news/roku-apple-tv-chromecast-amazon-fire-tv-market-share-2017-1202506850/

    There are 63M Playstation 4s, 25-30M Xbox Ones, 13.56M WiiU and 4.7M Nintendo Switches according the Wikipedia.

    So sales tells me that as a little side hobby Apple is making the lion's share of profit in the set top box market (again) and has almost as many active monthly users as Xbox One has sales. This is with no first party game studio and no exclusive TV or game content.

    And how is Apple losing "major ground" in set top streamers and not in smartphones?  Since when did being in 4th place matter?  

    Do you know what other market Apple is "losing major ground" and in 4th place?  Computers.

    http://www.businessinsider.com/top-pc-companies-sales-idc-market-share-chart-2017-4

    I suppose according to you nothing anyone says about Apple computer hardware or software area makes any sense if we are defending it as sales tell us everything we need to know about how much people like Apple computer products.

    If I rolled my eyes any harder they'd catch on fire.

    SpamSandwichwatto_cobra
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  • Reply 24 of 68
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,717member
    melgross said:
    melgross said:
    jkichline said:
    melgross said:
    Most people would rather have some Ads and save money. We know that already. $69 vs $149 is a major difference for many people. While Apple is pushing gaming, Amazon is not. How many people really care about the gaming aspect?
    My kids love playing games on the TV and the new 4K res is awesome for that!

    Also, only 8GB of storage? Apple quadruples that out of the gate and the processor is orders of magnitude faster.  This thing can pretty much just handle streaming and decoding 4K video.  That's about it.

    No ethernet? That's an extra adapter expense.  Sorry, but for streaming I'm not going to hook it up via WiFi and have my cluttered radio space make my kid's shows choppy.
    So far, very few people are gaming on their aTV. I tried it, and so far, it’s a bomb. Apple’s aTV sales have dropped to forth place, whereas at one time they were first place. Apple’s movie and Tv sales and rentals have dropped a lot as well, where they were once in first place for that too. There’s a correlation there. Obviously, Apple’s Tv products and services are losing major ground to cheaper competitors, and to ones who are willing to make the content deals Apple isn’t.

    until Apple turns that around, nothing anyone says about their hardware, or software in that area makes any sense, if they’re defending it. Sales tell us everything we need to know about how much people like the products.

    so, I’ve got this on order. I’ve also got several controllers for my iPad and iPhone which work. But that testimonial, as well as yours, means little, overall, because of the declining sales.
    This statement that I bolded is 100% unfiltered crap, and from a long-time Apple user to boot. Until the iPod came around, what did Apple lead in? It's never been in the lead in personal computer sales for the last 20 years, and probably more.

    Sales can either tell us how much people like a product, or how cheap the product is. $40 Android phones from an assortment of vendors beat iPhone sales -- does that mean the iPhone is crap? Acer's PC sales eclipse Apple's Mac sales. Does that mean the Mac is crap? Sale volumes say very little about capabilities of a product.

    Here: "I got this widget on sale for $X/2! It's not perfect, but it gets me to 60% of where I want to be, so, it'll be fine." Does this sound like anything to you?
    Don’t give me BS about how Apple feels about marketshare, because I’m tired of hearing that garbage. Apple has ALWAYS made points about marketshare, when Jobs as there, after he left, and after he came back. Now that he’s gone, they still do. This is nothing new, and if you knew half as much about Apple as you think you do, you would know that.
    Sorry but no, Apple doesn’t pander to the Church of Market Share. they have chosen profit over market share, time and again. They could have saturated several markets but have chosen not to engage in a race to the bottom, unlock all of the old PC companies of yore, android phones, etc. 

    I don’t doubt that they may brag about market share if they led it for some presentation slide, but it’s clearly not their product strategy. 
    Oh, for crying out loud. This is such a mantra here. Jobs, and now Cook want to see this company grow. They know they need to get sales from competitors. The statements they make about making the best products, and if people like them, they will buy them, is part truth, and part marketing. But marketshare is important to them too. They even brag about it when it looks good.

    marketshare isn’t a simplistic thing, the way some of you are apparently looking at it. You’re looking at it as though it’s this monolithic thing. It’s not. It’s broken down into categories, even in one industry, even in one segment of that industry.

    apple isn’t interested in marketshare in the entire cell industry. They aren’t interested in marketshare in the entire smartphone industry. They are interested in marketshare in flagship models. They are interested in marketshare in enterprise. That’s the way it works. They understand that. 
    edited September 2017
    gatorguy
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  • Reply 25 of 68
    Mike Wuerthelemike wuerthele Posts: 7,191administrator
    melgross said:

    melgross said:
    melgross said:
    jkichline said:
    melgross said:
    Most people would rather have some Ads and save money. We know that already. $69 vs $149 is a major difference for many people. While Apple is pushing gaming, Amazon is not. How many people really care about the gaming aspect?
    My kids love playing games on the TV and the new 4K res is awesome for that!

    Also, only 8GB of storage? Apple quadruples that out of the gate and the processor is orders of magnitude faster.  This thing can pretty much just handle streaming and decoding 4K video.  That's about it.

    No ethernet? That's an extra adapter expense.  Sorry, but for streaming I'm not going to hook it up via WiFi and have my cluttered radio space make my kid's shows choppy.
    So far, very few people are gaming on their aTV. I tried it, and so far, it’s a bomb. Apple’s aTV sales have dropped to forth place, whereas at one time they were first place. Apple’s movie and Tv sales and rentals have dropped a lot as well, where they were once in first place for that too. There’s a correlation there. Obviously, Apple’s Tv products and services are losing major ground to cheaper competitors, and to ones who are willing to make the content deals Apple isn’t.

    until Apple turns that around, nothing anyone says about their hardware, or software in that area makes any sense, if they’re defending it. Sales tell us everything we need to know about how much people like the products.

    so, I’ve got this on order. I’ve also got several controllers for my iPad and iPhone which work. But that testimonial, as well as yours, means little, overall, because of the declining sales.
    This statement that I bolded is 100% unfiltered crap, and from a long-time Apple user to boot. Until the iPod came around, what did Apple lead in? It's never been in the lead in personal computer sales for the last 20 years, and probably more.

    Sales can either tell us how much people like a product, or how cheap the product is. $40 Android phones from an assortment of vendors beat iPhone sales -- does that mean the iPhone is crap? Acer's PC sales eclipse Apple's Mac sales. Does that mean the Mac is crap? Sale volumes say very little about capabilities of a product.

    Here: "I got this widget on sale for $X/2! It's not perfect, but it gets me to 60% of where I want to be, so, it'll be fine." Does this sound like anything to you?
    I think your response is crap. You obviously didn’t understand what I wrote. Apple was bragging that they had the number one movie and Tv sales and rentals. Don’t give me BS about how Apple feels about marketshare, because I’m tired of hearing that garbage. Apple has ALWAYS made points about marketshare, when Jobs as there, after he left, and after he came back. Now that he’s gone, they still do. This is nothing new, and if you knew half as much about Apple as you think you do, you would know that.

    as far as my saying, or even hinting that the products themselves were crap, well, where did I say that? You won’t find it, because I never said that. You made a very distorted statement about what I said. But yes, it’s true, gaming on the aTV is terrible. I’m not the only one to say that. Read any review that involves gaming, and it will agree. Is it all Apple’s fault? No, it’s also the developers. But Apple did make it more difficult by requiring that all games enable the Apple controller. They’ve stated that. And that’s from developers who do very well on Apple’s other iOS platforms.

    innate capabilities aren’t the only thing that involves value. If developers don’t take advantage of it, then the value will be less. That’s really not difficult to understand. And right now, whether you like it or not, the state of gaming on the aTV isn’t very good. I do have hopes it will get better.

    i don’t understand what that last part has to do with anything. It certainly has nothing to do with what I said. But, we see that Amazon just released a new Tv device for $69. It doesn’t play games, true. But are people buying these things for games, or to watch video? I’d bet that almost all of the use is for video.
    Nice spin. Nice ad hominem too, and selective application of Apple's statements about marketshare over time.

    Done here, and disappointed. Have a nice night.
    Oh, don’t give me that. I just threw your own word back at you. If you’re not happy about that, then why did you start it by throwing it at me? Was I ticked? You bet. I expected better from you after all.

    i’ve seen Apple’s history from the beginning, real time, and I knew all of these guys from the Homebrew Computer Club before most people here were out of kindergarten. I understand their talk about marketshare quite well. If you disagree, come back and talk about it. Don’t slink away.
    Fine. 

    You're applying selective application of Apple's stance on marketshare. Yes, Apple talks about it when they get good gains. No, they don't give a shit about it, and never have -- and since you knew the guys since kindergarten and had that experience you should know that as well instead of trotting out the whole sales=measure of goodness argument. Famously, Jobs said for over thirty years that he didn't care about marketshare, was more interested in best-in-class products, and I still don't think he did the day he died.

    The Apple TV 4K is best in class. The new Fire TV is less powerful than the predecessor. It's using the crappy Amlogic S905, and only very slightly beats out the second generation Fire TV stick. So, sure, let's race to the bottom. That always ends well. They did the same thing with their Fire tablets, where the 10-inch Fire HDX was a very nice piece of kit, then Amazon got stupid with the ridiculous $40 POS.

    Apple's marketshare of streaming content is falling, but volumes are growing. That's not because Apple has lost any special sauce -- it's because the market is changing. There will always be a market segment that likes the on-sale get-you-most-of-the-way-there option. Apple doesn't chase that market, and frequently says so.

    Anyway, I left the conversation other than popping in for moderation duties since I have the keys tonight, because you are so convinced that you're right and have a unique perspective that you're not that interested in discussing it  - and it isn't the first time I've seen it. You didn't really read what I said, nor comprehended that the last sentence wasn't in response to you, but an addition to what I was saying.  Nor did I say anything about gaming at all in this particular forum thread, but am on record for saying that the fourth generation was only going to be as good as the gaming software -- which never really materialized for an assortment of reasons.

    I wasn't disappointed about the response so much as I was by your lack of vision surrounding the device. That, and some linguistic tells that you were gearing up for an argument that will get us nowhere and take time from other stuff I've got going on, including slamming this Apple TV 4K right here.

    Off topic fun fact: I was hired by Apple in 2000 to be on a new games evangelism team. The position never got started, and we all got canned three weeks after on-boarding. 

    The ad hominem I was referring to was the "if you knew half as much about Apple as you think you do, you would know that," not the "crap" part. 
    edited September 2017
    tenchi211fastasleepStrangeDaysSpamSandwichwatto_cobrakevin kee
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  • Reply 26 of 68
    nhtnht Posts: 4,522member
    melgross said:
    StrangeDays said:

    Sorry but no, Apple doesn’t pander to the Church of Market Share. they have chosen profit over market share, time and again. They could have saturated several markets but have chosen not to engage in a race to the bottom, unlock all of the old PC companies of yore, android phones, etc. 

    I don’t doubt that they may brag about market share if they led it for some presentation slide, but it’s clearly not their product strategy. 
    Oh, for crying out loud. This is such a mantra here. Jobs, and now Cook want to see this company grow. They know they need to get sales from competitors. The statements they make about making the best products, and if people like them, they will buy them, is part truth, and part marketing. But marketshare is important to them too. They even brag about it wen it look old.

    marketshare isn’t a simplistic thing, the way some of you are apparently looking at it. You’re looking at it as though it’s this monolithic thing. It’s not. It’s broken down into categories, even in one industry, even in one segment of that industry.

    apple isn’t interested in marketshare in the entire cell industry. They aren’t interested in marketshare in the entire smartphone industry. They are interested in marketshare in flagship models. They are interested in marketshare in enterprise. That’s the way it works. They understand that. 
    "In particular, Roku, Amazon and Google all offer ‘stick’ options that plug directly into your TV as well as their set-top box options, and these cheap stick solutions are proving perennially popular; Park Associates states that streaming sticks account for a full half of the 2015 total streaming media player market. In fact, the Fire TV stick accounted for three quarters of all Amazon’s streaming media player sales."

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnarcher/2016/05/18/apple-tv-doubles-sales-but-still-trails-google-roku-and-amazon/#16d5da0f3d47

    Apple does understand that.  

    Too bad you don't.
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  • Reply 27 of 68
    calicali Posts: 3,494member
    melgross said:

    cali said:
    Why the hell do these companies have to copy Apple design especially for their remotes? Pathetic.

    melgross said:
    Most people would rather have some Ads and save money. We know that already. $69 vs $149 is a major difference for many people. While Apple is pushing gaming, Amazon is not. How many people really care about the gaming aspect?

    I don’t believe Apple is pushing gaming. It’s still just a hobby for them. I wish they would take gaming seriously. 

    melgross said:
    jkichline said:
    melgross said:
    Most people would rather have some Ads and save money. We know that already. $69 vs $149 is a major difference for many people. While Apple is pushing gaming, Amazon is not. How many people really care about the gaming aspect?
    My kids love playing games on the TV and the new 4K res is awesome for that!

    Also, only 8GB of storage? Apple quadruples that out of the gate and the processor is orders of magnitude faster.  This thing can pretty much just handle streaming and decoding 4K video.  That's about it.

    No ethernet? That's an extra adapter expense.  Sorry, but for streaming I'm not going to hook it up via WiFi and have my cluttered radio space make my kid's shows choppy.
    So far, very few people are gaming on their aTV. I tried it, and so far, it’s a bomb. Apple’s aTV sales have dropped to forth place, whereas at one time they were first place. Apple’s movie and Tv sales and rentals have dropped a lot as well, where they were once in first place for that too. There’s a correlation there. Obviously, Apple’s Tv products and services are losing major ground to cheaper competitors, and to ones who are willing to make the content deals Apple isn’t.

    until Apple turns that around, nothing anyone says about their hardware, or software in that area makes any sense, if they’re defending it. Sales tell us everything we need to know about how much people like the products.

    so, I’ve got this on order. I’ve also got several controllers for my iPad and iPhone which work. But that testimonial, as well as yours, means little, overall, because of the declining sales.

    Because Apple is still tinkering and playing with this hobby. While Amazon, Goog, Roku etc. Are putting in 100% effort Apple is just dipping their toes in with maybe 20%. 

    if Apple took Apple TV out of beta they would have added:

    custom gaming chip.

    M-processor, 3D Touch and advanced Taptic Engine for gaming, fitness apps, health etc.

    AR camera array for shopping, FaceTime, games and other apps we can’t imagine yet.

    advanced IR aiming and an official nunchuck Style controller for gaming(again).


    With Swift, Metal 2 and A11Bionic, I know the day is coming soon when the “real” Apple TV is announced. I believe they’re waiting to mass produce a single chip that can handle iPad, iPhone, tvOS. We’re close but not there yet. 
    Going well back into the 1990’s, Apple made big, and very short lived foray’s into gaming. But they never liked it. Gaming was always something they had distaste for. Ironically, the reason why the “PC” became popular with the public wasn’t, as people think, because of work, but because of gaming. While Microsoft encouraged it, and did everything they could to get it going, Apple pretended it didn’t exist, most of the time. But, despite that, Macs were called toys. I suppose that had something to do with distrust of the genre. They were trying to be taken seriously.

    Apple is pushing gaming. Every developers conference, every major product intro, they talk gaming, and have games on stage. It worked for the iPhone. It’s one of the most popular gaming platforms. It hasn’t worked anywhere else. Not big time. They’ve been pushing gaming since the 4 came out, and they’re pushing it with the new 5.

    its fine to call everything that isn’t doing well as a hobby. But I’d bet that since the iPhone did become a major game platform they are taking it very seriously. But they don’t understand what they need to do. Enabling real controllers was a good first step. But requiring the aTV controller was a bad step. I get why. They don want people to have to buy a controller. But gamers will buy a controller. Do you see all of the gaming mice, trackballs, keyboards, sticks and other devices out there? That’s gaming, not the controller Apple supplies. At least, this year I expected something that would be better at it, but no.

    the aTV is not in beta.

    the SoC Apple uses can do all of what you’re saying right now. It all has to do with cost and profit. I was shocked when they said that the A10x was going into this at this price. It’s decent enough for good game play at 1080p. That’s a lot lower than my iPad Pro 12.9” 2017. They even put a fan in. I don’t see a performance problem.

    I understand but I do not believe they’re taking Apple TV as serious as they usually do their products.

    if you compare iPod, iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch and HomePod to Apple TV you’ll see what I mean. Today’s Apple TV is what the first version should have been.

    i understand it can play 4k games now but I don’t think it compares to the real players(Nintendo, Xbox, PlayStation) at all. I feel
    it will come eventually with their A series chips advancing faster than anything out there but we may have to wait until A13. I was happy too they announced A10x as it’s a year old and the 4th gen Apple TV used a chip that was very outdated at the time.

    Again if Apple took gaming seriously they would have announced enhanced Siri remote feautures, bought a few studios and made Mario Run TV a thing.

    regarding market share, it’s very important and I wanna see Apple take the cake like iPod did. I believe the reason the iPhone and iPad are having a hard time is because countries are allowing companies to make knockoffs and legally sell them as legit products. 
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  • Reply 28 of 68
    cali said:
    melgross said:

    cali said:
    Why the hell do these companies have to copy Apple design especially for their remotes? Pathetic.

    melgross said:
    Most people would rather have some Ads and save money. We know that already. $69 vs $149 is a major difference for many people. While Apple is pushing gaming, Amazon is not. How many people really care about the gaming aspect?

    I don’t believe Apple is pushing gaming. It’s still just a hobby for them. I wish they would take gaming seriously. 

    melgross said:
    jkichline said:
    melgross said:
    Most people would rather have some Ads and save money. We know that already. $69 vs $149 is a major difference for many people. While Apple is pushing gaming, Amazon is not. How many people really care about the gaming aspect?
    My kids love playing games on the TV and the new 4K res is awesome for that!

    Also, only 8GB of storage? Apple quadruples that out of the gate and the processor is orders of magnitude faster.  This thing can pretty much just handle streaming and decoding 4K video.  That's about it.

    No ethernet? That's an extra adapter expense.  Sorry, but for streaming I'm not going to hook it up via WiFi and have my cluttered radio space make my kid's shows choppy.
    So far, very few people are gaming on their aTV. I tried it, and so far, it’s a bomb. Apple’s aTV sales have dropped to forth place, whereas at one time they were first place. Apple’s movie and Tv sales and rentals have dropped a lot as well, where they were once in first place for that too. There’s a correlation there. Obviously, Apple’s Tv products and services are losing major ground to cheaper competitors, and to ones who are willing to make the content deals Apple isn’t.

    until Apple turns that around, nothing anyone says about their hardware, or software in that area makes any sense, if they’re defending it. Sales tell us everything we need to know about how much people like the products.

    so, I’ve got this on order. I’ve also got several controllers for my iPad and iPhone which work. But that testimonial, as well as yours, means little, overall, because of the declining sales.

    Because Apple is still tinkering and playing with this hobby. While Amazon, Goog, Roku etc. Are putting in 100% effort Apple is just dipping their toes in with maybe 20%. 

    if Apple took Apple TV out of beta they would have added:

    custom gaming chip.

    M-processor, 3D Touch and advanced Taptic Engine for gaming, fitness apps, health etc.

    AR camera array for shopping, FaceTime, games and other apps we can’t imagine yet.

    advanced IR aiming and an official nunchuck Style controller for gaming(again).


    With Swift, Metal 2 and A11Bionic, I know the day is coming soon when the “real” Apple TV is announced. I believe they’re waiting to mass produce a single chip that can handle iPad, iPhone, tvOS. We’re close but not there yet. 
    Going well back into the 1990’s, Apple made big, and very short lived foray’s into gaming. But they never liked it. Gaming was always something they had distaste for. Ironically, the reason why the “PC” became popular with the public wasn’t, as people think, because of work, but because of gaming. While Microsoft encouraged it, and did everything they could to get it going, Apple pretended it didn’t exist, most of the time. But, despite that, Macs were called toys. I suppose that had something to do with distrust of the genre. They were trying to be taken seriously.

    Apple is pushing gaming. Every developers conference, every major product intro, they talk gaming, and have games on stage. It worked for the iPhone. It’s one of the most popular gaming platforms. It hasn’t worked anywhere else. Not big time. They’ve been pushing gaming since the 4 came out, and they’re pushing it with the new 5.

    its fine to call everything that isn’t doing well as a hobby. But I’d bet that since the iPhone did become a major game platform they are taking it very seriously. But they don’t understand what they need to do. Enabling real controllers was a good first step. But requiring the aTV controller was a bad step. I get why. They don want people to have to buy a controller. But gamers will buy a controller. Do you see all of the gaming mice, trackballs, keyboards, sticks and other devices out there? That’s gaming, not the controller Apple supplies. At least, this year I expected something that would be better at it, but no.

    the aTV is not in beta.

    the SoC Apple uses can do all of what you’re saying right now. It all has to do with cost and profit. I was shocked when they said that the A10x was going into this at this price. It’s decent enough for good game play at 1080p. That’s a lot lower than my iPad Pro 12.9” 2017. They even put a fan in. I don’t see a performance problem.

    I understand but I do not believe they’re taking Apple TV as serious as they usually do their products.

    if you compare iPod, iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch and HomePod to Apple TV you’ll see what I mean. Today’s Apple TV is what the first version should have been.

    i understand it can play 4k games now but I don’t think it compares to the real players(Nintendo, Xbox, PlayStation) at all. I feel
    it will come eventually with their A series chips advancing faster than anything out there but we may have to wait until A13. I was happy too they announced A10x as it’s a year old and the 4th gen Apple TV used a chip that was very outdated at the time.

    Again if Apple took gaming seriously they would have announced enhanced Siri remote feautures, bought a few studios and made Mario Run TV a thing.

    regarding market share, it’s very important and I wanna see Apple take the cake like iPod did. I believe the reason the iPhone and iPad are having a hard time is because countries are allowing companies to make knockoffs and legally sell them as legit products. 
    Maybe the problem with ATV is leadership (*cough* Eddy Cue *cough*)
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  • Reply 29 of 68
    nhtnht Posts: 4,522member
    melgross said:

    i’ve seen Apple’s history from the beginning, real time, and I knew all of these guys from the Homebrew Computer Club before most people here were out of kindergarten. I understand their talk about marketshare quite well. If you disagree, come back and talk about it. Don’t slink away.
    Lol, when you run out of everything else argue that age and experience trumps logic and facts...

    If you take eMarketer active user share numbers and apply the 2015 50% of the market are sticks metric you end up with a market of 132.9M active streaming boxes of which 66.45M were sticks.

    So Apple had 21.3M active users out of the non-stick market of 66.45M users and had #1 share among the top 4 families of non-stick streamers including the mid-tier and low tier non-stick models that cost far less than $149.

    I'm guessing you're the one thats going to slink away.
    edited September 2017
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  • Reply 30 of 68
    nht said:
    melgross said:

    i’ve seen Apple’s history from the beginning, real time, and I knew all of these guys from the Homebrew Computer Club before most people here were out of kindergarten. I understand their talk about marketshare quite well. If you disagree, come back and talk about it. Don’t slink away.
    Lol, when you run out of everything else argue that age and experience trumps logic and facts...

    If you take eMarketer active user share numbers and apply the 2015 50% of the market are sticks metric you end up with a market of 132.9M active streaming boxes of which 66.45M were sticks.

    So Apple had 21.3M active users out of the non-stick market of 66.45M users and had #1 share among the top 4 families of non-stick streamers including the mid-tier and low tier non-stick models that cost far less than $149.

    I'm guessing you're the one thats going to slink away.
    I don't think sticks were common when I bought the Apple TVs in our house. If they were, I didn't know about them. I bought Apple TVs so we could AirPlay from our Macs to the big screen. I later dedicated a Mac mini to feeding it ripped content.

    If I were starting over now (which I might), I might perceive the current Apple TV as overkill for our needs and look into a simpler, less expensive device, like a stick.
    gatorguy
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  • Reply 31 of 68
    19831983 Posts: 1,225member
    Soli said:
    That design seems pretty poor. I hope it coms with some adhesive or Velcro so you can keep it from handling and putting pressure on your HDMI port.
    Yes, the previous design's form factor was better IMO. This new one just seems messy! With that being exacerbated by the need for an additional adaptor for Ethernet. Overall then, a cost cutting step backwards design wise.
    watto_cobra
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  • Reply 32 of 68

    Because Apple is still tinkering and playing with this hobby. While Amazon, Goog, Roku etc. Are putting in 100% effort Apple is just dipping their toes in with maybe 20%. 

    How can you possibly make assumptions like that? I hardly think Amazon are putting everything behind the "Fire TV" - it's just another portal to get people to buy on amazon.com, Google don't seem to put effort into anything other than search. Roku sure, but that's because that's all they've ever had. Apple TV is on it's, what, 5th gen now? fobbing any critisism off with "oh, it's just a hobby, they don't really put much effort into it", what a great statement for the company. :expressionless: 
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  • Reply 33 of 68
    ksecksec Posts: 1,569member
    I dont want three remote control for three different things relate to TV. And not something hanging out of it like this new FireTV.

    Apple, just give me an Apple TV Set with Apple TV built in, charge it 30%+ of Sony TV Set and I would still buy it.
    watto_cobra
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  • Reply 34 of 68
    ksec said:
    I dont want three remote control for three different things relate to TV. And not something hanging out of it like this new FireTV.

    Apple, just give me an Apple TV Set with Apple TV built in, charge it 30%+ of Sony TV Set and I would still buy it.
    Dear Apple:

    I have no problem with you making what @ksec wants, just please don't stop making a separate Apple TV box in its current form. I don't want to replace a big, expensive TV every time there's an upgrade to the "feeder" device.

    Sincerely,
    Lorin

    PS> If you want to add some kind of hub capability that would translate Siri commands into IR beams for my other, non-Apple components, that would be fine too.
    watto_cobra
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  • Reply 35 of 68
    ksecksec Posts: 1,569member

    In a perfect world, Apple would have something similar to LG OLED TV and some other Chinese TV, where all the electronics are in a separate box, and a proprietary cable for the Panel. You could then update the box every 2 - 3 years.

    But then I think we have reached a stage with SoC ( A11x Next year likely faster then 90%+ of all PC ever shipped), Wireless ( 802.11ax is around the corner ), and Panel where the tech are all good enough for many years to come, and are lacking some serious UX changes.

    watto_cobra
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  • Reply 36 of 68
    Oh man...it's kind of bizarre how so many people don't understand the ATV 4/5. As far as gaming goes, it's meant to be a complimentary device to iOS. People keep trying to compare it to Xbox and Playstation, but it's not following the console model. It's more like a personal computer, similar to the iPhone and iPad. As Apple continues to refine and improve the iOS App store, that will translate over to the ATV. As iOS game evolve over time, so will ATV games. There doesn't need to be a separate "effort" by Apple to turn the ATV into a clone of the PS/Xbox. The system for games is already in place, and it isn't going to be stationary in terms of what is available or how sophisticated the games become over time. 
    watto_cobra
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  • Reply 37 of 68
    melgross said:
    melgross said:
    melgross said:
    jkichline said:
    melgross said:
    Most people would rather have some Ads and save money. We know that already. $69 vs $149 is a major difference for many people. While Apple is pushing gaming, Amazon is not. How many people really care about the gaming aspect?
    My kids love playing games on the TV and the new 4K res is awesome for that!

    Also, only 8GB of storage? Apple quadruples that out of the gate and the processor is orders of magnitude faster.  This thing can pretty much just handle streaming and decoding 4K video.  That's about it.

    No ethernet? That's an extra adapter expense.  Sorry, but for streaming I'm not going to hook it up via WiFi and have my cluttered radio space make my kid's shows choppy.
    So far, very few people are gaming on their aTV. I tried it, and so far, it’s a bomb. Apple’s aTV sales have dropped to forth place, whereas at one time they were first place. Apple’s movie and Tv sales and rentals have dropped a lot as well, where they were once in first place for that too. There’s a correlation there. Obviously, Apple’s Tv products and services are losing major ground to cheaper competitors, and to ones who are willing to make the content deals Apple isn’t.

    until Apple turns that around, nothing anyone says about their hardware, or software in that area makes any sense, if they’re defending it. Sales tell us everything we need to know about how much people like the products.

    so, I’ve got this on order. I’ve also got several controllers for my iPad and iPhone which work. But that testimonial, as well as yours, means little, overall, because of the declining sales.
    This statement that I bolded is 100% unfiltered crap, and from a long-time Apple user to boot. Until the iPod came around, what did Apple lead in? It's never been in the lead in personal computer sales for the last 20 years, and probably more.

    Sales can either tell us how much people like a product, or how cheap the product is. $40 Android phones from an assortment of vendors beat iPhone sales -- does that mean the iPhone is crap? Acer's PC sales eclipse Apple's Mac sales. Does that mean the Mac is crap? Sale volumes say very little about capabilities of a product.

    Here: "I got this widget on sale for $X/2! It's not perfect, but it gets me to 60% of where I want to be, so, it'll be fine." Does this sound like anything to you?
    Don’t give me BS about how Apple feels about marketshare, because I’m tired of hearing that garbage. Apple has ALWAYS made points about marketshare, when Jobs as there, after he left, and after he came back. Now that he’s gone, they still do. This is nothing new, and if you knew half as much about Apple as you think you do, you would know that.
    Sorry but no, Apple doesn’t pander to the Church of Market Share. they have chosen profit over market share, time and again. They could have saturated several markets but have chosen not to engage in a race to the bottom, unlock all of the old PC companies of yore, android phones, etc. 

    I don’t doubt that they may brag about market share if they led it for some presentation slide, but it’s clearly not their product strategy. 
    Oh, for crying out loud. This is such a mantra here. Jobs, and now Cook want to see this company grow. They know they need to get sales from competitors. The statements they make about making the best products, and if people like them, they will buy them, is part truth, and part marketing. But marketshare is important to them too. They even brag about it when it looks good.

    marketshare isn’t a simplistic thing, the way some of you are apparently looking at it. You’re looking at it as though it’s this monolithic thing. It’s not. It’s broken down into categories, even in one industry, even in one segment of that industry.

    apple isn’t interested in marketshare in the entire cell industry. They aren’t interested in marketshare in the entire smartphone industry. They are interested in marketshare in flagship models. They are interested in marketshare in enterprise. That’s the way it works. They understand that. 
    If you qualify market share to mean “market share in this much smaller segment of the market” then you’ve redefined the term to mean something else. Apple strategy has not been to claim product category market share at the expense of profit. It’s profit first. If market share for a small segment of the market that is high end and very profitable is what you mean, then sure ok. 
    watto_cobra
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  • Reply 38 of 68
    gatorguygatorguy Posts: 24,771member
    Oh man...it's kind of bizarre how so many people don't understand the ATV 4/5.
    ....it's meant to be a complimentary device to iOS. 
    I would disagree since Apple has designed it to be compatible with other non-Apple operating systems and devices.  It doesn't rely on iOS-compatibility. A lot of Apple TV's are used by folks that don't have a single Apple device other than that. 
    edited September 2017
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  • Reply 39 of 68
    gatorguy said:
    I would disagree since Apple has designed it to be compatible with other non-Apple operating systems and devices.  It doesn't rely on iOS-compatibility. A lot of Apple TV's are used by folks that don't have a single Apple device other than that. 
    You're disagreeing with something I didn't say. You edited out "as far as gaming goes", which immediately preceded "it's meant to be a complimentary device to iOS". In other words, Apple doesn't have to try and convince developers to create games for a unique device like a console. The ATV is simply an extension of iOS game development.
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  • Reply 40 of 68
    gatorguygatorguy Posts: 24,771member
    gatorguy said:
    I would disagree since Apple has designed it to be compatible with other non-Apple operating systems and devices.  It doesn't rely on iOS-compatibility. A lot of Apple TV's are used by folks that don't have a single Apple device other than that. 
    You're disagreeing with something I didn't say. You edited out "as far as gaming goes", which immediately preceded "it's meant to be a complimentary device to iOS". In other words, Apple doesn't have to try and convince developers to create games for a unique device like a console. The ATV is simply an extension of iOS game development.
    Ah gotcha.
    FWIW  and IMHO there's no particular reason Apple could not have developed a separate platform-agnostic gaming portal if games were something they thought important, adding value to Apple TV. They still could for that matter. It's been done with some success.
    edited September 2017
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