Apple TV - a few question (persuade me to buy one)

AdrianII

Right, im off to the states this week and a friend of mine is biggin up the apple tv device, just wondering if any one on here can clear up a few things for me.

At present, i have one windows machine running XMBC, this is connected to an external hard drive that has my converted dvds on, some of these are mp4s and some are avi's.

If i get an apple tv, do i plug the hard drive into the device??
Will it play all the files? i heard atv only plays files that itunes can play, so that rules out half my collection, right!! is there any way around this?

I also have a macbook, with xbmc and front row on it, is there any need for an atv if at present i have the mac or pc going into the tv via the vga connection?? thats basically the same as the atv.

Sad Professor

AdrianII wrote: »

Will it play all the files? i heard atv only plays files that itunes can play, so that rules out half my collection, right!! is there any way around this?

You'd have to use a hack.

This is probably not what you wanted to hear, but my advice — don't touch the Apple TV with a barge pole. It's overpriced and crippled. It's main selling point is that it's nice and shiny and has the Apple logo on it. I love Apple products and all but I have draw the line somewhere. The Apple TV hasn't been updated since it's original release in March 2007 because Apple still consider it a "hobby."

If you want a media centre get a second-hand Mac Mini. Or wait and see if Apple do anything with the TV/mini over the next year.

setanta5

I've got one and i really like it.

There are some issues with compatability, but it is just so easy to update/operate.
Basically works like any Ipod for your tv. Not sure about ireland, but in UK it is quite good for Video rentals too. Little bit expensive but i think the convenience is worth paying for.

As for file formats, you can hack the ATV quite easily now with Boxee or similar products. you simply put the Hack on a USB stick and plug it in the back

Gives access to a whole host of new menus and options, including playing .Avi's

Unfortunatly i thnk you will find for everone who likes it, you'll find 4-5 people who dismiss it out of hand. For me, i don't need the functions of a media centre, so it suits my needs, although i'm thinking of getting a Mini to go under the tv and put the ATV in my room.

thatoneitguy

I own one and I do enjoy it however I wish I would have just spend the extra €€ and gotten a MacMini. Don't get me wrong, I love the ability to rent movies straight from my TV and have access to my pictures and podcasts and such but when I hacked it to run Boxee and XBMC, I saw the real possibilities. You can run XBMC on the ATV but don't expect great performance. Video playback is fine but navigating the menus is a pain. Hope I've helped.

jamieh

Hi lads,

I have an ATV with Boxee and XBMC installed, could someone tell me how to transfer movie files onto the apple tv?

chrislad

I have one, and it's fine. I ripped most of my DVDs to an iTunes compatiable format, so there was no converting issues, as such. Lobbed an 500gb external drive to my iMac, and away I went, not a bother. Only thing I would like to do is hook the drive up to the ATV directly, as 30gigs is a ridiculously low amount of space.

AdrianII

thanks for the honest answers

best thing i think is to go in to the shop and see for myself.

thanks for the replies

WizZard

One thing is if you want to play >= 720p movie files that are not in the iTunes format (e.g. play using boxee or others) then it will stutter.
You can play 720p files that are in the iTunes format (the AppleTV uses some GPU acceleration for this). However boxee and others do not currently have access (or ability) to use GPU acceleration and so they use the CPU alone to play video, and the CPU is not powerful enough to handle >=720p files (for example, MKV files).

I still recommend it though as once you use it's interface you won't want to use others. I love mine

Regarding your Macbook: HDMI vs VGA is a different debate (but HDMI is better)

fbradyirl

jamieh wrote: »

Hi lads,

I have an ATV with Boxee and XBMC installed, could someone tell me how to transfer movie files onto the apple tv?

See here for full instructions (including how to install Boxee etc)

su_dios

I use ATV with boxee with an external hdd plugged in to store my movies and easier to transfer the files that way.

However you should also look into the far cheaper Western Digital TV.

bluemachaveli

Have mine running Boxee and i love it, have a 1TB dual bay NAS drive that i just drop all my media on to, then Boxee streams everything! There are cheaper alternatives but it works so well im thinking of getting a second one from the states!

pistolpetes11

thatoneitguy wrote: »

I own one and I do enjoy it however I wish I would have just spend the extra €€ and gotten a MacMini. Don't get me wrong, I love the ability to rent movies straight from my TV and have access to my pictures and podcasts and such but when I hacked it to run Boxee and XBMC, I saw the real possibilities. You can run XBMC on the ATV but don't expect great performance. Video playback is fine but navigating the menus is a pain. Hope I've helped.

Can you rent movies on the Irish store now ?

Bluehair

pistolpetes11 wrote: »

Can you rent movies on the Irish store now ?

Not that I'm aware of but it's a simple matter to setup a US-based itunes account and rent via that. The usual rumour sites would suggest that an Apple TV upgrade is very close so it may be worthwhile hanging on unless you desperately need it.

I'm intending to add one to our system as it's ease of use in terms of rentals and transfering material is easy peasy

AlanD

su_dios wrote: »

However you should also look into the far cheaper Western Digital TV.

The WD TV looks great! I've been dying to get an Apple TV for ages, but have been holding off pending an upgrade, but this looks like a great option

AlanD

Also check this out for Apple TV

http://www.atvflash.com/product_info.php?products_id=27

J-blk

AlanD wrote: »

The WD TV looks great! I've been dying to get an Apple TV for ages, but have been holding off pending an upgrade, but this looks like a great option

It's very good - I bought one this week . Only feature that is missing for me is the ability to play things over a network connection but it does work very well and is simple to use. And no issue with 1080p mkv either .

AlanD

J-blk wrote: »

It's very good - I bought one this week . Only feature that is missing for me is the ability to play things over a network connection but it does work very well and is simple to use. And no issue with 1080p mkv either .

Sounds good. Would you have to convert any movies that were bought from iTunes so as to remove the DRM from them? I've read it doesn't play anything from iTunes so you couldn't copy them over.

I guess one pitfall is even though you could add huge storage to it, it's an isolated box. Apple tv has the advantage of being a networked box so things can stream to it.

I see Linksys also have some media boxes too that look interesting.

I love the idea of Apple tv, but it's restrictions put me off it unless they do a major update.

J-blk

AlanD wrote: »

Would you have to convert any movies that were bought from iTunes so as to remove the DRM from them? I've read it doesn't play anything from iTunes so you couldn't copy them over.

You can't play any DRM content on it - so yes, if you primarily got your content from iTunes, the AppleTV beats it by a long shot. If however most of your content was from "other" sources, the WD TV is way ahead.

AlanD wrote: »

I guess one pitfall is even though you could add huge storage to it, it's an isolated box.

That's my biggest gripe with it. I keep all my media on a Windows Home Server and play everything back using my Mac(s) and Plex - the WD TV is only good for playing off a local HDD/thumb drive. However, it's pretty good for non-techies (e.g my parents...) and that's what I wanted from it mostly.

I'd definitely hold off on the current AppleTV though - something is definitely brewing and hopefully a new and improved mind-blowing AppleTV/Mac Mini/lovechild of them both will appear soon...

AlanD

Here is an interesting article comparing Apple TV to WD TV - http://www.raoulpop.com/2008/wd-tv-is-better-than-apple-tv/

I think something is brewing in the Apple TV/Mac Mini end of things too. A mini with hdmi and blu ray.....oh the dreaming....anyway.....

Yes, I get 90% of my content from iTunes. I buy and rent movies and tv shows which I find brilliant. I just plug in my Macbook to the tv and away I go. For times I want better sound, I take the audio from a Presonus Firebox I use for home music production. Picture quality on my CRT Sony is fantastic. But what's preventing me from upgrading my tv and any media hardware is content. I'd like 1080p tv, but won't pay Sky for the extra channels. I'll wait til they're standard. Apple TV can't do blu ray quality and I will almost never buy blu ray disks, so right now I have no need for a fancy tv. My sony is perfect as it is. What I want is downloadable HD movies. I know the bandwidth isn't there yet for the good stuff, but I know if I bought Apple TV, they'd upgrade it the next day.

Which is why WD TV looks like a very affordable option.

AlanD

... plus with this - http://www.macrumors.com/2009/02/11/itunes-replay-on-demand-video-coming/ on the way, something is brewing.

J-blk

AlanD wrote: »

Here is an interesting article comparing Apple TV to WD TV - http://www.raoulpop.com/2008/wd-tv-is-better-than-apple-tv/

Nice find - haven't seen a direct comparison article before...

AlanD wrote: »

Yes, I get 90% of my content from iTunes

Then indeed you wouldn't get enough use out of the WD TV to make it worth it...

AlanD wrote: »

I'd like 1080p tv, but won't pay Sky for the extra channels. I'll wait til they're standard. Apple TV can't do blu ray quality and I will almost never buy blu ray disks, so right now I have no need for a fancy tv.

All TV is 720p - only movies on Bluray (and the late HD-DVD) are 1080p but TBH, 1080p is hugely overhyped. I have a 40" HDTV which I watch from only 3.5m away or so (which I think is a lot closer than normal for that screen size) and it is pretty much impossible to tell the difference between 720p and 1080p (well on video, it's more obvious when looking at your desktop or playing games).

And I'm with you on Bluray - waste of time and money. I love having all my content on a central server and streaming it where and how I want - the last thing I need is the clutter of yet another disc format. Of course the problem with HD video downloads is that most ISPs here are just not ready for it, with ridiculously low caps, but that's a thread for the broadband forum .

su_dios

Basically my bro bought me an apple tv for xmas.
I bought him a WD TV and 320gb passport hdd.

I use boxee on my apple tv with a hdd attached as its the easiest way to move the files around and larger storage( I found streaming from my time capsule too slow).

His WD TV needs a hdd connected to it but doesn't have to install any extras to get it working and has a nice interface.

So both things are now set up doing the same thing but his is cheaper and is running natively. I was hoping rentals would be out soon so apple tv will come into its own. The remote for the wdtv tho is pretty nasty but I doubt you'll care too much.

http://www.pixmania.ie/ie/uk/1778320/art/western-digital/wd-hd-tv-media-player-wit.html 119eur

J-blk

su_dios wrote: »

http://www.pixmania.ie/ie/uk/1778320/art/western-digital/wd-hd-tv-media-player-wit.html 119eur

It's €99 on Komplett.ie - that's where I got mine:

http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.aspx?sku=408560

AdrianII

Just back now

bought one over in the us and got through customs ok

i love it, the interface is so simple and user friendly, no lag on streaming tv

One decision i have to make now is to flash it to allow me play avi or convert all my movies etc into mp4

also
if i flash it can i still use the itunes store?

fbradyirl

AdrianII wrote: »

Just back now
...
One decision i have to make now is to flash it to allow me play avi or convert all my movies etc into mp4

also
if i flash it can i still use the itunes store?

No need to flash it. Just follow the steps here.

You can still use all the existing features such as itunes store, rentals etc. It just adds some extra menu items. Works a treat and you are not losing quality by re-encoding to mp4

AdrianII

that looks good, but how do you get atv to look at location of the files on a windows machine, itunes doesnt play avi files only mp4s, if i install that perian on a mac it will work but how about windows??

fbradyirl

Shouldn't matter if you use windows. If I were you, I would:

1. Install Perian on your ATV
2. Install ATVFiles on your ATV. This lets you view the files in all directories of your ATV
3. Simply transfer your avi files from your Windows machine to your ATV into the directory /Users/frontrow/Movies . You can use an FTP program to do that.
4. Now when you select the 'files' menu on your ATV, select Movies, and you can play all the avi's

The alternative is to use Boxee but it's a little harder to set up. I have both on my ATV and it works very nicely.

AdrianII

thank for the info

i will try it tonight.

i dont plan on having the movies on the atv drive, i have an external hard drive with them on, ill test tonight and let ye know

also you know the way xbmc downloaded the movie information and tv episode info, does atv do this if not is this option available on the xbmc for atv

i will find out later but, if ye knew of top of yer head it would be great

AdrianII

got this little beauty working now

running xbmc from an external 1tb drive hooked into the usb port

could not get xbmc running via the wireless this will be the next phase hopefully