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Apple TV media player now available in UK. But why?

by Bob Crabtree on 26 March 2007, 03:37

Tags: Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL)

Quick Link: HEXUS.net/qaiag

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Apple's take


Apple TV Now Shipping

Watch Internet-Delivered Movies, Movie Trailers, TV Shows, Music, Podcasts & Photos on Your Widescreen TV

CUPERTINO, California—March 21, 2007—Apple® is now shipping Apple TV™, an easy to use and fun way to wirelessly play all your favourite iTunes® content from your PC or Mac® on your widescreen TV, including movies, TV shows, music, photos and podcasts. With Apple TV’s stunning new interface, anyone can quickly browse and view their entire collection of digital media from across the room using the simple and intuitive Apple Remote. Apple TV easily connects to almost all modern widescreen televisions.

“Apple TV is like a DVD player for the Internet age—providing an easy and fun way to play all your favourite iTunes content from your PC or Mac on your widescreen TV,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. “Apple TV allows you to wirelessly play your content from your PCs or Macs using your existing WiFi network as well as the newest and fastest version of WiFi—802.11n.”

The seamless integration of Apple TV and iTunes lets users choose from over 400 movies and 350 TV shows in near DVD quality; over four million songs; 5,000 music videos; 100,000 podcasts; and 20,000 audiobooks from the iTunes Store (http://www.itunes.com/uk). Users can also watch their favourite movie trailers right on their widescreen TV, listen to their favourite music on their home entertainment system, and view slideshows of their photo albums in high definition resolution. Apple TV makes it easy for users to explore their entire media collection with an easy to use and intuitive new interface. With the Apple Remote, consumers can easily browse through their favourite movies, TV shows, music and photos from up to 30 feet away.

Apple TV has a 40GB hard drive to store up to 50 hours of video, 9,000 songs, 25,000 photos or a combination of each and is capable of delivering high-definition 720p output.*

Apple TV is easy to connect to a broad range of widescreen TVs and home theatre systems and comes standard with HDMI, component video, analogue and optical audio ports. Using high-speed AirPort® 802.11** wireless networking, Apple TV can auto-sync content from one computer or stream content from up to five additional computers right to your TV without any wires.***
* Video playback based on 640x480 iTunes video content. Music capacity based on four minutes per song and 128-Kbps AAC encoding. Photo capacity based on Apple TV viewable photos transferred from iTunes. Actual capacity varies by content.
** Compatible with 802.11b/g/n. Based on an IEEE 802.11n draft specification.
*** Wireless video streaming requires an 802.11g/n network.

Pricing & Availability
Apple TV, which includes the Apple Remote, will be available beginning this week from the Apple Store® (www.apple.com/uk), Apple’s retail stores and Apple Authorised Resellers for a suggested retail price of £199 (inc. VAT). Apple retail stores will also offer hands on workshops and demonstrations of Apple TV’s features.

Apple TV requires iTunes 7.1 or later running on a Mac with Mac OS® X version 10.3.9 or later, or a Windows PC with Windows XP Home/Professional (SP2).

An 802.11b/g/n wireless network using AirPort, AirPort Extreme® or 10/100 Base-T Ethernet networking is required. Internet access is required and a broadband connection is recommended. Apple TV requires an enhanced definition or high-definition widescreen TV. iPod® games will not play on Apple TV. The iTunes Store is available in the US and select countries. Television shows and feature films are available in the US only, and video availability varies by country.

For information on any Apple product, or details of their nearest Apple Authorised Reseller, customers should consult Apple's U.K. web site
(http://www.apple.com/uk). Customers in the U.K. can buy direct from Apple through the Apple Store (http://www.apple.com/ukstore or 0800 039 1010).


About Apple
Apple ignited the personal computer revolution in the 1970s with the Apple II and reinvented the personal computer in the 1980s with the Macintosh. Today, Apple continues to lead the industry in innovation with its award-winning computers, OS X operating system and iLife and professional applications. Apple is also spearheading the digital media revolution with its iPod portable music and video players and iTunes online store, and will enter the mobile phone market this year with its revolutionary iPhone.



HEXUS Forums :: 26 Comments

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It's a good idea in principle IMHO, but it really needs to be able to support DivX before I'd consider getting one. Development on that appears to be progressing quite quickly, however.

Assuming that it is made to work, however, I would think that this would be an ideal replacement for XMBC - smaller, quieter and able to output hidef.
At first glance it appears to be a lot of money for little return :(
It's Apple, so long as it looks nice no-one really cares about the functionality :rolleyes:

It does look nice though.
b0redom
It's a good idea in principle IMHO, but it really needs to be able to support DivX before I'd consider getting one. Development on that appears to be progressing quite quickly, however.

Assuming that it is made to work, however, I would think that this would be an ideal replacement for XMBC - smaller, quieter and able to output hidef.

I read somewhere (not on Apple's site, I hasten to add) - and really should have said about this in the opinion - that there is allegedly some kind of support for DivX.

However, I tested this out as best as I could in the absence of having an Apple TV to try.

How? By attempting to open within QT player a whole bunch of different DivX files - some with AVI tails, some with divx tails.

With files having divx tails (which I could only access by choosing to view all files from within QT Player), I got an error message, “Error -2048: the file is not a movie file”.

I didn't get this message with files having avi tails but some simply wouldn't play and those that would play had no sound and no video.

When QT Player was able to open a file, it offered the option to get some missing element - and if I accepted that, it took me to one of DivX's own web pages where I could download the free DivX goodies (including Codec and player).

However, I already have all the latest DivX goodies installed (including some paid-for elements) and all seem to me fully up to date and working.

Nonetheless, I downloaded and installed the DivX package on offer, accepting that there was a possibility this might actually mess up my current installation.

Result - er, it seems to have messed up my DivX installation!

I'm still investigating that, though!
Did a re-install of some other (paid for) DivX elements, followed by a reboot (why is that necessary for goodness sake?) and DivX now seems to be back to normal.

Still unable to play any DivX files in QT player and, as I have now realised, also unable to import them into iTunes - of which I have the very latest version installed.