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Alpine Bruce

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Dec 21, 2009
9
0
Alpine, Wy.
I'm a two year Apple TV user. Its been great! I have a new problem and hope
I can get some advice, My setup is a 160 GB ATV with an external 1 TB powered USB desktop hard drive - Western Digital. I leave both my ATV and the hard drive on all the time - (that might be the problem by itself) Sometimes when I change the input to my LG flat panel TV to my ATV - it just goes blank. Then I restart the ATV - same thing. I've diagnosed my problem using the Nitro utilities - still nothing. The only thing that works is to unplug the ATV and power off the ext HD for about 15 minutes - then it works fine.

I think I may be overheating one or both devices. I have the ATV on a dresser and it is elevated about a half inch for cooling. Last night I added a small fan. My ATV is almost 2 years old - so perhaps its just getting worn out. I have it connected to my iMac 5 intel (2 1/2 G ram) with ethernet via an Airport Express device which feeds off my Airport Extreme. My computer is an iMac G5 intel running OS 10.6.4

Should I power down the devices? Is there a defect in my ATV? I do have ATV Flash 4.15 installed and I always keep that current.

Any advice will be appreciated!

Bruce Schweitzer
Alpine, Wyoming 83128
 

sanPietro98

macrumors 6502a
May 30, 2008
642
1
28.416834,-81.581214
My ATV is also about 2 years old and it's definitely starting to have problems. It often freezes up and needs to be power cycled. And I'm also seeing white "spots" when its playing videos (I've read this is due to overheating).

I would guess these original models are starting to reach end of useful life. This is probably what happens when you design a heat generating device with no fan.

I really hope the rumors about a new ATV this week are true. I've been wanted to replace my current model, but I'm waiting for the big announcement.
 

sanPietro98

macrumors 6502a
May 30, 2008
642
1
28.416834,-81.581214
Also, I've found that some TVs need to be power cycled periodically too, especially if you're using an HDMI connection from the ATV to the TV. Some TVs' firmware is known for HDMI sync issues.

It happens with my Samsung TV every now and then.
 
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