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Apple tv / itunes has crippled tv rentals

T

tmofee

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 27, 2009
204
0
Mildura
I just noticed this the other night, but for some reason apple have decided to limit television rentals to itunes and ios 4.1 products. What does this mean? Well, even though the transfer movie rentals work fine and dandy on the older apple tvs, you aren't allowed to transfer tv shows onto the old models!

Not only that, you won't be able to transfer tv rentals to your iPad until November.

Why would they do something stupid like this? I can understand there might be technical limitations to the netfllix streaming or something newer down the track, but rentals is a proven tech that already works on older apple tvs. I just don't get it.
 
B

brentsg

macrumors 68040
Oct 15, 2008
3,578
936
My wife was going to start renting some TV shows on our older AppleTV this weekend but couldn't figure it out.

I saw that it was available in iTunes. Is it simply not possible to view these rented shows on the new AppleTV? Or is it a matter of doing something manually that should be simple?
 
T

tmofee

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 27, 2009
204
0
Mildura
brentsg said:
My wife was going to start renting some TV shows on our older AppleTV this weekend but couldn't figure it out.

I saw that it was available in iTunes. Is it simply not possible to view these rented shows on the new AppleTV? Or is it a matter of doing something manually that should be simple?
Click to expand...

The new apple tv when it comes out will be running on ios4.1 . So they'll be able to watch rented tv. From what I know, the older models have completely different software.

So at the moment it's not a big thing with the whole handful of tv shows available, but it just seems silly to me, maybe its a tv studio request or something
 
TheBritishBloke

TheBritishBloke

macrumors 68030
Jul 21, 2009
2,532
0
United Kingdom
I think it's just the fact that Apple can't be bothered to update the software for your devices, they've given you free updates for many years, they want you to upgrade.
 
Shoesy

Shoesy

macrumors 6502a
Jun 21, 2007
718
1
Colchester, UK.
Seems silly to me as apple must surely make a bit of money out of the rentals. I know there arn't a huge amount of appletv's about but those of us using the originals are surely the hardcore! We would love this service.
 
D

dmm219

macrumors 6502
Aug 25, 2008
416
0
it is very doubtful you will ever see tv rentals on the old ATV...Apple needs there to be SOME reason for you to upgrade to an inferior machine...

i'll stick with purchases on my old ATV thank you...
 
W

waw74

macrumors 601
May 27, 2008
4,683
949
tmofee said:
The new apple tv when it comes out will be running on ios4.1.
Click to expand...

no, the apple tv is running it's own OS.

to watch from your iOS device (iphone, ipod touch) you must be running 4.1

apple's KB on this (link) doesn't seem to mention the appletv at all,
 
P

Phantom Gremlin

macrumors regular
Feb 10, 2010
247
29
Tualatin, Oregon
30 Hz capability needed

I don't think the "crippling" is anything sinister. It's because sitcoms etc are shot on video, so they need 30 Hz playback. The old Apple TV will only do 720p at 24 Hz.
 
rorschach

rorschach

macrumors 68020
Jul 27, 2003
2,272
1,856
I don't think that asking for Apple to release a MINOR update that enables viewing of TV shows we paid for on 1st gen Apple TVs is too much. It's not even that big of a deal to me, tbh, but it would be nice.
 
T

tmofee

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 27, 2009
204
0
Mildura
Phantom Gremlin said:
I don't think the "crippling" is anything sinister. It's because sitcoms etc are shot on video, so they need 30 Hz playback. The old Apple TV will only do 720p at 24 Hz.
Click to expand...

Normal tv shows that you buy are playable on the old apple tv now. That's how i have been watching true blood at the moment
 
T

tmofee

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 27, 2009
204
0
Mildura
waw74 said:
no, the apple tv is running it's own OS.

to watch from your iOS device (iphone, ipod touch) you must be running 4.1

apple's KB on this (link) doesn't seem to mention the appletv at all,
Click to expand...

Are yu sure abiut that? Im sure I read somewhere that the newer apple tvs will be running ios. Make sense.
 
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