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Sdahe

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Oct 26, 2007
1,722
23
San Juan, PR
Hello Guys,

I'm considering an Apple TV but want to know the good and the bad first from those of you that already have it. I have a 42" LED Tv so I'm good there... I also have a Bose Home Theater system so good to go in the sound department... Have a 4MB internet connection so i don't know is that's enough.. you can tell me.

My concerns are... Movie renting costs... I've seen that is $4.99 to rent a movie. I can rent Blueray movies in RedBox for $1.49 so it's kind of a big difference there...

I'm also concern about the minimum internet connection that I need to watch movies in HD..

Anyway, tell me the pros and cons.. about having Apple TV… should I buy it or not…

Thanks!!!
 

bt22

macrumors 6502
Feb 15, 2009
309
19
Alabama
You didn't mention, so I will ask. Do you have any music or movies on your computer now? If you plan on using Handbrake to digitize your owned DVD's and you have a lot of music then the Apple TV is a great little device. We have multiple Apple TV's in our house and use them reguarly. If you only want one to rent movies thru, then not sure it would be worth it. You can sync to your pictures on your computer and Apple TV will use the pictures as a screen saver... We enjoy this feature when we have birthdays and christmas and such. We turn on Apple TV and it scolls all the pictures on the TV and family can see the pictures without having to stand around a photo album or phone... I would highly recommend an Apple TV... Also if you have iPhones or iPads you can use them as a remote for the Apple TV. Apple just released a software update enabling bluetooth keyboards so it's nice to use a keyboard when searching for youtube videos where you need to type a lot. Hope this helps
 

mic j

macrumors 68030
Mar 15, 2012
2,663
156
Your download speed is marginal, to be honest. And the higher price of the rental movies is for the convenience of not having to go out, pick, and return the disc. Only you can make the determination if that is a good price or not. Also be aware that if you want to play any local media, iTunes has to be running on a computer somewhere. I would suggest you buy one, try it out and if your not satisfied, return it.

I have 11Mbps download speed and a good wifi system in the house. I love mine and only occasionally stream from iTunes. I find the rental price to be a fair price to satisfy my impulsiveness.
 

Sdahe

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Oct 26, 2007
1,722
23
San Juan, PR
Can I download my movies to the Apple TV?

How much space the Apple TV has?

To answer the first question... Yes, I have an iMac in one of the rooms that has a lot of music in it... That's what I use when Im working
 

bt22

macrumors 6502
Feb 15, 2009
309
19
Alabama
The Apple TV does not have the ability to store anything locally, everything is streamed to 2nd & 3rd generation Apple TVs. Often times I wish I could store stuff on the Apple TV but streaming works pretty well. Actually I connect my Apple TV via Ethernet.
 

mic j

macrumors 68030
Mar 15, 2012
2,663
156
Can I download my movies to the Apple TV?

How much space the Apple TV has?

To answer the first question... Yes, I have an iMac in one of the rooms that has a lot of music in it... That's what I use when Im working
The aTV will start playing the movie as soon as it has enough stored data to begin. If your download speed is a problem. You can start the movie playing and then pause it until enough downloads. It has 8GB RAM, but some, small amount of that is used for other functions.
 

iMarc845

macrumors member
Jul 3, 2008
99
22
Rockland County, NY
I have two aTVs: a second-gen which is hooked up to my 720p TV in the bedroom and a third-gen connected to the 1080p TV in the living room.

We use them mostly to stream content from our Macs. If you have video in iTunes, that streams natively. If you have video in other formats besides .mp4/.m4v, there are third-party solutions to stream those without converting them (Beamer and Air Parrot, for example, can stream anything your Mac can play.) Or if it's something I want to keep in iTunes, I convert it using the free utility Handbrake.

Of the aTV built-ins: we watch movie trailers, an occasional YouTube video and some podcasts. Once in a while we'll buy something from the iTunes store. We don't currently use Netflix but I have considered subscribing to it. As others mentioned, the photo screensaver is quite cool; it's nice when some of our vacation photos show up onscreen randomly. If I were a big MLB, NBA, NHL fan or a WSJ watcher, those subscriptions would be major.

I have a very fast 'net connection, so I cannot advise you on that aspect.

We are very happy with ours; I'd agree with the person who suggested you buy one, try it out and return it if it's not to your liking. It's far from a necessity but it really is a nice-to-have, IMO.
 

CocoaPuffs

macrumors 68020
Aug 23, 2008
2,005
3
If your main usage for considering ATV is streaming Bluray movies and cost is a factor, I would stick with renting movies from Redbox.
 

bearcatrp

macrumors 68000
Sep 24, 2008
1,728
67
Boon Docks USA
Renting movies from itunes can be slow. Unless you plan ahead, you will be waiting on your movie, all dependent on your connection speed. Works great with netflix. To steam movies from home you need itunes running on your mac. I have been looking at different options so i can pull from a hard drive rather than itunes doing all the work. OUYA, Western Digital live are a couple i am considering. Not sure why but apple could put iOS on the apple tv, with about 8gb memory and do this. Would make a great ATV.
 

Charliem78

macrumors newbie
Apr 15, 2012
14
0
I had a second gen Apple TV but I found it seemed to have buffering issues. I personally recommend getting a basic Mac mini yes it's about 5 times the price but it has tons of storage for your digital movies and is super fast and the apple remote works perfectly with it. Just install XBMC for playing all you media and some streaming plugins like ice films or 1channel. Toss in some Netflix and Hulu and your set to practically cut the cable cord.
 

hackthatphone

macrumors 68000
Jul 28, 2010
1,590
1
Renting movies from itunes can be slow. Unless you plan ahead, you will be waiting on your movie, all dependent on your connection speed.

While I agree if you have some ridiculously slow internet connection you could be waiting awhile, we have the typical cable internet service nothing special and don't have speed issues. You don't have to wait for the whole movie to download to begin playback it's ready to go at 1% downloaded. We rent all the time on itunes we also use netflix streaming on the tivo. If anything that netflix streaming has the buffering problem. I've never seen so much as a hiccup with itunes rentals playing while downloading.
 

mic j

macrumors 68030
Mar 15, 2012
2,663
156
While I agree if you have some ridiculously slow internet connection you could be waiting awhile, we have the typical cable internet service nothing special and don't have speed issues. You don't have to wait for the whole movie to download to begin playback it's ready to go at 1% downloaded. We rent all the time on itunes we also use netflix streaming on the tivo. If anything that netflix streaming has the buffering problem. I've never seen so much as a hiccup with itunes rentals playing while downloading.

Same here. Download/startup is quick. I have 11Mbps download DSL.
 

Sdahe

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Oct 26, 2007
1,722
23
San Juan, PR
Hello guys...

I got the AppleTV today and have one question... Is there a problem with Youtube?... It's not working. I open the Youtube app the I cant search or login with my account... Nothing!!!

Is there something else I need to setup?
 

RVijay007

macrumors member
Jul 20, 2010
90
27
Download Speed

Not sure if you meant 4MB (bytes) or 4Mbps (bits), but if you really meant the former, that is definitely fast enough for streaming HD. Mine is only 3.2 MB/s (30 Mbps) and is plenty fast to stream an HD movie.
 
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