Apple Says New Apple TV 4K is Tremendous Value at $179, Not Designed to Compete Directly With Xbox or PlayStation

[Swift]

Not a bad price but because I still have a 1080 set, I am not compelled to update from my original ATV.

That's right. The whole idea is to be able to deliver 4K HDR at 60 fps. No stuttering. The processor is the 12x or so. Lots more cores. You can keep up with HDMI 4.1. Mine comes tomorrow. (That gives me another year of TV+, which will give me more and better movies after the virus stops slowing things down.) Aside from the way the AppleTV integrates with everything else, it's great for me. I'm no gamer, though.

 

[Scoob Redux]

... With most Tv's supporting airplay now and every major streaming service the only point of an apple TV is to have specific features like arcade and fitness+....

huh? I would never use those features, yet an Apple TV is a must for me. I can't imagine letting a "smart" TV connect to the internet! You lose total control of what that TV does and what information about you it reports back to the mothership. Not to mention that the Apple TV UI is about 1000x better than any smart TV. It's all about the best experience and user control.

 

[6787872]

Honest question: What advantages does Apple TV bring to a Smart TV?

My TV already has a smart hub that does more than I can use, it can record shows and AirPlay comes built into it, so I can seamlessly mirror my iPhone or iPad screen, or even use it as a monitor wirelessly. I do not even have a set top box, the TV can already handle the TV-input from the provider.

modern tv's have gotten a lot better but i just prefer the UI of the apple tv and how easy it is to control with my phone.

 

[Neil Harrison]

modern tv's have gotten a lot better but i just prefer the UI of the apple tv and how easy it is to control with my phone.

My Samsung tv is 4K and 5 years old and the software/ui is shocking…it’s about as much use as a chocolate fireguard. Apple TV will be the only platform that can deliver 4K..Sky q apps dont. I could use my Xbox but I completely agree Apple TV is the best way to watch streamed content and I can hardwire a 1gb Ethernet to it so doesn’t rely on WiFi

 

[Duncan-UK]

Modern LG sets are excellent - if it wasn't for iTunes extra and infuse I'd be happy to use the Apple TV app for the TV all the time. Indeed on the set in my kitchen/diner, I dont have anything plugged into the TV other than an aerial. The TV uses wifi to access everything via the internal apps.

 

[matrix07]

The one thing I wish the AppleTV would do is play my local media from a NAS. VLC works in a pinch but it’s not what I would expect using an AppleTV.

Why don’t you use app like AirVideo HD, or Plex?

 

[MisterK]

The AppleTV is probably Apple's most difficult platform from a positioning perspective because it's not clear what they *should* make. As a brand you play to your strengths, and for Apple those are industrial design, brand cachet, ecosystem, and user interface. None of these get better by building a cheaper stick. Price conscious consumers are not Apple's customers. And, because of their (current) developer/app ecosystem, Apple have a price ceiling. They would have a very hard time selling $60-$90 games so they can't price themselves like a games console. Apple is not going to go for market share through a very cheap device (why I presume they're putting AppleTV+ on smart TVs, to still get those viewers) and they're not building a games console, so what they are trying to build is "the best streaming box you can buy." Regardless of price, the middle–to upper class consumer should not be able to get a better streaming box than the AppleTV. That is their goal.

So presuming they are correct, from a business sense, in making a box that's between $150-$300, then the question becomes "what can you have the box do to make that price feel worth it?" I think the current AppleTV was a sensible answer that just didn't take. You couldn't "blame" anyone for the lacklustre success of the AppleTV because the rationale was sound. Give it an App Store and let people build whatever, apps of all kinds, shareware sized games, all the streaming providers, Siri built in, HomeKit integration, great UI....

To fix the AppleTV, they need to either A) keep the price what it is and make incremental improvements until it is undoubtedly the best consumer streaming box (non-nerd, non-pirating and totally grandma friendly) OR B) they need to go upmarket and compete with a games console (too?). But for Apple to get the margins they want, that probably means a very heavy investment in making their own games studio at the very least. And making controllers. And I'm not sure they want to go there. And then they'd still want something for high end customers who don't game. And that would probably look like our current AppleTV.

 

[Benjamin Nabulsi]

Noticeably snappier, it’s like moving from iPhone 7 to 10

 

[slothinker]

I just got and installed the new Apple TV. I like the remote (although I haven't done much with it) but I was also hoping that it would be possible to use it in addition to an older Apple remote (I have a spare). This is useful if you have two people watching TV who aren't sitting on top of each other. Unfortunately I don't see any way to activate both.

For what it's worth the Swiss remote which is compatible with Apple TV works fine with the new Apple TV. It also functions fine as a second activated remote.

 

[star-affinity]

Let me guess – the games on Apple TV when used with a 4K television will be upscaled from 1080p pixels?

OK @ikir do you know I'm incorrect or do you think I'm incorrect? 🙂 Depends on the game maybe? And if one can settle for less than 60 frames per second?

 

[name99]

I just got and installed the new Apple TV. I like the remote (although I haven't done much with it) but I was also hoping that it would be possible to use it in addition to an older Apple remote (I have a spare). This is useful if you have two people watching TV who aren't sitting on top of each other. Unfortunately I don't see any way to activate both.

For what it's worth the Swiss remote which is compatible with Apple TV works fine with the new Apple TV. It also functions fine as a second activated remote.

You can add any standard IR remote to AppleTV -- just look in the prefs.
I have the Siri remote and 2 IR remotes connected and all three work fine, whichever is most convenient to reach.

 

[sross16]

I actually agree with him.
Even though I think $179 is just a bit steep, and I think them selling the old 2015 model for $149 still is a complete rip off, I do think that it is the best streaming box out there.
It definitely has the smoothest and easiest to use user interface, it supports all my iTunes purchases over the years, it has a decent remote, and it definitely supports the most formats.
Not to mention, you can’t beat that ecosystem integration.

I like my Apple TV but you’re wrong on one major point. The Apple TV absolutely is horrible when it comes to video format support. Most formats are in fact not supported natively and need to be transcoded. It makes for not the greatest Plex or Emby client because of this

 

[snooksy83]

I own 2 AppleTV 4k units and I was hanging out for a decent hardware upgrade. Apple Arcade games run slow on the previous gen. I’m always out of space on my 32GB unit so I really wanted to see a 128GB. Games are massive now. I held off to see whether it would get a decent APU to match the games they are trying to put on Apple Arcade such as NBA2K21 etc. and I was disappointed so I bought a PS5 instead. I think Apple couldn’t get manufacturing capacity with TSMC to put anything except a last generation A series APU in it. The performance upgrade wasn’t enough to keep the device current. Apple missed the boat here with the Apple TV again. I’ll use it for streaming actual TV over my network but without proper Atmos and HDR10+ support the device doesn’t meet my overall needs any longer. I have an Oppo 203 for proper media streaming with actual Atmos output, Dolby Vision, NFS support, HDR10+ as well. Now I have the PS5 for gaming. The Apple TV can run the TVheadend client on my Oled and Projector. I’ll put the ATV in the bedroom. The remote never bothered me once you got used to it. The Bluetooth pairing with PS4 controllers is very flaky on the previous gen 4K model as well.

 

[snooksy83]

I own 2 AppleTV 4k units and I was hanging out for a decent hardware upgrade. Apple Arcade games run slow on the previous gen. I’m always out of space on my 32GB unit so I really wanted to see a 128GB. Games are massive now. I held off to see whether it would get a decent APU to match the games they are trying to put on Apple Arcade such as NBA2K21 etc. and I was disappointed so I bought a PS5 instead. I think Apple couldn’t get manufacturing capacity with TSMC to put anything except a last generation A series APU in it. The performance upgrade wasn’t enough to keep the device current. Apple missed the boat here with the Apple TV again. I’ll use it for streaming actual TV over my network but without proper Atmos and HDR10+ support the device doesn’t meet my overall needs any longer. I have an Oppo 203 for proper media streaming with actual Atmos output, Dolby Vision, NFS support, HDR10+ as well. Now I have the PS5 for gaming. The Apple TV can run the TVheadend client on my Oled and Projector. I’ll put the ATV in the bedroom. The remote never bothered me once you got used to it. The Bluetooth pairing with PS4 controllers is very flaky on the previous gen 4K model as well.

One more point. If you want codec support use Infuse and stream your media in its original format. I have 100’s of terabytes of content and nothing ever gets transcoded.

 

[ErikGrim]

Why don’t you use app like AirVideo HD, or Plex?

Or Infuse even?

 

[slothinker]

You can add any standard IR remote to AppleTV -- just look in the prefs.
I have the Siri remote and 2 IR remotes connected and all three work fine, whichever is most convenient to reach.

Right, thanks for replying. I was just hoping that two Apple remotes could be supported simultaneously. It would be handy in my particular situation.

 

[mi7chy]

Does it finally include a browser since some video content is only available on browser?

 

[Richdmoore]

Does it finally include a browser since some video content is only available on browser?

We could really a web browser on the Atv to play XCloud on the apple tv, but so far apple hasn't allowed it, unlike iOS/iPadOS. Hopefully it will be announced at WWDC, but no rumors so far about a change in policy, at least that I've read about.

 

[mi7chy]

We could really a web browser on the Atv to play XCloud on the apple tv, but so far apple hasn't allowed it, unlike iOS/iPadOS. Hopefully it will be announced at WWDC, but no rumors so far about a change in policy, at least that I've read about.

We just have to keep pestering them with obvious stuff like support for YouTube VP9 decode that they finally relented to.

 

[Td1970]

You can via different apps. There's Plex, Infuse, and a number of other apps that let you stream from a NAS. I personally use both, and they work great streaming from my Time Capsule. They also let you output different audio formats such as DTS, multiple Dolby formats etc along with different video format MKV, ISO, AVI etc. You can also install iPTv apps that let you add different content.

Native support would be far superior

 

[brucewayne]

Pretty sure the Mac Pro's 28-core Intel Xeon processor wipes the floor with the M1 in the Mac mini.

Pretty sure the Mac Pro's 28-core Intel Xeon processor wipes the floor with the M1 in the Mac mini.

 

[Websnapx2]

As the PS5 is lightyears more powerful than an A12, I imagine it’s the app makers fault if you’re experiencing issues, less the platform.

Does it really matter? I mean it's all about user experience and so be it an issue with app development or hardware, the end result of a poor experiencing accessing the same local and app-streamed media is a major issue. If my 5-year-old Apple TV could do it seamlessly then something with that much more power should be able to power right through.

That was my thought initially too, that the PS5 is a more powerful machine that would be better equipped to handle that sort of load but it doesn't — not for media.