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Kendo

macrumors 68020
Original poster
Apr 4, 2011
2,356
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My friend is willing to sell me his Apple TV 3rd gen for $35. I only need an Apple TV to stream iTunes movies or use AirPlay on my iPad. Does the A5 run real slow? I was ready to buy the new Apple TV for $150 but I realized I have my Smart TV for Amazon Prime and Netflix apps and a Chromecast for HBO NOW. Does the A5 run at a decent clip?
 
It's not bad but can get a bit slow when you're in the settings menu. However, if you are planning to use Apple Music to stream music, I think you need the new apple tv to do that. But I am planning to keep my current gen Apple tv and put it in my bedroom to stream movies & TV shows.
 
My friend is willing to sell me his Apple TV 3rd gen for $35. I only need an Apple TV to stream iTunes movies or use AirPlay on my iPad. Does the A5 run real slow? I was ready to buy the new Apple TV for $150 but I realized I have my Smart TV for Amazon Prime and Netflix apps and a Chromecast for HBO NOW. Does the A5 run at a decent clip?

Great price. If your only need is to stream iTunes movies and use AirPlay it should perform fine. The limiting factor will be your network, if you will use Wi-Fi make sure there is a good strong signal from your router to where the ATV will be placed. If there is, ask your buddy to try it out and I think you will like it.

I have 2 ATV 3s that we use for streaming music via AppleMusic, HBO Go, Showtime, streaming movies stored on my iMac and looking at photos stored on my iMac. They both work great!
 
I understand the price is good but the main point of the thread is if it runs smooth. In other words, I can easily go for an iPad 1 for $50 but I might as well burn the $50 because the original iPad is almost unusable today.
 
It's not super fast, but it works well and is more than usable. (not like the iPad 1 you hinted at).
At this stage we don't really know how smooth the ATV4 will be by comparison.
 
Thats a pretty good deal, and you shouldn't have any lagginess. It's a very capable streaming device.
 
My friend is willing to sell me his Apple TV 3rd gen for $35. I only need an Apple TV to stream iTunes movies or use AirPlay on my iPad. Does the A5 run real slow? I was ready to buy the new Apple TV for $150 but I realized I have my Smart TV for Amazon Prime and Netflix apps and a Chromecast for HBO NOW. Does the A5 run at a decent clip?

Until today it was the best Apple TV you could buy. 35$ is a great deal. I have a jailbroken gen 2 Apple TV. And I have no problems streaming anything. If it's an app or service offered on the 3rd gen product it will work well on the 3rd gen product. Barring a few issues Apple isn't known for allowing poorly working services on their devices.
 
Keep in mind there are 2 version of the ATV 3. Latest which works better for Airplay is model = A169. You can see it in the settings under About (I think). If it is not the A169 I would consider a referb A169. New they are $69. Also, my guess the ATV 3 will be cheaper in a couple weeks. However, I would really consider the 32gb version of the ATV4 if you you decide to spend closer to $69.
 
Keep in mind there are 2 version of the ATV 3. Latest which works better for Airplay is model = A169. You can see it in the settings under About (I think). If it is not the A169 I would consider a referb A169. New they are $69. Also, my guess the ATV 3 will be cheaper in a couple weeks. However, I would really consider the 32gb version of the ATV4 if you you decide to spend closer to $69.

Why? Isn't the revised Apple TV 3 the same but instead of the dual core A5 with one core locked, it's just a single core A5?
 
Why? Isn't the revised Apple TV 3 the same but instead of the dual core A5 with one core locked, it's just a single core A5?
Actually did not hear that before. But does make sense. I was talking about better WiFi where your iPhone makes a direct connection to the Apple TV. Not sure what they call it exactly. Maybe WiFi Direct or something like that. You should be able to look it up. Maybe Google Apple TV 3 WiFi A1469 or something like that.
 
Currently my Apple TV 3 (a launch model so quite old now!) connects to a Home Share iTunes Library 8,000 Songs, over 500 1080p Films between 1-8GB in Size, and around 1 TB of SD/720p TV Shows. The menu system is a pain but other than that it is ok. I use it wireless and takes around 7-9 seconds to start playing a movie, once started never any bother. Airplay from iPad 4 is good, I airplay BT Sport to it and no complaints.

If anything I'm only getting the ATV4 out of curiosity.
 
Wow you guys were right, the Apple TV 3 still runs flawlessly smooth. I picked it up yesterday and set it up with the latest OS. Tested out AirPlay and streamed a movie from my iPad. The only criticism I have is that the channel lineup is kind of all over the place but once I hide the options I don't need, I should be all good to go. This was totally worth the $35 and I'm glad I saved $149 by passing over the Apple TV 4.
 
I understand the price is good but the main point of the thread is if it runs smooth. In other words, I can easily go for an iPad 1 for $50 but I might as well burn the $50 because the original iPad is almost unusable today.

Apple TV 3 is still good if you want to use AirPlay or watch a movie.
The user interface is sometimes laggy, but you get used to it
 
I guess mine is gen 2 (720p model), and it's still generally fine. It isn't lightning fast but you don't really need it to be for what it does.
 
I've got the 3rd gen. It's good. Not great. Could be the 1.25TB of media I'm asking it to load from the iMac. The 4 sounds like it'll be pretty good. That said, I just can't find a reason to pull the trigger on it. I don't do any services. Just streaming from the computer. I'm hoping the Apps make it a must have but again, not sure how they will. Lots of stuff I have on my phone that I'd like on my TV but without touch that conversation ends.
 
I did a fair share of iTunes streaming, it has no problems actually playing my movies/shows when I'm in there, problem is navigating my 500+ library is as slow as can be. You can use the remote app on an iPad or iPhone and pick your show or movie that way and it's faster. I just couldn't take the slowness of menu speed anymore.
 
It is absolutely worth it. I have 3 AppleTV gen 3s, and they work flawlessly. At most, I reboot them once every 2-3 months. And I have them set to always stay on (which I've found helps assure stability/connectivity with Home Sharing).

If/when I get ATV4s, I will hand my ATV3s to family members. They are still very useful devices and will likely remain so for a couple of more years.
 
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