Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

mrmini78

macrumors newbie
May 21, 2009
22
12
Sydney, Australia
is it only me, but is there stuff on iTunes(Mac/Pc) that isn't on the apple tv?
theres a few movies and trailers on the Mac that aren't showing up on apple tv. and yes i have searched for them.

also, I'm waiting for tv shows to show up in the New Zealand store, come on apple!!! get on the game already

The reason there is movies missing on the Apple Tv is because you can only watch rentals and on iTunes it has all movies available.

With the missing tv shows, it's up to the networks not Apple
 

shurcooL

macrumors 6502a
Jan 24, 2011
939
118
Safari feels sna... oh wait.

----------

One thing about iTunes in the Cloud that doesn't make sense on Apple TV... If you go to Movies or TV shows, it lets you stream whatever you've purchased.

However, if you go to Music, it requires you to buy iTunes Match in order to listen to songs you've purchased. Why? Why can't I stream songs I've purchased (not matched) without iTunes Match.

Not a big deal, but kinda lame.
 

andrewsyd

macrumors newbie
May 10, 2012
22
19
Am I the only one who loves the AppleTV here? It does exactly what it claims to do, and very well.

No I love my Apple TV too.. In fact I would go as far to say it is possibly my favourite Apple device.. And I love my macs, iPhone and iPad.

And I agree, it does do what it claims to do very well. My only real issue is the inconsistencies between what you can do with iTunes vs what you can do with Apple TV... i.e. viewing by genres and viewing by artwork. When you have over 400 TV Show "albums" you want to be able to view by genre instead of a neverending alphabetical list. Right now I have "Documentaries - " in the title before every documentary series in my library to separate them from all my dramas and comedies. Kinda annoying that that's the best way to sort things right now. And I think displaying artwork instead of an endless list of tv show names also helps address the "folders" feature that time and time again people keep requesting be brought back. It doesn't bring it back as such, but certainly tidies things up while keeping the iTunes "every tv season is an album" mentality.

If they introduce this into the UI, bring in the Music store and continue to improve on minor performance issues over time, I can honestly say that to me, it would be the perfect device. I don't want apps (I use AirPlay way more than the YouTube area, for example) or the ability to play this format or that format... Apple TV is iTunes on my TV - and I hope that's all it ever really is. But of course we all have different opinions, this is just mine :)
 

Marcus PM

macrumors regular
Aug 9, 2011
147
121
Anyone know if this will help with netfix freezing and going to black screens and then the audio/video loosing sync? It is sad that my smart tv has a netter netflix app than my Apple TV...Apple usually means quality except in this case

I had that same problem but only on my Apple TV, until 5 months ago I complained to NetFlix. Not had a problem since.
 

shurcooL

macrumors 6502a
Jan 24, 2011
939
118
Btw, does anyone else have the (minor) problem where the white LED light on the (2nd gen) Apple TV goes on after the device falls asleep. It happens randomly, usually a few hours after it falls asleep. There is no HDMI signal, yet the light is on.

I wonder if this update will fix it...
 

Gubbz

macrumors member
May 2, 2010
64
26
Perth, Australia
One thing about iTunes in the Cloud that doesn't make sense on Apple TV... If you go to Movies or TV shows, it lets you stream whatever you've purchased.

However, if you go to Music, it requires you to buy iTunes Match in order to listen to songs you've purchased. Why? Why can't I stream songs I've purchased (not matched) without iTunes Match.

In the UK, we can't do that with movies either, only TV shows, so you should count yourself lucky, but I imagine it'll come :)
 

saccento

macrumors 6502a
Jun 30, 2008
664
4
New Jersey
doesn't look like the preview for the movies in the iTunes store are HD after installing update. The previews in the Trailers app are HD though.
 
Last edited:

sdv5

macrumors member
Jun 15, 2010
36
1
The new ones are fantastic. I didn't think I'd be as thrilled as I am. I don't turn mine off. I have it connected via HDMI to my Pioneer Elite VSX-33 AVR, from there to my Pioneer Elite 50". My NAS runs via Cat 6 to my current gen AEBS along with my Mac Mini. I have all my media servers and Plex in my Login Items. Turn it on, goes right into Plex, all my music, movies (even my 29GB Blu-Ray encodes play flawlessly with DTS surround sound), pictures run right through Plex, hardly ever have to use Lion unless I'm updating/tweaking something. The apple remote works perfectly.

If you have the money to spare, I'd highly recommend a Mac Mini as a HTMC over an Apple TV. The Apple TV is too limiting, even the compressed 1080P encodes aren't much better than the 720P versions. I did a test, compared my Blu-Ray's played in OS X, their handbraked encodes, and iTunes' 1080P versions. Course the Blu-Ray's won hands down, but my 1080P encodes blew away iTunes' and were as lossless as I could get from the original source. Plus DTS surround sound and the myriad of supported formats, to me it was a no brainer :).

Actually, this is not going to work well. You simply cannot connect Mac Mini directly to your AVR if you care about picture quality even a little bit. Unless, of course, your Pioneer AVR has the ability to handle computer input over HDMI differently from the rest of your devices (e.g., BD player, set-up cable TV box, etc.).

Computers have different color range than CE devices. If your AVR treats all HDMI inputs the same way (as CE devices), then the picture from your Mac Mini will have crushed blacks and blown highlights because of the color range mismatch. Computers and computer monitors work with RGB full range 0-255. CE devices are designed for standard range 16-235. The easiest way to tell that something is wrong is loss of shadow detail (in dark scenes), or clipped highlights.

To fix this issue, you would need to connect Mac Mini directly to your TV and make sure that you use HDMI input on your TV that is designated for computer connection. If you do so, you will be able to get proper 1:1 pixel mapping and color range. You would then need to use toslink optical audio output from your Mini to transmit audio to the AVR.

I have both Mac Mini and ATV3 connected to my HT. Mac Mini goes directly to the TV for the reasons I explained above, and ATV3 goes to AVR. The convergence of computers and consumer electronic devices has not happened yet.
 

mentaluproar

macrumors 68000
May 25, 2010
1,762
209
Ohio, USA
If they ever drop in support for hulu, this box would really be nice. The only thing appleTV has over others at this point is iTunes store and airplay support. Otherwise, Roku STILL beats it. :(
 

Roy G Biv

macrumors 6502
Dec 26, 2010
362
104
Could someone explain how the new UI is bad? It took the iPhone/iPad UI and made it 16:9 with artwork up top. I find it superior in every way.
 

a0me

macrumors 65816
Oct 5, 2006
1,074
166
Tokyo, Japan
Btw, does anyone else have the (minor) problem where the white LED light on the (2nd gen) Apple TV goes on after the device falls asleep. It happens randomly, usually a few hours after it falls asleep. There is no HDMI signal, yet the light is on.

I wonder if this update will fix it...
I have the same "issue" on my 3rd gen Apple TV. No idea where that comes from either.
 

HiRez

macrumors 603
Jan 6, 2004
6,250
2,576
Western US
What the hell is wrong with you people? What is the big issue with the UI? It looks fine!

One problem I have with it is the very thin line it puts around the selected icon on the home screen. From a distance it's extremely hard to tell what's selected, which means you need to move the cursor to see where it is.
 

nokuchikushi

macrumors member
Jan 31, 2012
48
0
What the hell is wrong with you people? What is the big issue with the UI? It looks fine!

I agree. I think it looks and works great and MS would have been lucky to come up with this (please don't mention Metro AKA Windows for Stupid People). To be honest, I think people just like to complain. Especially because the complainers are the ones who have jailbroken their Apple TV, and I don't know if you've ever jailbroken your Apple TV, but I have, and it doesn't get any uglier than those jailbroken interfaces.

----------

Am I the only one who loves the AppleTV here? It does exactly what it claims to do, and very well.

You are not alone. Those of us who like it just fine don't constantly bitch and complain so it just seems like you are alone.
 

jasonefmonk

macrumors 6502
May 5, 2011
385
431
Btw, does anyone else have the (minor) problem where the white LED light on the (2nd gen) Apple TV goes on after the device falls asleep. It happens randomly, usually a few hours after it falls asleep. There is no HDMI signal, yet the light is on.

I wonder if this update will fix it...

Yes this seems to happen on at least one of the two Apple TV boxes in my house. As it has the one-hour standby I don't think much of it, although wasted energy is wasted energy.
 

HiRez

macrumors 603
Jan 6, 2004
6,250
2,576
Western US
Oh, another thing I hate about the AppleTV is I can't use it with the TV off. I have it hooked up to my stereo with an optical audio cable, I want to use it for music streaming, but I don't want to keep my electricity-guzzling, heat-pumping 50" plasma on to do it. When the AppleTV doesn't detect a live signal on the other end of the HDMI cable (i.e. a television that's turned on), it shuts down and won't output through the optical cable.
 

jasonefmonk

macrumors 6502
May 5, 2011
385
431
I'm unsure if this was a feature before, but I hadn't noticed it. Since the update I am able to sleep my Apple TV by holding the centre button (select) on the remote.

Regardless of when it was implemented, it's much nicer than going in to the settings menu.
 

Sedulous

macrumors 68030
Dec 10, 2002
2,530
2,577
I'm unsure if this was a feature before, but I hadn't noticed it. Since the update I am able to sleep my Apple TV by holding the centre button (select) on the remote.

Regardless of when it was implemented, it's much nicer than going in to the settings menu.

No, that has been in place since original firmware on ATV2.
 

macpeach55

macrumors 6502
Oh, another thing I hate about the AppleTV is I can't use it with the TV off. I have it hooked up to my stereo with an optical audio cable, I want to use it for music streaming, but I don't want to keep my electricity-guzzling, heat-pumping 50" plasma on to do it. When the AppleTV doesn't detect a live signal on the other end of the HDMI cable (i.e. a television that's turned on), it shuts down and won't output through the optical cable.

They fixed that some time ago on one of the updates, don't remember which one - if I stream from iTunes, I just turn the ATV on, activate airplay, switch the receiver over to that input, and it works fine.
If the TV is already on and I switch it off, there is a momentary interruption, but then the audio carries on.
And this is through the HDMI Cable.
Sounds like something else in your setup is causing the problem, such as your TV settings. There was one in ours that caused the TV to come on if any device is activated and the receiver is switched to that input, but we turned that off.
 

Navdakilla

macrumors 65816
Feb 3, 2011
1,100
13
Canada
Am I the only one who loves the AppleTV here? It does exactly what it claims to do, and very well.

I am another one that loves it,
Took me a while to convert all my videos, but now that's all said and done I love it. All my movies, and tv shows at my fingertips


Only 2 beefs I have with it
1 - how it needs to be linked to a itunes on a running mac/pc
2 - The need to convert videos to mp4.

Even with those dislikes, the apple tv is an amazing product for me
 

Appel

macrumors member
Nov 21, 2010
68
0
Can anyone confirm if the media player / click To plugin airplay plug in works with this version? If so im eillibg to scip my jailbreak for this.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.