AT&T to Offer Internet TV on Apple TV?

[bigmc6000]

It's sweet...

I just switched from DSL to cable -- much faster -- but I had to sign a contract for a year. Two days later, while cancelling the DSL, I hear that, as of May 1, they've rolled out U-Verse in my area. Fiber optic to the door, 6 Mb/s, and cable TV. Drat!

Now imagine downloading a show at that speed.

That's exactly what I have - they also bump the uploading speed to 1Mbps when you get UVerse - that's made a noticeable difference when uploading my photos.

 

[~Shard~]

I just switched from DSL to cable -- much faster -- but I had to sign a contract for a year. Two days later, while cancelling the DSL, I hear that, as of May 1, they've rolled out U-Verse in my area. Fiber optic to the door, 6 Mb/s, and cable TV. Drat!

Now imagine downloading a show at that speed.

If they've rolled out FTTH then you should be seeing a lot more than 6 Mbps. As I previously said, we're currently delivering roughly 16 Mbps to the home and we will soon be doing 40 Mbps, all utilizing DSL technology with 800-900m loop lengths. Our FFTH trial customers receive approximately 100 Mbps to their home via GPON, and that's based off a 24 or 32 split from the OLT - technically we're delivering 2.6-3.2 Gbps to each node...

6 Mbps over fibre?! Man, are they ever short-changing their customers!

 

[danielwsmithee]

Can you explain why live TV is the killer app? Most people already have cable/satellite and a box to decode it. More and more of these systems are also adding on demand content, and many offer a single box with built in DVR.

Are you advocating the TV replace my cable box as the cable tuner? I'd then need a separate DVR and Apple would probably be stuck with a limited choice in who your cable provider could be (think Cingular and the iPhone).

Of course it's all a moot point on my end anyway since I don't have any HD TVs in the house (yet).

That is exactly what I am saying. There are many people out there that are not willing to pay the outrageous cable/satellite TV fees. I would love it if all I needed was an Apple TV and an internet connection. No need for Cable TV or satellite.

I currently have cable internet, and basic over-the-air channels (which is free with cable internet), because I can't see paying the outrageous prices they are asking for TV service. I would watch maybe 3-4 channels, and they want $40 for analog cable let alone the price for digital HD cable.

 

[danielwsmithee]

If they've rolled out FTTH then you should be seeing a lot more than 6 Mbps. As I previously said, we're currently delivering roughly 16 Mbps to the home and we will soon be doing 40 Mbps, all utilizing DSL technology with 800-900m loop lengths. Our FFTH trial customers receive approximately 100 Mbps to their home via GPON, and that's based off a 24 or 32 split from the OLT - technically we're delivering 2.6-3.2 Gbps to each node...

6 Mbps over fibre?! Man, are they ever short-changing their customers!

I get 8Mbps over cable. Fiber should be at least 10 times that otherwise what is the point.

 

[wyatt23]

We are here to discuss rumors, there is a difference between rumors and facts.

Who cares if it is true or not?
The fun is in the discucion of the possibilites and how we would take advantage of it if the rumor was true.

i was asking about a service that is already implemented at one of our fellow MR member's company. bc if their settop box can take in ethernet... and puts out through DVI/HDMI [or anything really]... then....

ut oh... what do we have here on the back on the TV... looks like an ethernet input and hdmi out...

meaning... if apple already has the hardware set up to do it, then this is nothing more than a system update before the rumor is a reality.


i wasn't talking about apple's service. read the posts before that.

 

[~Shard~]

I get 8Mbps over cable. Fiber should be at least 10 times that otherwise what is the point.

Precisely - as I said, we're delivering 100Mbps and could easily deliver more if we chose. Then it comes down to the customer's home network though - most home networks still utilize CAT5 cabling throughout. For our new builds though, along with fibre we're implementing CAT7.

 

[Porshuh944turbo]

Anyways, back to the article... the only strange thing in the whole idea is that Microsoft developed the IPTV software that runs on the U-Verse STBs as well as all the backend server-side software. Would the MS client software be loaded on the Apple TV to run the EPG and all the client software? I find that hard to believe. The only way I see this happening is if Apple is allowed to create their own client software and EPG guide that fits in with the Apple TV gui look. Afterall, it's just data from the server, much like a webpage (the EPG).

This is not too hard to believe I guess, after seeing Steve and Bill on stage together at D the other day -- and when Steve was talking about the Client side software on the iPhone that interfaces with Google Maps, he was boasting how great their team has done with the Client and how Apple is so good at doing that sort of thing.. He also said something to the effect of "no one made Google Maps look as good as we did, and we used the same backend that Google and everyone else uses... even Google was amazed at how good it looked... " So, could they do the same with the MS backbone stuff and make a better client for Apple TV? Yes. But, it would have to be a partnership with AT&T and Microsoft.

Very interesting..... very very interesting.