Finally please don't cost $300 4K HDR10 new Apple TV

[TheRealAlex]

https://9to5mac.com/2017/08/05/4k-apple-tv-dolby-vision-hdr10/

So freaking glad I waited I am so excited. I am hoping Apple keeps its $149 Price but part of me doubts that. IMO Apple in keeping with its Product line segregation strategy will market this as the Apple TV Pro to fit its line up of Mac and Mac Pro, iPad and iPad Pro, and MacBook and MacBook Pro. Offering a $99-$150 Budget friendly standard Apple TV, and a top tier Apple TV Pro at $200-$250.

My guesses are

A10X CPU because it has to handle HDR and the A9X can't
4GB DDR4 RAM to handle all the 4K content and menus smoothly
HDMI 2.0a praying for 2.1
New remote with a Display
Dolby Vision HDR 12-bit for LG OLED TVs
HDR10 for 4K non-OLED 10-bit LCDs TVs

 

[akash.nu]

I wonder what people use their Apple TV for mostly.

 

[Surf Boy from Barcelona]

I wonder what people use their Apple TV for mostly.

It's the only thing that I watch TV for!!! For me it's perfect and here's why...
I buy my films from Vimeo (Surfing, Skateboarding) and iTunes (Foreign film, Independent, Hollywood). With iTunes, we rent films and buy when they appear on offer etc.
RedBull Sports TV
WSL World Surf League
Netflix
YouTube
M2M Fashion
VeVo
Homesharing - Photos, Films, Music

And of course Airplay from my iPhone and MacBook.

For me, it's perfect and fits my lifestyle perfectly. I watch TV only 10 minutes over lunch / brunch and maybe for one hour during late evening dinner, so not a huge TV viewer.

I've been using ATV since ATV2 at the end of 2010 and I love it.
No DVD/BluRay, sky boxes etc for me - just ATV

 

[Richard28]

In the UK its should also read "finally have some decent content"

Apple TV in the UK is currently over priced, under spec'd, and has poor content.

It needs to address all three of these, otherwise, whats the point?

 

[PilotWoo]

I hope they don't charge any more for the 4k variant. It's overpriced as it is.

I won't be upgrading immediately, I will wait until I get a 4k TV.

 

[Surf Boy from Barcelona]

In the UK its should also read "finally have some decent content"

Apple TV in the UK is currently over priced, under spec'd, and has poor content.

It needs to address all three of these, otherwise, whats the point?

I disagree - if you are an old style TV viewer there's Sky and Freesat/Freeview and BT. Apple should stick to what they are amazing at - internet style - Airplay, home sharing, iTunes along with apps like YouTube, Netflix, Vimeo, RedBull etc. Apple joining the 'mainstream' worries me as that's never what they did best - they were the non-conformists for the creatives and non-conformists :

 

[d21mike]

I wonder what people use their Apple TV for mostly.

Like the other post.....
I have 8 TV's and 8 Apple TV 4's. I replaced 2 DVR's and 2 STB's when the Apple TV 4 came out. Now instead of only 4 TV's with all of the content I have all the content on all 8 tv's. I also now only have 1 HDMI and REMOTE for every TV. The UI is the same for all tv's. Regarding cost I was paying > $70 per month for just the FIOS Hardware. However, even though cost is important it is not my main driver. For me it was the overall superior experience.

Another example: My mother in law just changed from pretty much everything (including premium channels) from the cable company. TV, PHONE, INTERNET. At a cost of $290 per month. Cost was important to her. Now she has just Internet 200/20 speed and pays $80 per month to the cable company. She is using OOMA for phone service where she elected the premium option of around $15 per month (I pay about $4.50 which I mainly use for FAX). Now she is testing DIRECTV Now and Hulu Live TV. Both together is about $75 per month. Because of the huge savings she may just keep both for now since not one of the tv services has all of the content she wants. But that could change at any time. So 80 + 75 +15 = $170 vs. $290. She did drop HBO and MAX but she could easily add both for $10 from DTV Now if she wanted them back. But at this time she does not. She currently has 5 TV's but is only using 3. With Apple TV 5 expected in the fall she will probably end up with 1 or 2 ATV 5's and the rest ATV 4's. She felt no rush to get all TV's updated since she will probably get some free Apple TV's coming from me and others. I expect to upgrade 2 or maybe 3 of may Apple TV 4's to the 5 if they are much better. At this time I only have 1 4K TV but expect to get another around the time of the 5's release.

 

[kyleh22]

https://9to5mac.com/2017/08/05/4k-apple-tv-dolby-vision-hdr10/

So freaking glad I waited I am so excited. I am hoping Apple keeps its $149 Price but part of me doubts that. IMO Apple in keeping with its Product line segregation strategy will market this as the Apple TV Pro to fit its line up of Mac and Mac Pro, iPad and iPad Pro, and MacBook and MacBook Pro. Offering a $99-$150 Budget friendly standard Apple TV, and a top tier Apple TV Pro at $200-$250.

My guesses are

A10X CPU because it has to handle HDR and the A9X can't
4GB DDR4 RAM to handle all the 4K content and menus smoothly
HDMI 2.0a praying for 2.1
New remote with a Display
Dolby Vision HDR 12-bit for LG OLED TVs
HDR10 for 4K non-OLED 10-bit LCDs TVs

I'm guess they release a $50-75 streaming stick similar to the fire stick. There is clearly a huge market for small streaming sticks.

I don't see Apple supporting one specific manufacture's TVs. It would be a lot of work to support just a relative few number of TVs. I'm not even convinced they are going to support HDR TBH.

All of your other predictions sound very plausible to me Time will tell I guess.

 

[ZeRoLiMiT]

I agree! I have 3 AppleTV4 one for each room! I have a Nvidia Shield for my living room to watch UHD movies for 4K support. Once this new appletv comes out ill sell the shield

 

[GizmoDVD]

I'm guess they release a $50-75 streaming stick similar to the fire stick. There is clearly a huge market for small streaming sticks.

I don't see Apple supporting one specific manufacture's TVs. It would be a lot of work to support just a relative few number of TVs. I'm not even convinced they are going to support HDR TBH.

All of your other predictions sound very plausible to me Time will tell I guess.

I think you overestimate the 'stick' market. They are pretty under-powered and I don't really see Roku or Amazon push them much anymore. Might be because they have TVs with their OS built-in and would rather the other ones buy a set top box.

 

[ZeRoLiMiT]

I agree the sticks are horrible!!!

 

[kyleh22]

I think you overestimate the 'stick' market. They are pretty under-powered and I don't really see Roku or Amazon push them much anymore. Might be because they have TVs with their OS built-in and would rather the other ones buy a set top box.

or b/c the profit margin is too low. If Apple priced them at $50-75 margins would probably be thick enough. I think for the average "non-form browsing user" a stick is plenty powerful. All of my non IT savvy friends use them and enjoy them.

I will add, when I travel, I typically bring my chrome cast stick with me. It's really nice that it's so compact.

 

[benji888]

https://9to5mac.com/2017/08/05/4k-apple-tv-dolby-vision-hdr10/

So freaking glad I waited I am so excited. I am hoping Apple keeps its $149 Price but part of me doubts that. IMO Apple in keeping with its Product line segregation strategy will market this as the Apple TV Pro to fit its line up of Mac and Mac Pro, iPad and iPad Pro, and MacBook and MacBook Pro. Offering a $99-$150 Budget friendly standard Apple TV, and a top tier Apple TV Pro at $200-$250.

My guesses are

A10X CPU because it has to handle HDR and the A9X can't
4GB DDR4 RAM to handle all the 4K content and menus smoothly
HDMI 2.0a praying for 2.1
New remote? ...with a Display... no
Dolby Vision HDR 12-bit for LG OLED TVs
HDR10 for 4K non-OLED 10-bit LCDs TVs

If Apple is smart, they will take the price of the ATV4 down to $99, and start the ATV5 at $150-180.

I agree with most of your specs, but, maybe A10X or A11 (no "X").

I don't know about a new remote, and doubt we'll see it with a display, that's an iPod touch w/remote app. I do think Siri will be improved, tho.

 

[TheRealAlex]

Like the other post.....
I have 8 TV's and 8 Apple TV 4's. I replaced 2 DVR's and 2 STB's when the Apple TV 4 came out. Now instead of only 4 TV's with all of the content I have all the content on all 8 tv's. I also now only have 1 HDMI and REMOTE for every TV. The UI is the same for all tv's. Regarding cost I was paying > $70 per month for just the FIOS Hardware. However, even though cost is important it is not my main driver. For me it was the overall superior experience.

Another example: My mother in law just changed from pretty much everything (including premium channels) from the cable company. TV, PHONE, INTERNET. At a cost of $290 per month. Cost was important to her. Now she has just Internet 200/20 speed and pays $80 per month to the cable company. She is using OOMA for phone service where she elected the premium option of around $15 per month (I pay about $4.50 which I mainly use for FAX). Now she is testing DIRECTV Now and Hulu Live TV. Both together is about $75 per month. Because of the huge savings she may just keep both for now since not one of the tv services has all of the content she wants. But that could change at any time. So 80 + 75 +15 = $170 vs. $290. She did drop HBO and MAX but she could easily add both for $10 from DTV Now if she wanted them back. But at this time she does not. She currently has 5 TV's but is only using 3. With Apple TV 5 expected in the fall she will probably end up with 1 or 2 ATV 5's and the rest ATV 4's. She felt no rush to get all TV's updated since she will probably get some free Apple TV's coming from me and others. I expect to upgrade 2 or maybe 3 of may Apple TV 4's to the 5 if they are much better. At this time I only have 1 4K TV but expect to get another around the time of the 5's release.

Getting ripped off. My At&t TV, home Phone, Internet Skyrocketed from $100 to $176 a month, Called into retentions.
Long story short they locked me into a 2 year price guarantee $94 a month If I add a Cellphone with them I get $25 OFf extra.

 

[routine_analyst]

https://9to5mac.com/2017/08/05/4k-apple-tv-dolby-vision-hdr10/

So freaking glad I waited I am so excited. I am hoping Apple keeps its $149 Price but part of me doubts that. IMO Apple in keeping with its Product line segregation strategy will market this as the Apple TV Pro to fit its line up of Mac and Mac Pro, iPad and iPad Pro, and MacBook and MacBook Pro. Offering a $99-$150 Budget friendly standard Apple TV, and a top tier Apple TV Pro at $200-$250.

My guesses are

A10X CPU because it has to handle HDR and the A9X can't
4GB DDR4 RAM to handle all the 4K content and menus smoothly
HDMI 2.0a praying for 2.1
New remote with a Display
Dolby Vision HDR 12-bit for LG OLED TVs
HDR10 for 4K non-OLED 10-bit LCDs TVs

I'm so glad I bought the last Apple TV and used it the last two years. So happy I'll buy the next one too.

 

[easy4lif]

https://9to5mac.com/2017/08/05/4k-apple-tv-dolby-vision-hdr10/

So freaking glad I waited I am so excited. I am hoping Apple keeps its $149 Price but part of me doubts that. IMO Apple in keeping with its Product line segregation strategy will market this as the Apple TV Pro to fit its line up of Mac and Mac Pro, iPad and iPad Pro, and MacBook and MacBook Pro. Offering a $99-$150 Budget friendly standard Apple TV, and a top tier Apple TV Pro at $200-$250.

My guesses are

A10X CPU because it has to handle HDR and the A9X can't
4GB DDR4 RAM to handle all the 4K content and menus smoothly
HDMI 2.0a praying for 2.1
New remote with a Display
Dolby Vision HDR 12-bit for LG OLED TVs
HDR10 for 4K non-OLED 10-bit LCDs TVs

My guesse is

A10 fusion 2.2ghz/1.0ghz
3GB LPDDR3 RAM
HDMI 2.1
Same remote (God Awful)
Dolby Vision HDR 12-bit for LG OLED TVs
HDR10 for 4K non-OLED 10-bit LCDs TVs[/QUOTE]

32-128gb storage
iOS11 default

$149-199 price tag U.S.

 

[BJMRamage]

Throwing my predictions out at the wall...

Apple will keep the AppleTV4 around at a reduced cost, entry point.
ATV5 will be priced at the current levels.
they will not sell an ATV stick...they cannot compete with the entry level and those don't support the "App Experience" they want to push.

HDR, 4K, no new remote. maybe a jump from 32/64 to 64/128 since 4K will need to download more into cache for quick scanning to a new location. Same size, the current one is a but larger than really needed (I know there is the cooling aspect) and they have that "sweet" hockey puck size.

Most tend to use the AppleTV to watch iTunes purchases/rentals, or for using apps in place of a smart TV. Price it too high, and people may not care to buy it and then Apple loses out on selling 4K movies at a higher cost.

 

[vipergts2207]

Happy that the leaks are pointing to HDR10 support. Getting the new ATV for the living room 4K HDR TV and an ATV4 for the bedroom 1080p TV. Currently using an ATV3 in the living room and a PS3 in the bedroom.

 

[tillsbury]

Was just about to get another ATV4 for the spare room. Will definitely wait now and get the new one for the main living room and pass the existing one on.

 

[techwarrior]

Apple will keep the AppleTV4 around at a reduced cost, entry point.
ATV5 will be priced at the current levels.
they will not sell an ATV stick...they cannot compete with the entry level and those don't support the "App Experience" they want to push.

No need for a stick, the ATV4 WILL go down in price when ATV5 comes out and that will be the "entry level offering. Apple never feels the need to match competitor pricing, they consider their products superior and worth more to consumers. My bet would be they drop the 32GB price to $99 and completely drop the 64GB model for "budget" ATV4 buyers.

As for ATV5 price, maybe a tick higher. The CPU upgrade and presumably more memory may drive their costs up a bit. They may also add 1Gbps Ethernet. It might require a bit more storage. But, 64GB is probably cheaper now than 32GB was two years ago, so maybe 64GB will be the base model? Sales of 64GB model have been much lower than 32GB, but I suspect Apple won't cut corners and risk users maxing out storage and not having room for more Apps.
[doublepost=1502150569][/doublepost]

I wonder what people use their Apple TV for mostly.

Everything here... Tablo to stream OTA broadcast signals to my 2 ATV4, and Netflix, Hulu and DirectTV Now. Plus, a bunch of the On-Demand apps from the networks. And, Plex\Infuse to stream Movies stored on NAS. I dropped cable\satellite entirely a couple years ago.

Plus, Airplay music from iTunes to both ATV and AP Express with Aux speaker connected to get whole house audio. Both ATV are connected to HiFi audio, so the whole house thing is great for large get togethers at the home.

 

[kiranmk2]

It should 'only' need an A9 chip to support hardware decode of even 10-bit HEVC (http://alex4d.com/notes/item/notes-on-apple-hevc-and-heif-from-wwdc17) - looks like the A10f chip is only needed for hardware encoding.

This will be a good test of how cheap Apple is becoming. The A10f chip will be a year old by the time ATV 5 launches (good availability), will offer more future-proofing than the A9 chip (faster speeds, HEVC-encoding support) and lower power draw (low power cores could probably run the UI and even 1080p h.264 playback) so, other than increased profit margins, there shouldn't be any reason that the A9 is used...

 

[profets]

To the comments about the ATV4 sticking around at a lower price:

It makes a lot of sense, especially for non-4K TV use. I wonder though how they’ll market it since they just refer to them as ‘Apple TV’ and they’ll likely look the same physically.

 

[rpmucha23]

To the comments about the ATV4 sticking around at a lower price:

It makes a lot of sense, especially for non-4K TV use. I wonder though how they’ll market it since they just refer to them as ‘Apple TV’ and they’ll likely look the same physically.

AppleTV & AppleTV-Pro

 

[2979382]

I'm guess they release a $50-75 streaming stick similar to the fire stick. There is clearly a huge market for small streaming sticks.

I don't see Apple supporting one specific manufacture's TVs. It would be a lot of work to support just a relative few number of TVs. I'm not even convinced they are going to support HDR TBH.

All of your other predictions sound very plausible to me Time will tell I guess.

I sure hope not... Making it a stick would send all the wrong messages, and frankly would make it a lot less powerful in terms of hardware. The AppleTV is fairly pocketable as it is, not sure there's a need for it to become considerably smaller. Maybe a wee bit thinner, but other than that, I think the current design is absolutely fine.

 

[Moonjumper]

Dolby Vision HDR 12-bit for LG OLED TVs
HDR10 for 4K non-OLED 10-bit LCDs TVs

Just a little correction, Dolby Vision can go up to 12-bit, but no TVs currently support that. LG OLED TVs are 10-bit.

Also, a number of manufacturers have Dolby Vision support, or have promised it in a firmware update, including Sony, Loewe, Philips, Vizio, Hisense, and LeEco, so Apple wouldn't be adding it for only one manufacturer.

I think HDR10 is almost certain, Dolby Vision is a strong possibility, and HLG a reasonable possibility (HLG is a broadcast format that allows only one signal to be sent out for both HDR capable TVs and those that do not support it, something the other formats do not do).