How do SD movies look when streamed to Apple TV?

It depends on your kit. I have a large 1080 TV and ATV3 and would say yes definitely.

 

I agree - even between SD and HD from the iTunes store I can tell a big difference let alone the difference between SD DVD's (or DVD rips) and Full HD Blurays (or Bluray rips) which is so noticeable as to be quite jarring.

 

SD of any format looks terrible on a large HDTV.

 

If SD looks ok too you then stick with it. I walk into the living room all the time to see my gf watching a channel in SD that we have in HD. She doesn't care, however it bugs me.

 

back when HD was still relatively new, i couldnt stand when my family would still watch the SD channels, after countless times showing them

 

SD on ATV

I also have no issues with SD on a 48" LED TV. I only have a few I've bought through iTunes but I have ripped many of my SD DVD's with Handbrake/MakeMKV so that I can watch them via my ATV.

 

It's no so much the resolution, but the bitrate that will make it look "crappy", because of the artifacts. Lower resolution just looks soft.

We have an 82" TV and I have plenty of DVD ripped 480p movies in our library, but I rip them at 3500Kbps. They look fine.

However I recently bought a Southpark episode (for us) and a Yo Gabba Gabba! episode (for the kids) off of iTunes and they were both in SD, and the Yo Gabba Gabba! episode in particular looks bad. Lots of blockiness. We have some episodes that I ripped from DVD's and they do not exhibit this quality.

Smaller TV will look better though.

 

Some things to consider here:

1. Size of TV.
2. Viewing distance.
3. Eyesight.

If you sit 15' away from a 50" TV, SD will probably look almost as good as HD, unless you have great eyesight.

If you sit 10' away from a 60" TV, HD will look noticeably better than SD, unless you have mediocre eyesight.

 

I'd say it depends on the content. There is a definite difference, not as dramatic on your Apple TV 2 at 720p vs the ATV 3 at 1080p. Movies with an emphasis on visuals are definitely a better experience in HD, but a basic rom-com or kid's movie is perfectly enjoyable either way.