New Apple TV Rumored to Launch Next Year With These Features

[poematik13]

Ill be upgrading regardless, but I really want to see 120hz/ProMotion for the entire tvOS UI. That's about it everything else is perfect.

If they wanted to go big on gaming they can have an A18 Pro and 1TB storage model with a bundled DualSense and Arcade sub for $299

 

[N0ughtsAndCr0sses]

Patiently waiting versus buying a > 2 year old version.

Same boat

But if i waited that much i can do another 9 months now.

Patience is a virtue innit 🤣🤣

 

[AppleGuy00]

In my case, it would be useless since my Apple TVs are behind the TV and out of sight.

I wonder if the detail that might be missing from this rumor is that the new Apple TV might take the form of a soundbar with a built in camera. Would be nice to have it mounted below the TV and be able to connect to HomePods for surrounds, etc.

 

[rit56]

A mute button would be nice

 

[CarlJ]

What do you expect from a product which does what it should ?

You wanna watch tv/movies/ show , you dont need fancy stuff on your tv.

Clearly the Apple TV needs a modern version of Clippy - "It looks like you're trying to watch a movie..."

 

[Mrkevinfinnerty]

In my case, it would be useless since my Apple TVs are behind the TV and out of sight.

the built in camera would be on an arm, for your family's convenience

 

[subjonas]

The only thing I'd like added is the ability to search across all of your streaming platforms and the ability to just play from the search without having to load the specific app.

That already exists (the app icon with the magnifying glass, or the search function in the TV app), more services just need to opt into it I’m guessing.
It does load the app first but I don’t know how it’s possible to get around that, and it loads and plays automatically so it’s not really an inconvenience.

 

[jlc1978]

I wonder if the detail that might be missing from this rumor is that the new Apple TV might take the form of a soundbar with a built in camera. Would be nice to have it mounted below the TV and be able to connect to HomePods for surrounds, etc.

I nice idea, but that would mean making it long and thin, rather than a small square. I think if anything they'll do a mini and make it a smaller box.

the built in camera would be on an arm, for your family's convenience

Yea, I don't see Apple deviating from its one small solid box design. A small bluetooth camera to mount on the TV would work, similar to the continuity camera setup for Macs.

 

[profwafflez]

The Apple TV works, but it is a pretty boring product.

Once LG started forcing ads on their smart TVs, my LG smart TV got immediately disconnected from wifi and the Apple TV became our primary media streaming device. The Aerial 4K screensaver really brought some fresh life to the never updated and boring LG screensaver. Boring or not, the Apple TV has cemented itself as an exit strategy for those not willing to put up with smart tv manufacturers abusing their customers.

 

[mgrabenstein]

I'm pleased with the 2022 version of AppleTV.
The only sore spot has been the remote. I hope that is among the hardware updates. I seem to side-click on the round touchpad when I want to center-click, and with no way to tell if my finger is centered, it happens a lot.

 

[krakenrelease]

Increase the storage for what? To install a another 75mb streaming app?

These could have 16gb storage and no one would notice any difference.

There are apps that can download video like a dvr. My dad does this all the time with FuboTv for international content

 

[krakenrelease]

I'm pleased with the 2022 version of AppleTV.
The only sore spot has been the remote. I hope that is among the hardware updates. I seem to side-click on the round touchpad when I want to center-click, and with no way to tell if my finger is centered, it happens a lot.

The remote is so trash. No indication of charging when you plug it in either

 

[Ctrlos]

An A18 puts it on par with a PS4 as it can play those top end titles. Might make Apple market it more as a games device.

 

[iJon]

I just want proper AirTag tech in the remote with a speaker so I can find the damn thing.

 

[Phoneless]

I got tired of waiting for the rumoured new model so I ordered the current AppleTV during Apple's Black Friday promotion. I now have the 4K60 support in YouTube that I wanted so I'll have no buyers remorse if a new AppleTV comes out in 2025. I doubt a faster A-chip would do much for me and adding Apple Intelligence features is unlikely to impress me.

 

[QuarterSwede]

The Apple TV works, but it is a pretty boring product.

And that’s exactly how we like it. It’s highly functional, has no annoying UI ads, and gets me to shows quickly. What more could I want?

 

[bn-7bc]

I hope Hi-Res Audio support

Doesn't the atv already have support for bitstream ( ie sndkng the hires audio tonan external dac/receiver)?

 

[QuarterSwede]

A mute button would be nice

… the remote has one …

 

[gnomeisland]

An A18 for AV1 and upscaling seems like low-hanging fruit. If the new AppleTV (and/or HomePod Hub) enable local network Apple Intelligence across HomePod that would increase the value proposition for a lot of users I suspect.

Although Apple *still* needs to solve the which device's Siri answers problem!

 

[marrrrcus]

My 2nd gen is doing just fine, no performance issues …

you were saying just right. my 2nd generation is also working great, with the thread functionality in particular. When it comes to selfhosted video library, hope the storage could be increased.

 

[kiranmk2]

They need to increase bitrates first because regular blu-ray movies have more motion clarity than 4K HDR/DV streams while also providing uncompressed audio.

Unlikely that they can produce any of the newer chips than A15 for cheaper at this point, although the A16 is probably getting pretty close, and there is something to be said for economies of scale with other devices using the A15 likely to be discontinued soon. Switching to an in house designed WiFi & Bluetooth chip with no licensing costs will be a cost savings though. The A15 can handle the demands of 4K streaming with only basic passive cooling (earlier versions of the Apple TV 4K with the A10x and A12 required active cooling), so presumably anything newer would be fine for 4K streaming with only passive cooling as well.

The iPhone 14 (with A15) looks like it will be made for at least a further 9 months, so there is still another device that the A15 can go into if needed. Whilst the A15 can be passively cooled for gaming, I've seen several reports (including on here) that the chip thermally throttles (to below A12 speed) when gaming...

Did you run out of space for apps?

I have a 32GB and never had a problem with space before, but just today I was in the middle of watching a movie streaming from my Mac via Home Share and it stopped and a notification popped up saying that I was out of space. I don’t remember the last time I downloaded a new app to my ATV so I have no idea why I ran out of space today all of a sudden. Maybe it was a bug…

I've had InFuse tell me many times that it's had to delete all the downloaded meta data due to lack of space on a 32 GB model. I'm putting it down to the combination of cache space for 4K streaming and the aerial screensavers which can quickly chew up the space (but look so good).

I think we can all agree that a "gaming" Apple TV isn't going to be forthcoming (that would need an M4/16 GB for 1080p 30 fps at mid-high graphics - which is a $599 Mac Mini). However, I do think there are several interesting hardware developments that would be useful for a streaming Apple TV 4K 4th gen. An A18 chip could enable the following:

1. Apple Intelligence - including the ability to process requests from Homepods / Homepod Mini's on the same network. This would let Apple upgrade people's existing Homepod devices to Apple Intelligence and keep the prices down of the HomePod Mini 2s that are rumoured for next year via a continued use of Watch S-chips
2. MetalFX-like machine learning image reconstruction/upscaling. This would allow the Apple TV to reconstruct a 1080p video to 4k better than basic upscaling - and unlike gaming, where the renderer doesn't know what the next frame will look like due to player inputs, this is not the case in streamed video so hopefully image artifacts and shimmer could be minimised. It could also reconstruct 480p/576p/720p to 4k, but like DLSS/XeSS/FSR etc, putting in less resolution would likely lead to a poorer output. There is also the possibility to reconstruct 4k video to 8k if Apple wanted to push to 8k without all the "there is no content" pushback. Even better, would be to open this up system-wide, so a user can apply it to all apps.
3. DLSS 3/FSR 3-like machine learning frame generation. As with upscaling, there is also the possibility that a framegen technique could be used to boost the fluidity of video. Obviously, this would need to be controlled somehow (noone wants the soap opera effect added to 24 fps film content), but I think this would be a great addition for sports where a 30 Hz stream could be boosted to 60 Hz or a 60 Hz stream boosted to 120 Hz with a better outcome and less artifacting that most TV's built-in frame interpolators. The recent announcement of CyberPunk 2077 for Mac included the information that a MetalFX framegen feature was coming, so why not apply it to video too?

Combine this with some quality of life improvements (option for 120 Hz UI, DTS:X support, USB-C power delivery support etc) and I think you've got something that might surprise a lot of people by how much of a good upgrade it is.

 

[jz0309]

you were saying just right. my 2nd generation is also working great, with the thread functionality in particular. When it comes to selfhosted video library, hope the storage could be increased.

My 2TB movie/video library sits on my Mac, so more storage as an option is cool, I wouldn’t need it.
I should also add that I use a few streaming services and then watch the movies from my Mac, and for that, the 2nd gen is doing great

 

[Icehawk]

With the whole Apple Intelligence push, you'd think they'd update the CPU to whatever is needed for that. Get that in as many products as fast as they can.

 

[dampfnudel]

It's going to be interesting to see if Apple uses a "binned" A17 Pro SoC (same one used on the new iPad mini) or the regular A18 SoC on the next Apple TV, given it may gain Apple Intelligence capabilities.

Maybe I’m wrong, but I thought I read something months ago here on MR that there were two unknown devices discovered using an A17 Pro. We now know one of them was the iPad mini 7. It’s possible the Apple TV 4K 4th generation was the other one?

 

[svish]

Expecting the next Apple TV to have a newer chip and maybe a slightly lower price tag. Expecting nothing else to change and hopefully it will be announced by WWDC. Overall it will be a very minor update.