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I know you're just trying to expand on what was previously said, so please bear with me as I just want to use the quote as a starting point, in the middle of an existing conversation...

The differences in resolution simply can't be captured by such a simplistic chart... one that is oft-cited, yet never understood. They always state "full" benefits, and the math changes depending on what set of standards are used... and that math often points to the distance where you start being able to pick out actual pixels... and nobody (hyperbole, since I'm sure there's someone on planet earth that has) has ever sat that close to a TV. But either way, our living rooms are bound by walls, and unless we're setting the thing up in a gymnasium, you'll find it very hard to back up far enough to where the benefits disappear entirely on a screen over 40".

You have excellent eyesight.
 
I have a third gen Apple TV from 2012 and zero complaints. This new model doesn't offer enough to make the upgrade worth it, imo.

It does, IMO if you side-load Kodi or run MrMC (assuming you have DTS encodes of Blu-Rays and the like you'd like to use or AVIs, MKVs, etc. that Apple doesn't support). I encode DTS into my M4V files now along with Dolby Digital and the Dolby Digital will play on AppleTV (Gen2/3) and DTS is available for Kodi. It even works with DTS-HD MA (iTunes and AppleTV just ignore the extra DTS soundtracks, but Kodi detects and can use them; sadly this doesn't work for Dolby TrueHD as there is no support to store them in M4V containers yet).

Why would you want DTS? Even if you don't believe it has better sound quality, there are 6.1 discrete (DTS-ES) DVDS (and some core blurays) and quite a number of DTS-HD MA 7.1 discrete Blurays out there and Kodi can play them back in full 6.1 and 7.1 (Gen1 ATV could even play DTS 6.1 music files without it even knowing it, for example on Sheryl Crow's DTS-ES "Globe Sessions" album; sadly Gen 2/3/4 ATV won't output 44.1kHz so DTS Music CDs don't work anymore, but you can convert them to AC3 with FFMPeg or sample convert and re-encode to DTS 48kHz (FFMPeg "experimental" encoder works, but sometimes takes a few tries here for some reason). My Gen1 ATV with a broadcom card plays EVERYTHING with OpenElec Kodi 15.2. Not bad for a $15 upgrade to an 8-year old device! ;)

Serious philosophical question:

Who in their right mind watches TV?

I think you're right. I use my "left" mind when I watch TV. ;)

And if you think there's no reason to watch TV at all, then you haven't seen Red Dwarf or The IT Crowd or even the first 7 years of Two And A Half Men. Laughing is good for you. :)
 
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Can't they resell them as new if they're unopened? I would think refurb models would only be ones swapped out or returned after opening.

All returns are tainted. Anyone can buy a shrinkwrapping machine.

I returned an unopened iPad once and the Apple Store worker opened it right in front of me to ensure that the correct item was inside and that it hadn't been replaced, Indiana Jones style, with some sort of weight.
 
Wow. Just wow.

Plex, alone is worth the upgrade.

Does it do anything that KATproxy to hard drive, to handbrake, to iTunes, to 3rd gen AppleTV can't do?

Add in Siri search, voice navigation ("What did he say?", "Back up 20 seconds.", etc.) Apple Music voice control, games, and the upcoming Amazon Prime app, and I am completely blown away that anyone would make that statement.
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Meh. Be blown away then, I guess.
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What about games? Not worth it?

Oh for sure I love playing Fallout 4 on my XBox, and now that I've finished that, Fallout 3. What games does AppleTV have? A Frogger clone?
 
I know you're just trying to expand on what was previously said, so please bear with me as I just want to use the quote as a starting point, in the middle of an existing conversation...

The differences in resolution simply can't be captured by such a simplistic chart... one that is oft-cited, yet never understood. They always state "full" benefits, and the math changes depending on what set of standards are used... and that math often points to the distance where you start being able to pick out actual pixels... and nobody (hyperbole, since I'm sure there's someone on planet earth that has) has ever sat that close to a TV. But either way, our living rooms are bound by walls, and unless we're setting the thing up in a gymnasium, you'll find it very hard to back up far enough to where the benefits disappear entirely on a screen over 40".

And I would take the other approach that it would be hard to see the benefits on a 40" screen in most situations. If you're 5 feet away from the screen, probably. But who sits 5 feet away from their television? A 65" screen at 10 feet, probably. But not a 40" screen.
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Does it do anything that KATproxy to hard drive, to handbrake, to iTunes, to 3rd gen AppleTV can't do?

Yes. Very much so.
 
Just picked up the 32GB Apple TV from Best Buy. Sure enough they matched Radio Shacks, but said they couldn't include the HDMI cord, which I was find with.
 
And I would take the other approach that it would be hard to see the benefits on a 40" screen in most situations. If you're 5 feet away from the screen, probably. But who sits 5 feet away from their television? A 65" screen at 10 feet, probably. But not a 40" screen.

I think you need to consider some things here, independent of each other and as a whole.

-Source content - is the content something you'd notice it in? Is it actually in a higher resolution to begin with and downsampled? Is it something purposefully degraded to give it some edge? ie, I wouldn't expect to see a difference if I'm watching a 4k Walking Dead, which is gritty on purpose (non-existent, but the imagery likely won't be cleaned up and the grittiness would remain if it did)... but I would expect it on the new Star Wars when it comes to Blu Ray 4K. Then there's Pixar movies and other computer generated animation... it was always digital, it will look virtually identical at any resolution.

-What you're scrutinizing - am I going to notice if the edges along the silhouette of someone's body are jagged versus smooth? Maybe not. But if I'm watching sports or news, text is most certainly sharper and they've become more graphical with logos which are clearer, and both are smaller and smaller to make more use of screen real estate... and the ball/puck/whatever is clearer and easier to track... and player numbers are easier to see... and in a total contradiction of my first item listed here, lines defining the field of play are smoother and contrast between all other items is higher...

-Quality of the set - you can get some dirt cheap sets today... and even staying constant on the technology (LCD vs LCD), there's going to be a variance in quality at every resolution.
 
I think you need to consider some things here, independent of each other and as a whole.

-Source content - is the content something you'd notice it in? Is it actually in a higher resolution to begin with and downsampled? Is it something purposefully degraded to give it some edge? ie, I wouldn't expect to see a difference if I'm watching a 4k Walking Dead, which is gritty on purpose (non-existent, but the imagery likely won't be cleaned up and the grittiness would remain if it did)... but I would expect it on the new Star Wars when it comes to Blu Ray 4K. Then there's Pixar movies and other computer generated animation... it was always digital, it will look virtually identical at any resolution.

-What you're scrutinizing - am I going to notice if the edges along the silhouette of someone's body are jagged versus smooth? Maybe not. But if I'm watching sports or news, text is most certainly sharper and they've become more graphical with logos which are clearer, and both are smaller and smaller to make more use of screen real estate... and the ball/puck/whatever is clearer and easier to track... and player numbers are easier to see... and in a total contradiction of my first item listed here, lines defining the field of play are smoother and contrast between all other items is higher...

-Quality of the set - you can get some dirt cheap sets today... and even staying constant on the technology (LCD vs LCD), there's going to be a variance in quality at every resolution.

Agreed on all points. But...

The fact of the matter is that, even taking into account everything you said above it is scientifically impossible for the human eye to see the difference, depending on distance from the screen vs. screen size.

If you put a 125" 1080p screen 20 feet from someone, and put a 125" UHD screen right next to it you are absolutely going to be able to see the difference. But if you put 60" screens that same distance you will not be able to see any difference.

Period.
 
Agreed on all points. But...

The fact of the matter is that, even taking into account everything you said above it is scientifically impossible for the human eye to see the difference, depending on distance from the screen vs. screen size.

If you put a 125" 1080p screen 20 feet from someone, and put a 125" UHD screen right next to it you are absolutely going to be able to see the difference. But if you put 60" screens that same distance you will not be able to see any difference.

Period.

That's the problem though, the chart isn't science. Scientifically, you absolutely can see the differences. And scientifically, studies point to 11k being the limit for human vision with actual studies done with human beings.

http://www.homecinemaguru.com/can-we-see-4kuhd-on-a-normal-sized-screen-you-betcha/
 
Agree with those who think ATV4 is worth it. I love:

1) Siri

- When binging shows it's great to be able to say "fast forward 40 seconds," as I do when watching West Wing, skipping the opening credits. It saves a lot of time.
- It's great to say the name of a show and have the search results pull it up across all platforms. This also saves time.
- I have a fairly large iTunes movie library. Rather than pull up all my movies under the "purchased" tab (which takes longer on the ATV3 than it does on ATV4, by the way), I can say the name of a movie and it's there. This also saves time.
- Gives you quick control over lots of things. "Captions on/off" is one I frequently use.

2) Touchpad remote

- You can scroll through all the scenes of a show or movie very easily. Amazon Fire TV has this too. With ATV3 you can FF as far as you want, but you're doing it blindly for the most part. With ATV4 you can pull up any scene with ease.

I can understand those who feel underwhelmed with no 4k and such. I'd love to have futureproofed in that regard. I'm not THAT disappointed personally b/c I have no interest in 4k right now. A) I'm not in the market for a new TV, having just bought 5 HDTV's over the past 5 years. B) According to Netflix, you need 25 mbps to watch 4k. I have the fastest internet available in my small town (25 mbps down). But of course you don't consistently get the internet speed for which you pay. I doubt I'd be able to consistently watch 4k. Most people have faster internet than I do, but plenty of people have what I have or worse.
 
err.... removes all those steps and replaces them with one? Also, no re-encoding, so no loss in quality.

Well, I suppose I could give the Plex app on my XBox a try then. Which also has an Amazon Video app. I still can't see a reason to buy a newer Apple TV. I see a reason to drop the damn thing altogether though...

I shouldn't bring up the XBox as comparison? Well, I didn't. Apple did.
 
Not sure if your post is sarcasm or not, but I saw a great deal of people right here on MR that did this.
No sarcasm, just makes no sense to me. I don't get that excited or impatient over much of anything. I admit, I waited two weeks to see the new starwars too.. and I love me some starwars.
 
I kind of shock that TV4 did not have even a third of the Apps found in the Roku box! Major missing app is the Sling TV!
 
Yes shocking that something that was released less than 3 months ago would not have close the amount of Apps as something that was released years ago, amazing
 
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