Sales of New Apple TV to Hit One Million Units This Week

[Ugg]

I love mine. I'm a big fan of Netflix and had a 5 at a time deal, but have downgraded to 3 at a time and only watch on disk what isn't available via streaming.

I haven't rented much via iTunes because as supremedesigner said, what's the point in paying even more money for shows lacking Closed Captioning. Hulu's been able to figure it out, even if it's not all that elegant. Netflix said they would have a solution "this fall". Obviously "this fall" is over so...

The only thing missing for me is Hulu. Maybe it'll warrant an app?

 

[sonofmof]

Fix the Issues with HDMI ?

I would love mine, except every 10 minutes the colours invert and it becomes unwatchable

A VERY common problem with Sony and Phillips TV's and some Sansung and Sharp models too.

Inconsistant answers from Apple (when they bother to reply) and no official statement despite 38 pages of forum posts. HERE


Don't get me wrong, I love my apple equipment and am quite a fanboy but....... the magic is fading fast right now.......

This is not what I expect and they REALLY need to do better.

 

[cgc]

Of all these ATV owners I wonder how many of them can actually rent movies "instantly". Because I and it seems many owners on forums are having to wait ridiculous download times of hours before movie rentals can actually be watched. Apple needs to seriously address this issue.

When that happens you should have your dial-up modem redial into your ISP I have no problems w/ startup times on FIOS.

 

[cxny]

Satisfied

We had friends over recently and had fun switching DJ duty with airplay streaming through the Apple TV.

I don't like having the TV on all the time so I created a black screen saver on my Flickr account so we could use the home theatre without the annoying penguin screen savers.

 

[rzmartin1]

Apple TV needs web browser software update ASAP !

A web browser is available from Fire Core, but requires breaking ...
Most people (me included) feel this is a mandatory first priority update to the Apple TV. We really enjoy our ATV, but it needs a browser !!

 

[lowbatteries]

Internet Radio!

I listen to internet radio on mine all the time (its there under the Internet tab). If you means Pandora or the like, yes, that would be nice too. AirPlay from an iPhone is how I usually do it at the moment.

 

[reactions]

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Still a hobby product and that comes from an apple fanboy

Anyone care to digress?

It will be neat when we have full screen apps and use our touch screen as a remote but we will never see the day when this streams mvks or 1080p

 

[alent1234]

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Why hasn't Apple purchased Netflix outright? What the heck are they saving over 50 billion dollars for?

Any thoughts?

probably cheaper to just cut your own deals with content owners or let netflix code apps for your hardware.

i have netflix streaming as well but the party isn't going to last long. expect the price to go up soon and the cable companies to start to release new hardware/software with the same features except it will work better than netflix

 

[Xenomorph]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8B117 Safari/6531.22.7)

Still a hobby product and that comes from an apple fanboy

Anyone care to digress?

It will be neat when we have full screen apps and use our touch screen as a remote but we will never see the day when this streams mvks or 1080p

Hobby product?

Did you not notice the "Netflix" part of the Apple TV?

It is already a multi-billion dollar industry that is killing old media. But I'm guessing it's just a passing fad, right?

 

[carmenodie]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8B117 Safari/6531.22.7)

This is embarrassing to the competition like Google and Sony. While they are struggling with their geek boxes, Apple shows simplicity has won out.
Has anyone seen that outrageous Sony Internet tv remote? Garbage! And Google, 1 million dollar a share, has gone back to the drawing board. Lol!
I'm getting the Apple tv next week from the Apple store next to my apartment.

 

[lexusford]

I love mine, and have never had a problem

 

[Frobozz]

I bought one

I bought one for my parents. They have a Netflix account, which I also gift them every year. In particular, I thought this would be great for them in their winter home, because they won't have to shell out for television content the 6 months of the year they aren't there. With a rental structure, this allows them to keep their costs low when they don't need television entertainment.

I'm looking forward to trying it out this holiday season.

 

[darkplanets]

Question to all you jailbreakers out there: if I JB with plex, can it play mkvs, etc?

That aside, having 1 million units for a hobby is rather nice.

 

[smithrh]

Works great, will be buying 4 today as gifts.

Yeah, I know, Netflix doesn't have everything available for streaming, but if you turn it upside down and look at what they do have (instead of what they don't have), you'll see a pretty good selection of things to watch.

For example, Netflix has excellent coverage of older TV shows that Hulu doesn't come close to.

Netflix knows that the future is streaming so they'll be negotiating for more content (and more HD content).

I also have an extensive iPhoto library and iTunes library, works great for that, not to mention the AirPlay possibilities cropping up now and in the future.

 

[adztaylor]

I love mine, still hoping for apps to make it even better. Dedicated Skysports app please!

 

[Unstupid]

I own both the previous version and the aTV2. What I miss most on the aTV2:
- iTunes Extras
- the ability to browse and purchase music from the device.
- the ability to purchase movies or tv shows. (If I have computer connected to the aTV2 why can't it just transfer the movie/tv show/song from the aTV2 to the computer)

Stuff It needs:
- Pandora, Hulu etc...
- a FaceTime app (I see a usb port in the back of the device, is that for a camera and mic?)
- a keyboard... typing on screen is slow!

 

[jamesryanbell]

I'm super happy with mine! Great product at a great price!

 

[likemyorbs]

Bought my TV last week. I love it. Although i would never waste my money "renting" from apple. This thing is really great for people who pirate their content, never have to physically connect my mac again. beautiful. And i do have a netflix account and no other box that plays it, so thats great as well.

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8B117 Safari/6531.22.7)

This is embarrassing to the competition like Google and Sony. While they are struggling with their geek boxes, Apple shows simplicity has won out.
Has anyone seen that outrageous Sony Internet tv remote? Garbage! And Google, 1 million dollar a share, has gone back to the drawing board. Lol!
I'm getting the Apple tv next week from the Apple store next to my apartment.

Yeah it's pretty ironic isn't it? Google and Sony are struggling to get a set top box out at a reasonable price. Apple releases this simple little product that they put practically no thought into and consider a hobby and priced it correctly, and it sold a million units in a couple of months. Looks like it might be time for apple to promote the ATV from hobby status.

 

[phpmaven]

Have you seen this?

http://www.cultofmac.com/google-might-be-to-blame-for-appletvs-slow-streaming-speeds/73952

That's pretty interesting. It explains why most of us don't have a problem and a few do. It's amazing how many issues with downloading and slow internet access can be resolved by checking your DNS config and making sure your preferred DNS servers are responding quickly. That's why I periodically run NameBench to make sure I don't have any issues. If you are sitting there waiting for something to happen, there's a good chance that you're really waiting for domain name resolution to happen.

 

[tempusfugit]

Question to all you jailbreakers out there: if I JB with plex, can it play mkvs, etc?

That aside, having 1 million units for a hobby is rather nice.

root access to the device won't allow you to view unsupported codecs. you'll have to wait for a VLC ATV app or something.

 

[wirelessmacuser]

Fantastic. I'm hoping eventually more sales = more support. More support = more updates. More updates = AppleTV App Store

Your dreams are perfectly aligned with ACE.

Apple Consumer Electronics

As we (tech people, programmers, engineers etc) mourn the passing of Apple Computer, now officially Apple Inc. I'm happy to see that at least Apple is doing what the CEO & Fanatic Followers worship, and that's making money.

We know that's the highest priority in their life. Fulfilling their intrinsic need for bragging rights. Judging the value of life on one narrow goal. Money.

Apple has a tremendous amount of momentum as they're now the darlings of Hollywood, Wall St, and anywhere that money is worshipped above all else. Apples success and the grow of it's worshippers is a fascinating story to follow. Steve Jobs DNA is deeply embedded in the company, thus if he should retire, Apple won't miss a beat. They've got this game down cold.

 

[bommai]

Internet Radio!

Internet radio is already there.

 

[Xtremehkr]

Your dreams are perfectly aligned with ACE.

Apple Consumer Electronics

As we (tech people, programmers, engineers etc) mourn the passing of Apple Computer, now officially Apple Inc. I'm happy to see that at least Apple is doing what the CEO & Fanatic Followers worship, and that's making money.

We know that's the highest priority in their life. Fulfilling their intrinsic need for bragging rights. Judging the value of life on one narrow goal. Money.

Apple has a tremendous amount of momentum as they're now the darlings of Hollywood, Wall St, and anywhere that money is worshipped above all else. Apples success and the grow of it's worshippers is a fascinating story to follow. Steve Jobs DNA is deeply embedded in the company, thus if he should retire, Apple won't miss a beat. They've got this game down cold.

Like the last time Steve Jobs left and Apple got a CEO who thought dressing as a Samurai for an interview would help to maintain Apples image as an outside and creative company.

All while moving closer to what other companies were doing and relying on marketing hype?

A lot of people dislike SJ but the difference he makes at Apple comes to a personal desire of his to head a company that makes the best products in the business.

Without another CEO who will place as much emphasis on making beautifully designed and cutting edge products Apple will become just another tech company.

Who else would have released the iPhone or the iPad, both were expected to be failures because they were too unconventional, not aimed at businesses, too expensive, no established market. Blah blah blah.

Look at the Microsoft Kin to see where playing it safe can get you.

 

[joudbren]

For some who think it's a speed or network issue, I assure you that I'm not new to wireless LANs and I know what I'm doing. It's not my network. It's also not my ISP. If it were my ISP, can you explain to me why my gen 1 ATV's still work perfectly, but my gen 2 takes hours to stream anything? It's a bug with the new gen 2's. I've been using Apple TV for a couple years now and never had a problem with the old ones (3 of them). It might not affect everyone, but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Benoitgphoto, thanks for advice on the 5 Ghz, I'll check mine and give that a try tonight.

EXACT same scenario for me and the Apple Forums are full of complaints regarding the same problem with dog slow downloads. Our original ATV was in use for over two years and about $600 a year in HD rentals with nary a problem. After two months trying to get some consistency out of this new POS we've given up. My old ATV is now back in service and working just fine. Both units were on Airport Extreme at 5ghz, 5 bars, 15Mbps download and EVERYTHING else works fine. Netflix is also fine and HD rentals from Sony on our PS3 are also fine.

They may have sold a million but I'm willing to bet a goodly percentage of those million aren't getting any satisfaction on movie rentals. Check out the ATV forums at Apple to view the complaints and the download issues even made the news at AppleInsider a couple of weeks back. I know Jobs says it's only a hobby but he didn't have to go and prove it... Sigh...

Signed: Ex ATV2 Fanboi

 

[bobr1952]

probably cheaper to just cut your own deals with content owners or let netflix code apps for your hardware.

i have netflix streaming as well but the party isn't going to last long. expect the price to go up soon and the cable companies to start to release new hardware/software with the same features except it will work better than netflix

It is certainly still a bit of a mess right now and will be interesting to see how it all sorts out. You may be right in saying it is in Apple's best interest to negotiate their own deals with content providers. That is what will make or break any device. If Netflix doesn't start getting more new content streaming deals with the studios, they will be in trouble.