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Who else is tired of waiting for a much better Apple TV? A remote that can be found...

No, the remote is a mess because the layout is busy and messy. I couldn't figure out how to control the TV itself instead of the DTV box. Just trying to turn the entire system on was confusing but I'm used to the simplicity of my Apple TV Remote, where tapping the little 'TV' icon wakes up my Apple TV, TV, and Yamaha AV Receiver and sets the input in one simple tap.

The mess the DirecTV layout is makes me glad I don't have Satellite TV. Unless I'm behind the times as usual and the DirecTV remote has changed. This is the one I remembered:

iu-2.png


I hated that blasted thing. Had to keep looking at it to use it. My Apple TV remote, the touch surface makes it possible to use blind.
 
I like the DIRECTV remote. I’d make a couple tweaks but it’s easy to use and I never have to look at it. Ever. Button shapes make them obvious which one I’m touching.

I also like the Apple TV remote too. I’d tweak it a little but it’s great. Mainly size and shape would be a little different if it where me.

Of course I also can’t ever imagine having to go back to the hell that was Touch ID either. Face ID is vastly better for me. And you can turn off the eye pay attention setting if you don’t want to be looking at the screen to get it to unlock.

I have friends and family that could never get Touch ID to work for more than a few days at a time before having to redo their finger prints. Face ID they never have a problem either.

It does seem like they could make the next remote show up in find my…. Which I’m guessing they will.

I second hdmi out for audio is the big addition to the appletv I’d like to see other than that for tv including 4K I don’t think an update will offer to much more than today’s. Gamers may see a big difference.

With all that said I’ve noticed they are out of stock in a lot of stores the last few weeks so I kind of expect a new one to be announced soon.
 
inkahauts said:
Of course I also can’t ever imagine having to go back to the hell that was Touch ID either. Face ID is vastly better for me. And you can turn off the eye pay attention setting if you don’t want to be looking at the screen to get it to unlock.

I have friends and family that could never get Touch ID to work for more than a few days at a time before having to redo their finger prints. Face ID they never have a problem either.
Click to expand...
I don’t know why we’re all talking about Touch ID vs Face ID now lol but I think both are very convenient and both are better for different reasons, though I prefer Touch ID myself. I remember having a lot of trouble with Touch ID working consistently a long time ago, I believe it was on my old iPhone 5S. It was infuriating. But since then it’s worked perfectly on all my other devices.

Back to remotes—I love the feel of my LG TV remote. It’s as if it was designed for my hand instead of designed to fit in a tiny envelope. If it only had a Siri and ‘home’ button it’d be perfect. It would also be nice if the scroll wheel could be programmed to speed through the timeline, keyboard letters, and other long scrollable menu items.
 
mtnbikerva1 said:
We are sooo tired of our Apple TVs locking up and freezing or just not working right! Also the remote leaves a lot to be desired! it is way too easy to lose and too hard to find!!! Is android, Amazon fire and Roku all better now, other than not having access to iTunes photos and podcasts?
Thank you.
Click to expand...
Just use your iPhone. You can even use the iPhone keyboard and password manager instead of dealing with the crappy remote.

The AppleTV remote is trash, to be honest I would not be surprised if they ditch it entirely and just make it controlled via iPhone/iPad/watch/etc.
 
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LG's so-called 'magic remote' is even worse than the DirecTV remote. It has a gyro that keeps waking up the 'mouse cursor' on the TV and randomly opens menus just from it moving around on the couch. That and the way the navigation keys work is odd. I tried to use the right arrow to scan forward and it somehow changed the input back to the cable box. That's another annoyance I deal with at my mother's. I thought grandmom's DirecTV remote was awful but LG's takes the crown for worst experience ever.

The scroll wheel is also the select key. Only it tends to scroll+click a lot of times.
 
nickdalzell1 said:
LG's so-called 'magic remote' is even worse than the DirecTV remote. It has a gyro that keeps waking up the 'mouse cursor' on the TV and randomly opens menus just from it moving around on the couch. That and the way the navigation keys work is odd. I tried to use the right arrow to scan forward and it somehow changed the input back to the cable box. That's another annoyance I deal with at my mother's. I thought grandmom's DirecTV remote was awful but LG's takes the crown for worst experience ever.

The scroll wheel is also the select key. Only it tends to scroll+click a lot of times.
Click to expand...
Not sure if mine is the magic remote but it sounds like it. The cursor does wake up unintentionally occasionally. There really should be a way to disable it, but I couldn’t figure out how.
I haven’t run into the other issues you mentioned, but I also don’t have a cable box.

The cursor thing is kind of annoying but it happens infrequently enough that I kind of forget about it.
 
on mom's TV (a newer OLED ThinQ smart TV) when you're watching a show on Netflix or Amazon you'd expect the left/right navigation keys to scan through video. Only with her's (which also has a Spectrum box connected to HDMI 1) it switches inputs. It pretty much relies on the 'mouse cursor' to highlight and click stuff also, and using navigation keys doesn't work as it feels like it should. I hate that thing. Eats batteries really badly as well.

Pretty much all LG WebOS TVs have magic remotes:

iu3.jpeg


Only her's lacks the 'input' button between Netflix and Amazon shortcuts, and has Hulu there instead. So the right/left 'arrow' keys switch inputs. You can also click the settings (gear) and select inputs from quick settings.
 
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nickdalzell1 said:
No, the remote is a mess because the layout is busy and messy. I couldn't figure out how to control the TV itself instead of the DTV box. Just trying to turn the entire system on was confusing but I'm used to the simplicity of my Apple TV Remote, where tapping the little 'TV' icon wakes up my Apple TV, TV, and Yamaha AV Receiver and sets the input in one simple tap.

The mess the DirecTV layout is makes me glad I don't have Satellite TV. Unless I'm behind the times as usual and the DirecTV remote has changed. This is the one I remembered:

View attachment 1744926

I hated that blasted thing. Had to keep looking at it to use it. My Apple TV remote, the touch surface makes it possible to use blind.
Click to expand...

No, not that one -- it sucks.

This one. 7 bucks on Amazon.

819+tmCD6UL._AC_SX679_.jpg
 
I haven't seen that one ^^^ for a long time. I recently had to help revive an old DirecTV DVR from 2010 for the boss last year and she had a beat up version of that remote. All the key caps that are commonly used were wiped blank as it came from the shop at work (using gasoline covered or greasy fingers). Admittedly without the symbols for vital functions it got a bit frustrating to reprogram the blasted DVR (and AT&T has one heck of a convoluted way to reactivate a dead receiver-trust me, don't bother!)

Sadly, all the newer boxes have the one I posted. Gotta love AT&T and their need to constantly mess with stuff. Guess that's where Apple gets it.
 
Yeah, I ordered a half-dozen of them years ago. Those remotes are a beast. I still use them, even though I dumped DTV long ago.

I guess where Apple TV takes the gold is that it will learn any remote you throw at it, rather than the other way around where the remote has to learn (know) the ATV.
 
That's why I also don't get the complaints about the remote it comes with. How many people actually use the remote that comes with their TV, DVD player, or so on? Most go out and get a universal one to replace it. (Or they deal with the five remote pile-up!)

I never tried to use a DTV remote like that to control a TV (I know you can match it to an ATV) by itself so you can control an ATV and the TV it's connected to (and have volume, channel up/down, etc). In that limited experience programming the DVR the DVR kinda matched the remote to the TV it was connected to with its own software. I couldn't find a way to manually enter a code into it (and the keys that you'd use if you could were just blank by that time!)
 
nickdalzell1 said:
I haven't seen that one ^^^ for a long time. I recently had to help revive an old DirecTV DVR from 2010 for the boss last year and she had a beat up version of that remote. All the key caps that are commonly used were wiped blank as it came from the shop at work (using gasoline covered or greasy fingers). Admittedly without the symbols for vital functions it got a bit frustrating to reprogram the blasted DVR (and AT&T has one heck of a convoluted way to reactivate a dead receiver-trust me, don't bother!)

Sadly, all the newer boxes have the one I posted. Gotta love AT&T and their need to constantly mess with stuff. Guess that's where Apple gets it.
Click to expand...

I won’t support a thing att has ever done to DIRECTV but to be clear, the remotes have zero to do with att. Att has never made a single new device for DIRECTV. All of their hardware was designed before att even tried to buy DIRECTV.

The old remotes work fine with all DIRECTV equipment in IR mode. The old remotes won’t work in RF with the genies though.

Anyhow, I kind of expect a new remote with a new Apple TV to be announced at the next event. I don’t think it will be massively different but I expect a bit of different.
 
nickdalzell1 said:
Won't impact me either way since I won't be buying a new Apple TV since mine works just fine!
Click to expand...

I think if apple can put some better-than-ps4 level hardware in it, and promote the gaming ability of it a bit more (some AAA game partners might help), there's a huge number of console gamers looking for a console at the moment but not able to get one.
 
throAU said:
Just use your iPhone. You can even use the iPhone keyboard and password manager instead of dealing with the crappy remote.

The AppleTV remote is trash, to be honest I would not be surprised if they ditch it entirely and just make it controlled via iPhone/iPad/watch/etc.
Click to expand...
That's what my wife and I have been doing for ... years now. I can't imagine manually typing in those passwords or account details using swipe LOL.
 
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throAU said:
I think if apple can put some better-than-ps4 level hardware in it, and promote the gaming ability of it a bit more (some AAA game partners might help), there's a huge number of console gamers looking for a console at the moment but not able to get one.
Click to expand...
I don't want a gaming console. I have a gaming PC for a reason. I only got a PS4 and Xbox one to make up for certain shortcomings or whenever the ATV box has a bad day and refuses to connect. Besides, gaming consoles already exist and so far the best one spec wise is the PS5. It's a market that's been done already.

So long as I can stream my content, view live TV, buy movies and shows, and not deal with rebuffering, I'm happy. What more must it do?
 
BigMcGuire said:
That's what my wife and I have been doing for ... years now. I can't imagine manually typing in those passwords or account details using swipe LOL.
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I got all that 'needs password to buy' stuff disabled. I live alone and unless my pet rabbit can gain intelligence to buy shows without my knowing it, it's a convenience to just click and go.

Although I despise that 'widescreen one-line keyboard' that's become static now. For a time, it went back and forth between it and the better grid keyboard but after tvOS 14 got forced on me (before I knew how to block it at the router) it's stuck with that wide one line version I hate. When searching for stuff to buy it really annoys me. Especially if not using the ATV remote.

This is the better keyboard I'm used to:

iu-3.png

This is what it has turned into permenantly now:

iu.jpeg

The latter is too swipe heavy.
 
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Great thread, sorry for getting involved late! :/

1) Apple TV remote is insanely fragile. Granted, my kids are at their most Neanderthaloid-phase of life, but the fact that it's glass all over is just supremely frustrating. I do LOVE the UX of Apple TV and we're like many of you and use them as a replacement for cable all over the house.

2) Anybody have help around password helpers? I use a mix of iCloud password keeper and 1password so my Chrome/Safari stuff is synced. When I download or reinstall a streaming app - is there a way to autofill? My random 23 digit passwords are a pain in the butt to type in.
 
nickdalzell1 said:
I got all that 'needs password to buy' stuff disabled. I live alone and unless my pet rabbit can gain intelligence to buy shows without my knowing it, it's a convenience to just click and go.

Although I despise that 'widescreen one-line keyboard' that's become static now. For a time, it went back and forth between it and the better grid keyboard but after tvOS 14 got forced on me (before I knew how to block it at the router) it's stuck with that wide one line version I hate. When searching for stuff to buy it really annoys me. Especially if not using the ATV remote.

This is the better keyboard I'm used to:

View attachment 1746445

This is what it has turned into permenantly now:

View attachment 1746449

The latter is too swipe heavy.
Click to expand...


1616263941692.png


That’s why I argue that something like the iPod click wheel would be more ideal than the touch pad, it’s perfect for both keyboard layouts. (Up/down/left/right buttons instead of menu/play/pause/prev/next though.) The click buttons for precisely navigating the grid; and both the scroll wheel and the click buttons to navigate the one line keyboard—scroll to cover distance, then buttons for precision.

Also the scroll wheel is great because you can continuously “swipe” without running out of space like on a trackpad, AND while swiping you can vary your speed and have precise control.
 
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Jon.Stewart87 said:
2) Anybody have help around password helpers? I use a mix of iCloud password keeper and 1password so my Chrome/Safari stuff is synced. When I download or reinstall a streaming app - is there a way to autofill? My random 23 digit passwords are a pain in the butt to type in.
Click to expand...
I don’t know of any way to auto fill non iCloud Keychain passwords, but to save from typing it all out, at the very least you should be able to copy paste using your phone when the ATV gives you the option to use your phone keyboard.

Edit- oh this is assuming you have an iPhone
 
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Any password manager that’s set up properly in your iPhone or iPad can offer passwords for appletv when you use your iPhone or iPad to fill in the password.
 
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