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AppleTV Hits the Streets
Stories are starting to pop up all over the web about the AppleTV, which evidently means that Apple has set loose the hounds of marketing and the units are (or will be tomorrow) available in Apple stores. Still no word on whether or not it plays DivX files. That will be the key to me purchasing one.
The thing will play specially encoded H.264 movies from iTunes with DRM bolted onto, end of story
Or, you know... not.
There's an "Export to [apple]tv..." option in the latest quicktime that produces unencumbered H.264 files. So DRM is not a requirement for it to play. The apple specs only declare a smallish subset of H.264 and MPEG4 files, but 720p H.264 isn't bad at all.
You have violated Robot's Rules of Order and will be asked to leave the future immediately.
I don't know about you, but I get tired of Mickey Mouse cartoons rather fast.
Disney own Miramax, Pixar, Touchstone, ABC, ESPN, Buena Vista, ABC and more. There's a little more to Disney then 40s Mickey Mouse clips.
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
The XBOX 360 makes a great Apple TV replacement for people who use PCs intead of Macs. It costs a little more, but it will play DVDs and cool games in addition to streaming your music, photos, downloaded shows, and TV (including live TV). Works properly with HDTV and all the DRM crap as well for those with digital cable. And it even comes in white!
If you are trying to save cash, you can also use your classic XBOX or third-party dedicated device. We call them "Media Center Extenders" here at the 'Soft.
Walt Mossberg apparently said it runs a slim version of OS X.
Why is parent flamebait?
Boom Shanka
Truely you jest.
Windows Media Center
ReplayTV
MythTV
MediaPortal (open-source backport of XBMC with added TV functionality)
DirectTV PVR (in house, current generation)
MS TV (closed box PVR for cable in use by major cable companies)
MS IPTV (NYR but shown at CES - closed box PVR for IPTV - xbox 360 and standalone)
UltimateTV (defunct)
I'm sure the list goes on. They all support recording, trick play, guide etc. and none of them infringe on any patent Tivo has. I'm sure Tivo's got a patent on a lot of aspects of their implementation, but nothing so all-encompasing that it would prevent Apple from including this functionality.
The reality is that it is HARD to provide a global (or even across the US) solution for TV which includes guide listings for everywhere, works with cable, satellite, etc. and is as reliable as a cable box. Apple is not interested in this (yet at least) and this is never what AppleTV was purported to be. It's more like a media center extender, except that it doesn't require a media center PC, or a windows media connect device with a better UI and no windows requirement.
That's a gross simplification of course, and I know they've made choices around local caching and PC-independent operation that differ from MCX and WMC - and choices around PC/Mac interop that differ from Tivo and all the closed box PVRs.
mp4 is not a proprietary Apple format, but an ISO standard that anyone can support. VLC Media player supports it. Also, ffmpeg has h264. When it comes to which has better hardware support, mp4 wins. When it comes to software support, mp4 wins. MPEG4 is an open standard. There are patents involved, but no royalties. Matroska was created to avoid patents, whereas mp4 has many patents in it. Matroska surely violates someones patents, but we just don't know whose yet. MPEG 4 has all the patent issues sorted out.
I actually just finished transcoding all of my video to mp4 as i prefer its subtitle support over the cheesy avi hacks. DivX was created during the non standard days of MPEG4, as the spec was not finalized. That spec is now finalised, and the standard codec is h264 in an mp4 container. These videos play in Windows, Linux or any other OS which has an h264 codec. They can be imported into iTunes as best as i know. My iTunes question of the day is actually which subtitle formats they use, as I don't know the answer to that.