Slashdot Mirror
Apple TV To Be Revamped
An anonymous reader writes: This Wednesday, Apple is hosting an event in San Francisco to announce updated versions of some of its products. One device getting a lot of the attention will be the Apple TV, which has languished for several years without significant changes. Apple is making a renewed push for the living room. The company has expanded its partnerships with TV studios over the past few years, launched its own streaming music service, and also made inroads on gaming. The new Apple TV will try to do all these things, including support for apps. It will also reportedly feature universal search: "Essentially, you'll be able to search for a show or movie once, and see results from all sorts of different sources." A side effect of this ambitious goal is that the device will more than double in cost, going from $70 to $150.
You mean like owners of Roku and Tivo boxes have been able to do months/years?
Apple is trying to reproduce its success from the cellphone market in the set top box. Bring out features that were already available on competing platforms and charge a premium for them. Obviously, the reason for Apple TV's lack of success is that its price was too low.
<Just waiting for the Apple fanboys to mod me down!>
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
The App Store on the Apple TV should be just as revolutionary as it was on the iPhone 3 when it came out. Instead of making a deal with Apple or Comcast or Roku to get your content on TV, you'll just write an app. This should open up TV to a whole new universe of niche providers and accelerate the trend of shrinking audiences for cable and broadcast shows.
I'm looking forward to all the new choices.
Why would anyone who already has a laptop want to own a TV at all? If you can answer this, you can answer why a laptop owner might want to watch content on a TV instead of a laptop.
If someone is decideing between a Roku or an Apple TV based on a $80 price differential then they probably can't affort to buy shows anyhow. What matters is what's the easiest thing to use , gives you great results, and doesn't become an on-line attack vector in your home because you left it unpatched. For example, I bought my Amazon firestick because it delivered the content I wanted in the most simple way and it keeps it self updated and patched. It's not over complicated. I don't want something that can do everything like a chromeStick or an XBMC home sever. I want something that does just what I want extremely well.
What's the one thing I'd like for my Amazon fire stick that it doens't have is to be able to access the apple iTunes movie store. When you can plan in advance, downloading the movie rather that real time streaming is likely to achieve much better outcomes when my connection is overloaded. Paying a $1 extra for that is usually worth it to me.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Seriously, you can't see why anyone would, then Apple must be wrong, I mean they were wrong about their smartphone, it barely sold any at all before they quit making it.
We have a Apple TV and are extremely happy with it, like most Apple products is it not very customizable, so instead of customizing it, we watch TV on it. My wife and I are retired, and we enjoy things that just work and don't require fiddling with. We have also tried Plex, and FireTV and find the Apple to be more to our liking. It may also have to do with being able to watch our 300+ movie library stored on my MacOSX and served up via iTune family sharing.
The new TV (assuming there even is one) providing App support could be cool, and iPhones and iPads are already used for more gaming by casual gamers (only a couple hundred million - barely any market at all). So, if the TV could play those same iPad games from the App store, we will certain play a few - also, since games bought on the App Store are mostly family sharing enabled, I expect we will be able to play all those games we already have on the new TV - yup, I expect you are right though, Apple has blown it again.
I have a laptop and a TV. I watch content on the TV because it's BIGGER and has better sound. I read slashdot on the laptop because the TV doesn't have a keyboard or browser. Sure, I could use the TV as a monitor, but then I wouldn't be able to watch TV!
Right now I'm watching a college football game. Who in their right mind would choose to watch something like that on a tiny laptop screen when there's a huge TV right here in the living room?
They are two separate tools. Each can do something the other one can't do.
"The linked New York Times article mentions that it will need an internet connection. "
It already does.
Why would anyone who already has a laptop want to own a TV at all?
Because for watching TV, a TV is generally the best device for that...
Nothing like sitting on the couch, chilling out, watching a 70" TV with your family together. Everyone sitting huddled around a laptop? That doesn't sound very social.
I think the bigger issue is that those devices are coming down in price - AppleTV is going up. All have versions available in the ~$40 range, and all work pretty well. I can't imagine an AppleTV doing anything that my FireTV doesn't already do for cheaper.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
And at what point is that? You mean at a point where most people don't have 4k TVs and most content is barely 1080p and most people don't have connections that support 4k streaming?
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
thats the exact thought process i went through a few months back when i bought my new TV> fir the same display panel, in the same exterior case, with the same remote - 180 bucks more for the smart tv vs the display only version. a 50$ roku stick was the final piece.
in the end i now can turn any hdmi capable display into a smart device, and i saved a good amount of money
I realize im raving about the roku on this thread, just a happy customer, nothing more
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
I can't imagine an AppleTV doing anything that my FireTV doesn't already do for cheaper.
Well that's just a sign of a limited imagination.