Apple iTV announced

[UNCjigga]

Gizmodo for linky

The new product: a box to connect to your TV to play all these iTunes Movies and iTunes TV shows on it.

This box supports wireless?no stringing cables?and is the missing piece.

iTV looks like a small Mac Mini. It's just an internal codename, and will be renamed later.

There's a power supply inside, USB, 802.11 wireless, Ethernet, HDMI, component, stereo audio, and optical audio out to your TV.

Whatever setup you've got, you can hook up to this iTV box. It can go out to your TV, stereo, whatever.

Steve's holdiing one. It's wider than a Mac Mini, but flatter.

iTV looks faster than Front Row. Looks similar to Front Row?has movie covers, TV covers.

When you're browsing your movies, it gives you the synopsis of the movie, stars, and the cover.

It looks just like a flatter Mac mini, so I suppose you can put this on top of or beneath your mini and have it look pretty clean next to your components. Or, just pair it/sync it with your regular Mac in another room and stream all your content off that. Not sure if this will be PC compatible.

 

[Inspector Jihad]

come on son...

 

[loup garou]

1) Already covered in the other thread.
2) Yes, it is PC compatible.
3) There are half a zillion products that already do this.
4) Can't wait for HD CableCard tuners in Vista + XBox 360 to show this thing who's boss.

 

[Mellman]

Originally posted by: loup garou
1) Already covered in the other thread.
2) Yes, it is PC compatible.
3) There are half a zillion products that already do this.
4) Can't wait for HD CableCard tuners in Vista + XBox 360 to show this thing who's boss.

QFT x 9?

 

[UNCjigga]

Uggh, I thought this was something else. PWNED! Looks like its just a dumb "Media Center Extender" type device with HDMI and snazzy software.

 

[yllus]

Xbox 360 + PC > iTV. And this coming from a person who's been vainly hoping for a nice Apple-designed HDTV OTA tuner + DVR box.

 

[loup garou]

Originally posted by: yllus
Xbox 360 + PC > iTV. And this coming from a person who's been vainly hoping for a nice Apple-designed HDTV OTA tuner + DVR box.

I don't think you'll ever see an official Apple DVR. They want the cash from selling TV and Movies on iTunes too badly.

 

[UNCjigga]

Originally posted by: loup garou
1) Already covered in the other thread. Oops, didn't see that.
2) Yes, it is PC compatible. Yay
3) There are half a zillion products that already do this. Zero, to be exact. None of them work with iTunes content
4) Can't wait for HD CableCard tuners in Vista + XBox 360 to show this thing who's boss.
Well, that would negate the need for MS to provide their own content portal, right?

 

[Fenixgoon]

Originally posted by: yllus
Xbox 360 + PC > iTV. And this coming from a person who's been vainly hoping for a nice Apple-designed HDTV OTA tuner + DVR box.

but it's an apple product, it MUST be better than the competition because steve jobs said so!

</sarcasm>

 

[UNCjigga]

Originally posted by: loup garou

Originally posted by: yllus
Xbox 360 + PC > iTV. And this coming from a person who's been vainly hoping for a nice Apple-designed HDTV OTA tuner + DVR box.

I don't think you'll ever see an official Apple DVR. They want the cash from selling TV and Movies on iTunes too badly.

I wouldn't have said so last year, but loup garou is probably right. Looks like we'll just have to wait for Vista HTPCs with CableCARD (Q3/Q4 2007?) or pony up the $$$ for Series3 Tivo + PC and wait for hacks.

 

[Fenixgoon]

Originally posted by: UNCjigga

Originally posted by: loup garou
1) Already covered in the other thread.
2) Yes, it is PC compatible.
3) There are half a zillion products that already do this. Zero, to be exact. None of them work with iTunes content
4) Can't wait for HD CableCard tuners in Vista + XBox 360 to show this thing who's boss.

hooray for proprietary formatting that has a lossy encoding:disgust:

im no audio purist, but i definitely think apple should be offering lossless files. and again, by downloading itunes, you limit yourself to where you can play music. hooray for the DMCA and everything that came with it:|

 

[aphex]

Anyone know if this can stream music as well or is it just planned to stream movies?

 

[loup garou]

Originally posted by: aphex
Anyone know if this can stream music as well or is it just planned to stream movies?

Music, Photos, TV and Movies.

 

[yllus]

Originally posted by: UNCjigga

Originally posted by: loup garou

Originally posted by: yllus
Xbox 360 + PC > iTV. And this coming from a person who's been vainly hoping for a nice Apple-designed HDTV OTA tuner + DVR box.

I don't think you'll ever see an official Apple DVR. They want the cash from selling TV and Movies on iTunes too badly.

I wouldn't have said so last year, but loup garou is probably right. Looks like we'll just have to wait for Vista HTPCs with CableCARD (Q3/Q4 2007?) or pony up the $$$ for Series3 Tivo + PC and wait for hacks.

:|

Fine then. I like Microsoft more than Apple anyways.

 

[randomlinh]

now, the question is will my xvid encoded stuff work. and $300 seems too much

 

[Raduque]

Meh, I was hoping for a true Apple HTPC solution including HD/SD recording and playback.

 

[yllus]

Originally posted by: randomlinh
now, the question is will my xvid encoded stuff work. and $300 seems too much

Transcode 360:

Transcode 360 enables the playback of unsupported video over Xbox 360 and Media Center Extender devices. This software is designed to run on Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005.

As of Beta 2, Transcode 360 can transcode faster than real-time, this is an advantage not afforded by other products which are for the most part, either real-time or batch solutions.

From what I?ve read so far, Transcode 360 supports playback of DivX, XviD, and DVD ISO images currently residing on your PC?s hard drive. The sticking point, again, is the probable necessity of the Media Center Edition (MCE) of Microsoft Windows XP.

 

[Kaido]

iTV = $299
Xbox with Xbox Media Center (XBMC) = $199 (used console with modchip installation)

XBMC can play just about every format known to man, not to mention Xbox games and emulators. I'll keep my Xbox, thank you

 

[Goosemaster]

Originally posted by: Kaido
iTV = $299
Xbox with Xbox Media Center (XBMC) = $199 (used console with modchip installation)

XBMC can play just about every format known to man, not to mention Xbox games and emulators. I'll keep my Xbox, thank you

can xbox play mpeg4 avc and wmv-hd (vc-1 codec)@ 720p or 1080i ?

if so that's not a bad deal

 

[Inspector Jihad]

xbmc seems like the best option for a media extender...what do you xbmc guys use as a dvr?

 

[loup garou]

Originally posted by: Inspector Jihad
xbmc seems like the best option for a media extender...what do you xbmc guys use as a dvr?

I think most of them use bittorrent.

Although it plays just about anything, I think even MCE dvr-ms files now.

 

[0roo0roo]

streaming video of presentation
http://events.apple.com.edgesuite.net/sep_2006/event/index.html

jobs is the master!