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Received Apple TV as gift

K

komatta

Member
Hello,
I just received an Apple TV (2G) as a gift. I do not own any Apple products and wanted to ask a few questions.

I already have a PS3 which can stream a lot of content, including Netflix. I was wondering if this Apple TV can do things that my PS3 cannot. I do not use iTunes but I could install it. I am moving tomorrow so I haven't tested the Apple TV yet.

Is there a reason to keep it if I have a PS3? Can it be hacked to do nifty things? Thanks a lot.
 
I have an Apple TV, a PS3 and a few Xbox 360s.

I use the PS3/360s with TVersity (uPnP media server) for streaming video. I think video is better organized in a folder structure than in iTunes, and I believe iTunes/Apple TV support limited formats.

I use the Apple TV only for streaming music. I like organizing my music with the smart playlists feature in iTunes. It's like a SQL query for your music. I prefer to stream my music that way rather than a folder structure with TVersity.

A lot of people don't like iTunes though. I like it. If you don't like iTunes, I wouldn't keep the Apple TV.

Re: hacking - I believe it has been hacked, and it may be capable of running Plex? Not sure if that is publicly available yet. The problem with hacking it is that it doesn't really have any storage (aside from whatever is available for firmware and buffering streams). I think that will limit what you can do with a hacked device.

For some reason people are still holding their breath for Apple to add app support. I don't know how that is supposed to work with no storage. I know Apple is known for leaving out features and adding them in the next version, but they took the disk out from the last gen to the current gen. Putting it back in doesn't seem like something Apple would do. Maybe after they release a $299 7" iPad...
 
I think that they got Plex onto it, and it can playback up to 720p video. The PS3 with PS3 Media Server however can playback up to 1080p. My roommate has both in the living room, XBMC (similar to Plex in functionality, but different appearance) is easier to use than the PS3.

Although you don't use iTunes, I suppose there is a chance that you have an iPod Touch/iPad/iPhone, if you do then you can use AirPlay to stream stuff from those devices to the AppleTV.
 
mugs said:
For some reason people are still holding their breath for Apple to add app support. I don't know how that is supposed to work with no storage. I know Apple is known for leaving out features and adding them in the next version, but they took the disk out from the last gen to the current gen. Putting it back in doesn't seem like something Apple would do. Maybe after they release a $299 7" iPad...
Click to expand...

There is 8GB of flash storage on the AppleTV.
 
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