Not a lot of people managed to get their hands on an Apple TV to review, but the folks at PC Mag did, and the verdict? It’s good – really good, especially if streaming media is your thing. That’s not to say that the device doesn’t have issues that Apple really could address if they wanted to, but it’s better in person than a lot of the feature roundups have proclaimed, and it was streamlined and polished enough to earn the Editor’s Choice award from PC Mag and a total of 4/5 stars.
Of it’s highlight features, it looks dead simple to set up and get running, is controllable from a variety of remote control apps (and comes with its own,) streams video and music and photos from a computer on the same network, and brings the thunder with Web video, including YouTube, Netflix Instant, and tons of rent-able TV shows and content from partner networks. If you have another iOS device like an iPad or iPhone, it can even stream what you have there to your television.
That’s all great, but it also doesn’t change the fact that the Apple TV doesn’t have a hard drive, can’t connect directly to storage, and all of your media consumption using the device will be rental and temporary in nature; you can’t keep anything on your Apple TV. But if the bulk of your streaming video is Netflix and Web video, you just can’t go wrong with this tiny little $99 box.
That is, at least until Roku’s new offerings come out for half the price, and then the Boxee Box hits the market for twice the price. Apple’s new gadget will be interestingly positioned both feature and price-wise, but we’ll have to see if it can go the distance.
Apple TV is internally almost the same as an iPod/Pad.
( http://www.engadget.com/2010/09/29/apple-tv-teardown-reveals-8gb-flash-storage-256mb-ram/ )
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So the AppleTV is basically an iPod in hardware. On the software side it looks like th old AppleTV simple stupid. Typical Apple zero learning curve.
( http://www.engadget.com/2010/09/29/apple-tv-review-2010/ )
That’s kind of the point, Sjon. The iPad and the iPod Touch have been wildly successful, and there’s no secret that the Apple TV has the same A4 processor that powers the iPad. It’s more or less and iPad in a small box with some additional connectors.
But that’s actually the beauty of it, and how Apple is able to price it so low for the features they’ve included. If you have a successful, popular product, why introduce a learning curve that your customers will have to get used to, when you can put out a great product that doesn’t require it?