My dreams are coming true. Within the last forty-eight hours, the Apple TV has been unboxed, opened, upgraded, and enhanced. The last two items are of most interest to me. After cracking open the case and gaining access to the hard drive, installing a larger hard drive with more media codecs is a fairly easy process. This is thanks to the Apple TV being a stripped down version of OS X, allowing codec packs such as Perian to be installed with ease.
I was hoping Apple TV would allow additional codecs, and I have a feeling Apple would love to support them. Unfortunately, Apple can’t ship the Apple TV with codecs such as Xvid. Shipping them would cause problems with licensing and most importantly, keeping the content providers on board with the iTunes platform. However, Apple can make installing codecs as easy as possible in hopes the device will becoming a modder’s dream. Unlike devices like Microsoft’s Xbox, Apple is not selling the Apple TV at a loss, so if people are buying them for the sake of modding that’s only more money in Apple’s pocket.
Depending on how the Apple TV modding scene matures, I could easily see myself picking up one down the road. I’m avid podcast/vidcast subscriber and always searching for a method to bring that content into the living room. My current solution is Xbox Media Center, but with more and more content being pushed out in H.264, the Xbox’s 733 MHz Pentium III can’t keep up. While the Apple TV would satisfy my podcasting needs out of the box, it would not satisfy my TV habits. I need the Xvid codec for my shows, which the modding scene will certainly make a reality.
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I was initially interested in the Apple TV, but after I heard the price tag and its limitations, I decided to purchase a cheap, used P4 machine from my day job for $150 and turn it into a Windows Media Center machine. I’ve been pretty happy with it so far.
This is precisely what I was hoping for when I heard the announcement. As long as they allow/don’t make it difficult to install other codecs this is perfect for me. I have a huge archive of fansubs, and this will be the best way to watch them once the modding matures a bit.
Excuse my ignorance, but I have a few questions:
Will this mean we can access movies and videos using the newly installed codecs with the sweet Apple TV interface? Or will we basically be using a Mac OS X desktop and launching a video player that will then play the videos instead?
Also, are we going to be able to get 1080i / 1080p content to play with this or potentially with some other hack?
You get to use the sweet Apple TV interface. The current hack method is to create a pointer Quicktime file which refers to the Xvid when played. As the modding matures, hopefully the Quicktime file will be unnecessary or an automated method will be created.
That’s still unknown. We should know shortly.
Do we know why it is limited to 720p? Is it because that’s all that’s (barely) available on iTunes, or is there reason to think that the hardware can’t handle it, while products like the Netgear can? Thanks for your wisdom.
Just swallow your ignorance and get Microsoft Media Center, it’s a much more fully featured product, the interface is fantastic, and you don’t have to bother with the itunes rubbish… for which most content by the way, isn’t even available to most parts of the world outside the US.
I may be dumb but I’m not dumb enough to start using iTunes, that would mean I’d have to buy a Mac cause I’m sure not using iTunes for Windows. Seems to me Apple TV, even if hacked, will have a damn hard time besting a Media Center XBOX 360 combo.
Trust me, I’ve tried Media Center using the 360 as a front end. Microsoft limits the functionality. Even using Media Center, you’re still limited to only WMVs. Yes, there are transcoding solutions out there, but they’re nowhere near to real time and frequently lag due to lack of processing power.
The only way the 360 will even become a media powerhouse is if it’s hacked or Microsoft finally allows other codecs. I’ve said this before, but I would PAY for Xvid/H.264 codecs. I don’t see why Microsoft can’t sell codecs in the Marketplace. That would deal with all the licensing issues.
My Apple TV outputs to the TV at 1080i (no option for 1080p in the menu – yet), and with the other hardware specs I believe it might be able to handle content at that resolution.
Your website seems excruciating slow again… What happened?
Beats me. I haven’t been having any trouble and my server statistics look normal. On the contrary, I have been having a ton of trouble getting to A Small Orange sites lately. They all seem down, but I think it might just be a problem with my DNS.
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