Now instead of scheduling torrents and streaming from my main machine I can just schedule my torrents directly on the Apple TV. This is just making our the move to IPTV through Bittorent more enticing.
After just a few days of using the Apple TV I’m thoroughly impressed. The major reason I purchased the Apple TV was because of all the hacking that’s been going on and with Apple practically saying, “it’s your box do what you will” we can expect some more great hacks, if running full OS X wasn’t enough. I had planned at least to install some Xvid/divX playback through a very simple hack but involves cracking the case open. Instead of jumping right into doing that I’ve instead planned to just use it as intended.
I already live out of iTunes so the unsupported codec didn’t pose a big problem. All my TV Shows have already been encoded for iPod playback so 90% of my video was ready for use. The other 10% had been movies I ripped to DivX to playback on your Heleos DVD player. I truly dislike re-encoding video especially when the original format is already compressed (divX) but I tested out a few conversions and they looked great.
It took me a day or two to export 30-40 movies straight from Quicktime through the “Apple TV” export setting on my MacPro and I’m positive that exporting this much video isn’t practical for the majority. Especially since my assumption would be the majority having more video than I and wouldn’t have a fast pc or mac that could export 10 videos at a time.
After getting all my video to a codec that the aTV supported the device shines. The one problem I have now is whether to export my future video for iPod or aTV. It should be easy since I’m not getting rid of cable anytime soon so I’ll just export any full HD downloads for the aTV (like Lost or Sapranos), otherwise all other TV downloads will go for my iPod which I use daily at work. And all movies will be exported through QT Pro or if it’s a DVD I’ve found ripping it straight to from handbrake is the ideal process.
Quality of converted HD content looks surprisingly good. I downloaded a full HD tv show and converted it’s original format to h.264 through QT pro. After streaming it over wireless, on a g network might I add the video looked great. I didn’t notice any difference in quality from the original format of HD DivX playback on my computer then through the aTV.
Another majorly mentioned drawback to the aTV is streaming HD over wireless. Some say that anything lower then a n network wont work but I’ve got a G network streaming video perfectly fine with about 5 seconds of beginning buffer and solid fast forwarding. It takes forever for iTunes to sync with it in the beginning since it sends 30+GBs of data but ever since I’v had no need to drop a cable.
In conclusion the aTV doesn’t have any drawbacks (for me), other then the minor process of waiting 30-50 minutes for converted HD downloaded video to be supported. And it’s wonderful not having to worry about burning DivX cds or finding a CD/DVD to play some kid video. With it’s simple interface we can pull up a full media library from upstairs on our TV in seconds.
Including in that library is podcasts, photos and images. Watching video podcasts is great. I only wish now that I had a faster internet connection so I can drop cable TV and just download all our HD shows to playback on the aTV. Or what would help, HD content downloads from iTunes.
I’ll still be following the Apple TV hacking scene and I’m sure they’re going to compel me to break the box soon.In the meantime I’ll order a new 2.5′ drive so I can keep the factory drive untouched.
Looks like Sling is listening and is releasing what everyone wants that the Apple TV doesn’t deliver in the SlingCatcher. Other articles describe it’s ability to stream whatever codec you want, which is perfect. Did I say it’s only $200, making it only easier for me to extend my video where I want it instead of a limited expensive box that the A-TV delivers or another expensive but clunky MythTV computer.
The Apple TV was the first out of the gate at today’s Macworld and it’s by far the most thing I’m excited about. The device is a media streaming device as well as a media player that syncs your library from another machine on it’s own hard drive, very similar to how an iPod syncs.
I’m interested in a few things: … Read More »
January 09
I just can’t figure out what to do. Either return the 360 and get the Wii (if I can) or just keep the 360. I just made a spreadsheet for cost comparison, I guess I need to do a matrix for pros and cons now.
My hope is the Wii will make us want to play games again, I’d think Sara would love it. There’s a web browser so we could watch youtube on TV and it’s a little cheaper then my current 360 setup.
The 360 does DVDs, plays the classics, and will have an HD DVD add-on which will end up costing more. The 360 is hard to explain, it’s a full powered tech gadget that does tons more then just play games. But I find myself not using all those bells, especially since WCME doesn’t support XVID and DivX streaming. Then the games come into the picture. The games that are coming out look amazing; Gears of War, Lost Planet, Tony Hawk and Halo 3. The graphics on the 360 kill the Wii so much I’m worried to play those standard def games after playing what I am now like Dead Rising and Tony Hawk’s P8 demo.
But the Wii has something more important then graphics, FUN. And fun for all; all the games look exciting, the graphics look crappy but like the DS it’s not noticeable when the game has playability.
So it’s either a tech gadget that does DVDs, HD DVDs, Media Center and a little more vs. a really fun game console. I’m leaning toward the Wii and the iTV from Apple. That way I’ll get my HD downloads streamed the right way and I’ll have all the fun I could have with every classic Nintendo game available for download.
Now I just have to get a Wii (just in case I decide to ditch the 360, :). I do have a couple plans: Toys ‘r us and the mystery spot on launch day.
To follow up with my previous post, I’m surprised at how close I was.
They announced iTunes 7 with movies
They announced the new Nano’s with new casing and sizes
They announced new iPods with a new size increase
They did release an update to Quicktime but nothing substantial like I mentioned
And what I wanted to see was a Media Extender and they pre-announced it. The thing looks awesome and I would consider it if it did xvid and divx streaming, which I doubt. Because if I’m going to convert something I might as well convert it to a DVD or something. I’m also not likely to buy it if I keep my Xbox 360 after the Wii comes out. I do love how it has HD component hookups, you don’t see that on new HD devices anymore. I’ll post on this later, maybe when we see more specs but a device like this is something I really want, it something that could replace our current cable DVR and service altogether since we could just download HD shows the day after without having to pay dumb cable bills.
Other announcements were the new shuffle, which looks awesome. Way better then the old design.
And the iPod wouldn’t see much of an update, making me not care about a brighter screen. Unless I missed something and it could playback on a TV at the new high-res and the 5G version (the one I have) can’t.
Another copy and past from Jason’s original post on scary stats.
I agree that BOOKS are regarded too high, almost as if they are the great tool of knowledge. In the past, books were the mainstay for increasing knowledge, fair perceptions of life and the world. Now it’s different and with many new media streams people can be very knowledgeable, still increase imagination and find avenues of philosophy without even touching a paper book.
Similar to what Nathan said, smart people have convinced the majority that books are for smart people and if you want to be smart you do what smart people do, which is read books. I really don’t see smart people reading because they’ve decided it’s the smart thing to do, I see them reading books because most are introverts and that’s a way of expression. Now I am generalizing a lot and I’m assuming that smart people are smart not because they’ve read a few books but rather they’re smart from the begining. Because it can’t mean that if I read Chomsky (never had) my scope logic is comparable to a genius.
Here’s where I flip-flop a lot.
As I said there are a lot of media streams rather then just books and IMHO these new inlets are ruining us. Since most aren’t calming and thought provoking we turn into fast passed media whores. TV, film, mags, music and the web I read only makes me only knowledgeable in the present rather then the future or the past; decreasing thought and imagination.
Unless we can consciously be aware of the numbing effects of this new media and are retroactively increasing thought through these forms we’ve essentially created a worse replacement to the books that brought us here in the first place.
So, I’m for books but personally I just can’t bring myself to complete a book maybe it’s because of childhood and just in case that’s why I’m going to take an effort in reading to Avery (or making sure Sara does) and limiting mind-numbing media from her.
My other problem; I’ve become a whore to tech, since it’s my hobby I want to broaden myself by reading a lot on the internet but the scary thing, I don’t see an end in sight. With no point of reflection, contemplation and thought in order to create something of my own it’s useless. And IMHO that’s true knowledge, when you’ve created or solved something for others that’s beneficial to all.
I’ve closed the comments so you’d go here instead.
HD DVDs
Who needs HD-DVD or Blueray when you can get HD-HBO I know it’s technically the same but it sure looks awesome.
I’m watched “Revenge of the Sith” and it looked awesome. It makes me want to figure a recording scheme out so I can record these movies.
Another reason I might not be buying the HD-DVD add-on to my 360 would be because HD streaming to the X-Box 360. And rumor has it M$ will be having HD movie downloads to the 360 directly which would be sweet.
Meet the Press as become one of my favorite shows of late. Yesterdays was extremely good and if you missed it they stream it for free on the site or you can subscribe to their podcast in iTunes. … Read More »
May 01
runtime360 is way better then the previous software I linked to in the earlier post about streaming Xvid and DivX to the 360. This time it’s easier to install, easier to use, has more features and is more powerful. Since it uses FFMpeg to transcode the files it handles a lot more codecs, including Quicktime.
Now all I do … Read More »
April 05
