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Apple TV refresh anytime soon?

T

topherchris9

macrumors newbie
Original poster
May 19, 2008
6
0
I've checked the buying guide and saw nothing about Apple TV.
Is there any indication that the ATV will be upgraded in the near future? The 160GB drive is nice, however I want the biggest and fastest without cracking the case open to upgrade it myself.
 
topherchris9 said:
I've checked the buying guide and saw nothing about Apple TV.
Is there any indication that the ATV will be upgraded in the near future? The 160GB drive is nice, however I want the biggest and fastest without cracking the case open to upgrade it myself.
Click to expand...

Why? Stream your media to it and you can have much greater expandability than a 2.5 internal IDE hard drive can give you.
 
topherchris9 said:
The 160GB drive is nice, however I want the biggest and fastest without cracking the case open to upgrade it myself.
Click to expand...

I bought the small one and stream to it over Ethernet/802.11n. The hard drive is essentially empty, but it has hundreds of gigabytes of content available to it.

A.
(I actually use 'Custom Sync' and don't sync any content. This seems to get the database synced to the Apple TV which makes everything pretty fast.)
 
To answer your original question, there is no way of knowing when/if Apple will do a product update/upgrade on this puppy.

There was an update (software only) not long ago which enabled video rentals, music, tv shows and movie purchases, all from the comfort of your couch. Unless they need to react to something like the Roku, my guess is we're pretty much where we're going to be a year from now.

For most of us, there's no reason to boost HD size for normal use, since streaming works well, though there's a really cool thread here by Cave Man (https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/438073/) that shows how he and, separately, dynaflash, installed larger HDDs without hacking the software.

I can't see Apple updating the hardware anytime soon.
 
Thanks for all the suggestions. I was just concerned about the performance from streaming from an external drive connected to my Time Capsule.
I agree this is the best solution, but I think for most things, I'll just keep it on my ATV and stream stuff that's not.
Aloha!
 
i was wondering the same thing. i want one now, but am wondering how well the HD content streams over wireless... any lag at all when streaming HD content? at first i was thinking of getting the 160 gig. but i have 2 terabytes hooked up to the AEBS in the back, as long as HD content streams well i see no reason for going for the 160 and just getting the 40 gig.

thinking of dropping cable except for my HS internet and going with the Apple TV.

if anyone has any issues streaming HD content wirelessly, please speak up!
 
Electro Funk said:
i have 2 terabytes hooked up to the AEBS in the back, as long as HD content streams well i see no reason for going for the 160 and just getting the 40 gig.
Click to expand...
Always bear in mind for streaming from an AEBS connected disk, if your wireless throughout. You have to support the bandwidth x 2 since the movie actually goes from your AEBS, back to your mac where iTunes is and then back our from your mac to the ATV. You are essentially streaming both ways. Again, that's assuming all three are on the same wireless network.
 
Cave Man said:
Yes, 720p/6mbps stutters frequently by wireless 802.11n. And forget about 2x or more ff/rew. Syc'd content, on the other hand, works wonderfully, even at 4x. Nice to have a 750 gb ATV. ;)
Click to expand...
I used to have problems starting to stream iTunes Store HD purchases (TV shows) via 802.11n @ 5ghz; it would frequenty stutter at the beginning of playback for a couple minutes before eventually working itself out. However, since 2.3 I have not been able to replicate this problem. I imagine they either tweaked the GPU code, or increased the network buffer... whichever was causing the actual problem.

My content is stored on a NAS connected to a gigabit switch along with my iMac (w/ jumbo frames enabled on both). My Airport Extreme is connected to this switch via 10/100, and the AppleTV via 802.11n. Switching the connection between the iMac and NAS to gigabit with jumbo frames has helped streaming in general immensely. I tried connecting my AppleTV to my wired network, but I see more problems via the 10/100 port (why Apple didn't include gigabit is beyond me) than 802.11n.
 
NightStorm said:
I used to have problems starting to stream iTunes Store HD purchases (TV shows) via 802.11n @ 5ghz; it would frequenty stutter at the beginning of playback for a couple minutes before eventually working itself out. However, since 2.3 I have not been able to replicate this problem. I imagine they either tweaked the GPU code, or increased the network buffer... whichever was causing the actual problem.

My content is stored on a NAS connected to a gigabit switch (w/ jumbo frames enabled on both). My Airport Extreme is connected to this switch via 10/100, and the AppleTV via 802.11n. Switching the connection between the iMac and NAS to gigabit with jumbo frames has helped streaming in general immensely. I tried connecting my AppleTV to my wired network, but I see more problems via the 10/100 port (why Apple didn't include gigabit is beyond me) than 802.11n.
Click to expand...

I am not at home right now but I believe you can set the buffer size within the ATV.
 
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