It isn't a requirement, but think about it from Apple's perspective. The AppleTV exists to sell content from iTunes.
Is that
your reasoning or Apples? If it's Apples, then much of the rest of your feedback makes more sense. If it's yours, I counter with a different take: The AppleTV exists to connect iTunes content to your HDTV and home electronics. I suggest that the majority of almost everyone's iTunes content is NOT content purchased from iTunes, but content they added by ripping their CD collections, converting their DVDs, etc. iTunes even manages the flow of their iPhotos so that it can display them on their HDTV.
I argue that AppleTV no more exists to sell content from iTunes than iPods or iPhones... or more simply- and as Apple has pitched it- the AppleTV is an iPod for your television. Do iPods exist solely to sell content from iTunes?
They sell content via the internet so what they sell has to be sent via the internet. Most home broadband internet connections range from 1 - 8mbps with many of those capped at 250GB data transfer per month.
OK. So what do you say to the same arguments applied to everything else that Apple makes? Why build in MMS & tethering until AT&T could fully support it? Why build in multi-core computers and grand central until most software was coded to support it? Why build anything that pushes the envelope until most of what would support the push is in place to support it?
Why is 1080 content now being added to many other sites like YouTube? Why are other manufacturers building AppleTV-like boxes or tech hooked to the Internet with 1080p hardware? Don't they all know about the broadband problem you point out? What are
they thinking?
Taking this stance argues there is little need to advance the platform until most of the U.S. broadband infrastructure is heavily upgraded to be able to manage the flow of these bigger files in a reasonable amount of time. Meanwhile, many other players enter the set-top box space with such hardware capabilities, increasingly pressuring the "why buy?" AppleTV proposition.
Furthermore, Apple has NO control over
when bandwidth might be expanded, just like they have NO control over when AT&T might be able to support features built into the last generation of iPhones, but that didn't stop them from advancing what they do control, delivering tech with advances beyond what is mostly supported, pressuring these other players to move (their support) along.
Very simply: we almost NEVER get there if we have to wait for broadband to be fattened up enough to support it. Until the keepers of that broadband significantly feel the need (such that it hits them in the pocketbook), they WON'T do very much about that problem. Stances like you appear to support creates NO REASON for them to bother.
If you are watching anything except a Blu-ray movie, you are most likely watching 720p content. Cable, satellite, and others push content at 720p resolution because of bandwidth constraints which means Apple's competition is mostly using 720p.
That's only got some modest truths in it. In my own case, I watch more major network television than any cable channels. I receive those networks for FREE over the air. I am pretty sure that CBS, NBC, and FOX are 1080i. The satt channels I watch are generally 1080i too, though there are some 720p channels.
Nevertheless, if we accept that Apple's role is only to meet- not beat- the competition, then there is also little excuse to advance. Get that competition to accept the same mentality, and all advances could stop here- all tech "as is" is good enough(???). As I understand the tech market- and Apple- the goal is to roll out "gee whiz" next big things, and not things that are only as good as- but no better than- the competition.
Note: For reference, a 1080p Blu-ray movie is approximately 22GB+ when stored on a hard disk. 10 of these movies would consume most of the monthly data transfer quota associated with a Comcast internet connection. Exceeding this quota can cause your internet connection to be disconnected.
See above. At one point we all had 1200 baud modems and 64Mb hard drives at best. Isn't it nice that instead of deciding that was "good enough" for the masses, the natural drive to advance tech continued to deliver faster modems and bigger drives. However, had the crowd decided that that was fast enough and/or big enough storage, then all would have stopped there.
I make no argument that 22GB is big (in both vs. broadband limits and hard drive storage). But until there is a common problem, there isn't a great deal done to solve that problem. At one time a 1MB file was massive (Bill Gates is famously quoted as saying "640K ram is all we'll ever need"), but now 1MB is "tiny". Hop even a few years into the future and 22GB will not seem nearly as large then, as it seems now. And when we have 10TB-20TB hard drives, a 22GB movie file will seem as small as a 3GB movie file seems on a 2TB hard drive.
The broadband pipes were clogged with Bittorrent, Youtube, Facebook, and similar traffic long before the idea of selling TV shows via the internet reached the mainstream. Comcast, Time Warner, and other services have no incentive to upgrade their networks to assist competitors with taking their cable television customers from them.
It's not about the load at all... it's about the loss of cash (revenues) because of the overload. Until enough people dump a Comcast, etc provider because it's network is too overloaded, there is little incentive to meaningfully upgrade their network. They could care less about the load as long as most of their subscribers keep paying the monthly fee. But let those subscribers start giving up on their broadband (stop paying for that overloaded network) and network upgrades will quickly follow. It is the
money- not the quality of service- that moves these pseudo-monopolies to spend money on their networks.
Note that at one time, Comcast cable was only loaded with analog video. Then, some of that was compressed into digital channels to make room for broadband internet. Then, some of the bandwidth that could give us super fast broadband was allocated to digital voice services. Meanwhile, there is still plenty of analog channels that could be digitized, freeing up even more room for broader pipes. And odds are good that if you'll check your Comcast service, you'll see that they offer much higher broadband speeds to business accounts at much higher prices. It's the same cable and same infrastructure: higher speed Comcast could be made available if the demand was there (and from our point of view: if the price was right). The point is that a gradual uptake of 1080p AppleTVs would be unlikely to overwhelm the Internet; but until the demand for broader pipes is realized, the supply of broader pipes feels no pull.
To the point that the cable TV companies who are also broadband internet providers have no desire to facilitate any fatter-pipes solution that would enable an erosion of their lucrative TV distribution cash cows, we completely agree there. However, how they'll deal with that is simply raising the price of the broadband (for higher demand users) to wash out the loss of cable TV revenues. Because of this unfortunate reality, a complete AppleTV-type cable replacement solution would eventually need Apple to find a way to bypass the current pipes. One crazy(?) idea would be for Apple to take some of their massive cash holdings and buy DISH network, giving them end-to-end control (and a bypass route) to link AppleTV demand directly to Apple servers. Can you picture little white dishes all over the country with the Apple logo on them?
All that said, I appreciate this kind of take on this situation, and how it seems to be a logical attempt to justify why having 3+ year old hardware in the existing
TV makes some kind of sense. But Apple applies that "good enough" philosophy to NOTHING (tech) else that it makes. As I see it, the problem is merely- and solely- Apple summoning up the will to build and market a next-gen
TV. If we have to wait until all of the other players are all lined up in full "we're ready for it" support, it (almost) never (can) arrives.
Or very, very simply: in matters such as this, should Apple lead or follow?
As for the examples of successful media players (Xbox/PS3/WD), I don't really consider any of them to be that successful, not in the way that Apple has been successful with their music endeavors. Ok, so the xbox can stream netflix and act as a Media Center Extender (which in and of itself is pretty crippled). I'm not too familiar with the PS3, so I can't really comment on that. The WD device is a lame also-ran compared to a Mediagate MG-800 (RIP) or a PCH A-110/C-200.