Buy An ATV Today Or Wait Until MacWorld?

[imlucid]

Was it this time last year they announced the Apple TV ? I can remember the announcement, slight delay and then everything being over shadowed by the iPhone and Leopard.

It was pre-announced at a special event in September (iTV codename), then shown at Mac World along side the iPhone with a February ship date.

Kevin

 

[mrgreen4242]

go ahead and buy it- unless you ure not satisfied with harddrive space, because POSSIBLY they will upgrade the hd. probably not, probably just a software update with itunes rental or whatever which everyone will be able to get. if ure dying to have it go get it, if not..why not wait to be safe?

Apple is going to HAVE to upgrade the hardware, or get more out of the old hardware through software updates. 720p24 @ 5mbps isn't going to cut it. 720p is acceptable, 5mbps is almost enough, but 24fps isn't acceptable for a lot of situations. A standard 30 fps the minimum, 60 would be much better.

The ATV also really needs to have a DVR option... just out of the box support for USB tuner and either an integrated h264 hadware encoder or support for a USB one. And a price drop.

If you could get a 160gb ATV that supports 720p60 @ ~7-9mbps for $250, a USB HD tuner (ATSC, NTSC, QAM compatible) for $100, and a hardware h264 encoder that did a decent job of realtime 720p60@7-9mbps they could be a big competitor for TiVo; I'd certainly replace my (SD) TiVo with one... Tivo HD is $299 + $13/month (supposedly current subscribers can get one for $199 by threatening to cancel). You'd start saving money after about a year, plus access to the iTMS rental store would be better than Amazon Unboxed, imo.