This is super incredibly useful for digital signage applications. It's not even funny. Only sad part is they're backordered to infinity already and no longer available for sale.
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Hands On: Mission's USB Power Cable Lets You Plug Your Apple TV Directly Into Your TV Set
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All electronics are e-waste from the inception. But, now imagine this: imagine your JOB is working on a tv show (not movie) that routinely films in practical locations, such as a real sports bar, or a real bowling alley, or a real wherever. Unlike a movie, where you have gobs of time for everything. In TV show production, you really don't. Not with 8 day episodes. So... In this sort of practical location, there could be a dozen or more flat-screen TVs in odd locations, sometimes hanging from the ceiling on a bracket, and other times mounted flat against a wall. Your JOB is to plug in a small computer and display computer graphics or stock footage in a loop to those TVs, so the sports bar, bowling alley, wherever, feels authentic. VERY OFTEN the electrical outlet to plug in a Mac mini is blocked by the flat screen TV being mounted directly onto a wall. So, you sometimes have to spend a half an hour removing the flat screen TV from the wall, to access the electrical outlet, then run power to a Mac mini to display visual content to the TV. And, before you say something like, "why not just use a Firestick..." the reason our industry uses Mac mini's is because there is software we can get for macOS (and now tvOS and iOS) to remotely, from across the room, over Wi-Fi, adjust the screen brightness, contrast, and white balance to make the screen brighter, darker, less contrasty, more contrasty, warmer, or cooler, and we can also do these adjustments in GROUPS of Apple TVs across the room, in unison. No need for TV remotes! All the adjustments are in software! And, these are not things we can do with a Fire Stick. The software simply does not exist. So, since our software runs on Apple TV, and not just Mac mini's, and since this nifty device can power a ~2.24w Apple TV HD or ~3.47w 2021 Apple TV 4K on a USB port on the back of a TV, this could potentially save us HOURS and HOURS and HOURS of time on a practical filming location lighting up screens and it's just damn unfortunate the thing is on backorder already. If not, I think I would buy several of them. For use in filmmaking. Hope this helps!
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I used to cruise a lot, pre-Covid, and Celebrity cruises used Mac Mini's for their in-room entertainment kiosk. It worked great for them. After the ATV became so much more usable, and they updated their ships, I was hoping to see the ATV being used. It would make perfect sense for that application as well. It doesn't need to be over muscular, and has to respond to a remote, and provide access to external sources on their closed system. What better system could they ask for, and this power solution could really help them out. With the Mini, the plug space was really tight with lighting and TV, the Mini, and another desk top power popup. They could use something like a UPS, but that's expensive, and they really aren't all that reliable. Something like this, with a small battery that deletes one plug from their crowded 'hutch' is rather brilliant. Niche markets, niche solutions...
Makes sense. a Big part of the challenge of making software for tvOS vs macOS is the limitation on WebViews. You can't have any. So, this precludes most kiosk software from being used. We went ground-up and had it built in Swift for tvOS. Works brilliantly. But, I can see how it would not be so easy to swap out for a cruise ship, depending on how they built their existing solution. Hard to say, knowing nothing else about it and just providing pure speculation.
But, yes, Apple TVs do rock! Love them!
If you don't mind me asking, how did you handle the meshing for sync purposes ?
Trade secret. Not kidding. Just a LOT of effort. You definitely do discover a lot of interesting issues when using 100+ devices wirelessly. You solve them one-by-one. That's all there is to it. Just a LOT of good old fashioned effort done by a team of people over the years.
And, you know, the work is ongoing. It's not complete. It never is.
The real answer: trial and error.
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I would like to get into autonomous drones, any ressources on wireless banding to recommend ?
Oh I see. Totally different sets of technologies. I'm not of any help.
You might look up what they use for the drone constellations at the Olympic Games.. probably YouTube videos of them.
They look incredible!
like this:
I read several of these replies, no one will probably read mine. It is exactly as described, I have a surge protector to plug in several devices. I like the fact that when I was testing a Roku I could keep the cords local and use the USB port for power. This is in the case of the wall-mounted TV where I have to snake the wires through. In the living room where I have a fiber cable to the TV and everything is in the cabinet, I do not need it although again, less use of the multiple outlets. Bottom line, I am buying two of them. UPDATE: Not buying any they are sold out, either they never made many or this article had a significant impact.
This is perfect for the RV crowd, van life people, etc, since powering a tv with 12v power and an Apple TV with usb power keeps everything on DC from your batteries instead of firing up a wasteful inverter. The o ly thing better would be if they fed the ATV without stepping up to 120v ac current. That’s an inefficient waste. But that’s the o ot choice without opening up the ATV.
Quick follow up on my musings on using this for non-Apple TV purposes. I managed to order one from Amazon before they sold out. Yes, I think it will work for my trickle charger. No, it can’t be used as a UPS.
It requires 5V power input from the USB connector in order to provide power to the Apple TV plug. As soon as I unplug it from a USB charger, it goes dead. So it couldn’t be a good pseudo-UPS because it won’t keep a connected device powered when the wall power is lost. For its intended purpose of running an Apple TV from the TV’s USB port, the Apple TV would shut off if the TV stopped supplying USB power.
However it does seem to run fine when the USB port is plugged into a basic USB battery pack, which means I think it can serve as a cheap 120V battery pack to run my motorcycle trickle charger where an AC wall outlet is not available.
I did a test with this Mission power pack plugged into a basic 4400mAh USB battery pack with 5V 1A (5W) output. It was able to power an 11W IKEA Tradfri LED light bulb (120V) for about 2.5 hours off the combined battery power. As soon as the 4400mAh battery was drained, everything shut off. So I think this could definitely power a 0.75A 12V (9W) motorcycle trickle charger for a few hours.
Looking around I didn’t find any other battery packs with 120V AC output for less than $100, so I’m pleased with this solution! The only other piece I needed was the Conntek 30132 IEC C8 to 1-15R Plug Adapter to convert the “Apple TV” power plug into a regular US 2-prong wall outlet.
The specs listed on the Mission product box were:
Input: 5V, Output: 120V / 17mA, Battery: 2000mAh / 7.2V (14.4Wh)
but on the device itself it says:
Input: 5VDC 1.5A, Output: 120V, 10mA, Battery: 7.2V, 2000mAh (14.4Wh)
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That’s 1.3 to 2.6 watts of output depending on whether you believe the box or the device.
Seems like it could have trouble keeping up with the ATV4k according to Apple’s own power consumption figures:
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Helps me run an AppleTV in my RV off DC power.
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Let’s me watch TV via ATV on my DC tv without need for 120v power when on the road.
Yeah 15 watts would seem to be enough perhaps except for the loss in converting it to AC 120…. But even then it should be enough.
troible might be that many USB adapters offer a max of 2.1 amps to all outlet combined so using two outlets results in 1.1 amps max per outlet, and of course if one is using this behind a tv and using the tv usb to power it there is usually only one USB port on a tv.
For my use case, vanlife, it would work very well.
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This isn't working for me at all. Any usb plug I try to plug this into just makes the ATV blink really fast every couple of seconds. Anyone else having this issue?
Yes, unfortunately my Apple TV 4K (2017) is doing the same thing. Tried it this morning and the ATV won’t boot, just get a blinking light and restarting endlessly. I emailed their support and waiting to hear back.
This is on a Sony X80J (2021) TV and I tried the USB 2.0, USB 3.0 ports and also an external USB power adapter.
I happen to have a 3rd gen (2012-13) Apple TV model and it does work normally with the Mission USB Power Cable. Just not the ATV 4K.
(Fortunately I don’t intend to actually use this with my Apple TV, but did want to try it for the sake of science before leaving an Amazon review.)
@marvin_h I agree their specified output numbers don’t really make sense, since you’d need at least 6W of output to run the ATV 4K. My light bulb test seemed to indicate it can output around 11W sustained for a couple hours (did get pretty hot).
Anyway glad / sorry to hear it’s not just me with that problem and I’ll report back with any solutions.
A lot, if you don't have any 120v outlets in your RV, but you do have DC outlets galore.
After confirming I'd pre-charged the device for 30 minutes before trying to use it with the Apple TV, Mission says the blinking behavior must be a faulty unit. They are going to send me a replacement and a label to send mine back once it arrives. Seems reasonable to me, we'll see how the new one performs.
Sorry for the late reply, I emailed them at support@missionaccessories.com and they got back to me within half an hour. They cross-shipped me a replacement unit to try, unfortunately it still had the same problem. So they issued me a refund through Amazon without me asking for one, and just asked that I send back one of the units. Seems like a good response on their part, although it's quite surprising their product isn't actually working.
I wonder how MacRumors was able to get it working on their Apple TV? Perhaps the 2021 4K model uses less power than my 2017? They definitely should not advertise it as working with "all Apple TVs" sheesh. Judging from the 2 bad reviews now on the Amazon page, looks like this one needed some more time in the oven. Maybe it was a manufacturing error?
I'm still hoping to use it for other low-power 120V gadget purposes, my motorcycle trickle charger does seem to work with it. For use with Apple TV 4K 2017, this cannot be recommended as-is, hopefully they will release a new revision that actually works as advertised.
Out of curiosity I just measured my Apple TV 4K 2017 32GB with a Kill-a-Watt EZ and during a cold boot the peak power draw I saw was 15W, there were a few seconds of sustained 13-15W draw before it settled back down around 4-5W idle. Jumping around between different apps the highest peak draw I was able to observe was 19W opening up the Apple Trailers or Apple TV+ app. Streaming Ted Lasso in 4K Dolby Vision on ATV+ and interacting with the player UI drew about 6-8W, similar range for playing Stranger Things on Netflix.
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