Ive been using boxee with my MLB.Tv sub and the one thing I love about there MLB app Boxee has is that there's a option to hide the scores so i can chose if I'm coming home from work watch the game if its still going on or start from the beginning with out being spoiled from logging into MLB.com first. normally and the quality has been better than the website so far.
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OK AppleTV haters, time to put up...
- Thread starter mrgreen4242
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Ive been using boxee with my MLB.Tv sub and the one thing I love about there MLB app Boxee has is that there's a option to hide the scores so i can chose if I'm coming home from work watch the game if its still going on or start from the beginning with out being spoiled from logging into MLB.com first. normally and the quality has been better than the website so far.
having recently ditched something that was described a good media player - the Popcorn A110 - I have no regrets at all to be rid of it's stupidly over complex interface which baffles all but the most technical of users. Yeah it plays 1080p and all that but TBH I don't really care as a 1080p anything is huge file sizes and hardly worth the effort over just firing up the blu-ray player instead. I don't want to sit down and operate the remote for my 4 year old daughter everytime she wants to watch some Disney film or my wife when she wants to watch a corny horror movie that she likes, this is the interface limitations you have to live with on just about all the media players I have tried thus far. Clunky interfaces, lack of things like meta tagged info, limited or bespoke file support or missing connectivity - LAN but no Wifi, no LAN but a USB port, no optical out yadda yadda. They are functional at best, annoying at worst.
Xbox360 and the likes of Tversity is a solution, if you don't care about just wanting to watch your movies rather than mess about with it every few minutes. If you want to pause or rewind a movie - say to watch a highlight or a bit you missed, it takes an age for it to respond if at all. Also how likely before the 360 falls over with its red lights flashing in the air or before it's drowned out your quiet movie with it's fans? I fail to see how it could ever be a solution for media .
I want to pick up the remote, fire it at the box and play my media without fussing about, you know like a DVD player or set top box does, which is what I now have in a hacked AppleTV and wish I had done it sooner as I only switched to the Popcorn for HD media when my old Xbox 1 started to get a bit long in the tooth with XBMC. The wife picked up the Harmony remote once I setup the ATV profile and away she went with no instruction at all, that's how this stuff should be!!!
Xbox360 and the likes of Tversity is a solution, if you don't care about just wanting to watch your movies rather than mess about with it every few minutes. If you want to pause or rewind a movie - say to watch a highlight or a bit you missed, it takes an age for it to respond if at all. Also how likely before the 360 falls over with its red lights flashing in the air or before it's drowned out your quiet movie with it's fans? I fail to see how it could ever be a solution for media .
I want to pick up the remote, fire it at the box and play my media without fussing about, you know like a DVD player or set top box does, which is what I now have in a hacked AppleTV and wish I had done it sooner as I only switched to the Popcorn for HD media when my old Xbox 1 started to get a bit long in the tooth with XBMC. The wife picked up the Harmony remote once I setup the ATV profile and away she went with no instruction at all, that's how this stuff should be!!!
keep it simple
look just go with the ATV, it is the most elegant and straightforward. Some times you just need to get the balance right.
look just go with the ATV, it is the most elegant and straightforward. Some times you just need to get the balance right.
Having read some of the "it's a failure" comments myself - people mostly complain about the lack of 1080p playback and overheating issues. Price seems to be not a problem for them. Different horses for different courses...I appreciate all the replies though, it confirmed for me that the ATV is the best at what it does in its price range - which makes all the "it's a failure" comments people male even stupider.
The ASRock 330 HT with XBMC live installed could be something for you. But it's over 200$ and has no component output. I replaced my Popcornhour NMT-A100 in the cellar with one of these, work's nice but you have to setup some things like sound output over HDMI and Optical out at the same time with a configuration change in /etc/asound.conf via terminal.
What's really funny is you spending the money on two of these. Your first one is failing. The top is removed and it's upside down dying a slow death. For the price of two, you could have bought a Mini, had three times the functionality, and we'd never be having this conversation.
Mini's START at $600. I paid $150 for the 40gb model I have now, and it's three years old... I could buy FOUR for what I would have to pay for one mini (they are NEVER in the refurb store), or at least three if there are no 40gb models to be had anymore. Also, there's no reason to believe that a mini would have lasted any longer than three years.
All that said, the original ATV hardware is really poorly designed. I hope/think they will do a much better job on a revision, and will do it soon.
Lastly, there's NO WAY that a mini gives you three times the functionality. It would add, at best, a DVD player and Netflix player. I almost never use DVDs (hate discs), and I can get a good DVD player for <$50. As for Netflix, well, when I bought the ATV Netflix wasn't even offering streaming, and for $100 I can get a dedicated Netflix player. For the added $400 you are spending you are getting ~$150 worth of features.
I love my 
TV!
Just needs this ash to clear over the UK so I can get it shipped out to me in NZ. Poor thing has been in storage for 12 months and its missing me
TV!Just needs this ash to clear over the UK so I can get it shipped out to me in NZ. Poor thing has been in storage for 12 months and its missing me
Got to disagree there. A Mini gives access to any digital file format without hacking. You can play programs like Spotify that have yet to be integrated in a set box. You can view a Slingbox stream. You can have the ideal Hulu experience compared to ATV Boxee. Using a VPN to view content from other countries (as I do with the UK) is so much easier. Wanting to relive the Olympics at nbcolympics.com is no problem. Etc. etc...
Of course you might not use these functions and so have little need for a Mini (I don't think the ATV is a bad machine btw, I enjoy mine). But it does offer much more than just a DVD and Netflix.
The current price of an AppleTV is $229. So add that to your original $150 and your looking at $379. You could have, even three years ago, picked up a used Mini easily. Even today, for $379, you could get a great Mini on Ebay, that will blow away your AppleTV in terms of a media center. And the Mini is one of the most beautifully engineered computers ever made, so your "it won't last three years" talk is utter nonsense.
As for the three times the functionality bit, I was being kind. The Mini is many magnitudes better than the AppleTV in every single aspect. It's a full fledged computer! It can play SO many more files, has a DVD drive, can surf the web and play any video found there... Then there's the whole computer side of it where you can use it to email, rip DVDs and CDs, look at Google Earth
D), etc., etc.The Mini is in a totally different class than the AppleTV. It does cost a bit more, but if you want a real solution for a TV connected box, there's only one Mac choice. Viva la Mini!
Hmmm, in the OP's specs I see little in favor of the macmini besides probably the wireless ... Just sayin'.
the Boxee box that is supposed to be coming out sometime this year might fit the bill if they ever announce its specs.
I personally love my appletv. I used to run boxee on a laptop w/ dock connected to my tv but hated not being able to use the laptop and boxee at the same time.
I bought a refurb 40gb for $150 and upgraded it to a 160GB drive. I also removed the wireless card (I have my tv area wired with 4 Cat5 jacks) and changed it to a Broadcom Crystal HD card. I have since stopped using Boxee and switched to XBMC since it will use the Crystal HD card allowing me to play ripped Blu-ray video's from the HDD.
Since it is on all the time I also can SSH into it to wake my powermac when I am away so I can VNC in (my router doesn't support the magic packets)
I also have a PS3 and I did use it for a while using TVersity on my windows machine but I wanted something that was a standalone device.
I personally love my appletv. I used to run boxee on a laptop w/ dock connected to my tv but hated not being able to use the laptop and boxee at the same time.
I bought a refurb 40gb for $150 and upgraded it to a 160GB drive. I also removed the wireless card (I have my tv area wired with 4 Cat5 jacks) and changed it to a Broadcom Crystal HD card. I have since stopped using Boxee and switched to XBMC since it will use the Crystal HD card allowing me to play ripped Blu-ray video's from the HDD.
Since it is on all the time I also can SSH into it to wake my powermac when I am away so I can VNC in (my router doesn't support the magic packets)
I also have a PS3 and I did use it for a while using TVersity on my windows machine but I wanted something that was a standalone device.
Fair enough, but he started a thread to get the opinions of the AppleTV haters, then basically let us know his required specs were that of an AppleTV. The AppleTV works as advertised, but the Mini advocates will point out that there is a much better choice with exponentially more functionality available, albeit a more expensive one.
If you're prepared to do the initial setup (Linux on a thumb drive etc.) , an Acer Aspire Revo + XBMC will get the job done nicely. You'll have to factor in the cost of a remote if you don't already have one but the Revo goes for $200 or so. Google it and see if it's something you're up for.
XBMC blows Front row away.
XBMC blows Front row away.
Exactly. Similar situation... I used to have a pretty sweet MythTV setup, but I grew tired of having to occasionally troubleshoot and tweak the config when all I wanted to do was watch a recorded TV show (after already spending the day troubleshooting computers/servers). I replaced everything with AppleTVs (along with getting rid of my cable) and haven't had any issues so far.
I think you mean that you had NOT any issues
How you get your TV shows without cable on your AppletTV ? you buy them?
Yes, I meant not any issues... I've updated the post to reflect that.
I decided a few years ago that it would be cheaper to buy the season sets of the shows I really enjoyed from iTunes versus paying for cable TV every month and buying the DVD season sets when they were released at the end of the season. So far, this has worked out as I expected; I get to see the show shortly after it airs (typically the next day), and I own HD versions of the shows so I have no need to buy the DVDs.
The current price of an AppleTV is $229. So add that to your original $150 and your looking at $379. You could have, even three years ago, picked up a used Mini easily. Even today, for $379, you could get a great Mini on Ebay, that will blow away your AppleTV in terms of a media center. And the Mini is one of the most beautifully engineered computers ever made, so your "it won't last three years" talk is utter nonsense.
As for the three times the functionality bit, I was being kind. The Mini is many magnitudes better than the AppleTV in every single aspect. It's a full fledged computer! It can play SO many more files, has a DVD drive, can surf the web and play any video found there... Then there's the whole computer side of it where you can use it to email, rip DVDs and CDs, look at Google Earth
The Mini is in a totally different class than the AppleTV. It does cost a bit more, but if you want a real solution for a TV connected box, there's only one Mac choice. Viva la Mini!
First, you are comparing new and used hardware to favor your point of view. You can get the ATV pretty much any time direct from Apple fo $189 or $199 refurb. Mini's are NEVER in the refurb store.
If you were using the device as a computer, sure the mini will be aces. It's not, though. It's a media player. One that I want to use because I don't like dealing with discs, so the added DVD drive is of marginal value, other than ripping, which I do from my iMac faster and more conveniently.
Other than out of the box file formats and 1080p, there's nothing media center related that the mini can do which an ATV can't. Both of those, for me, are non-issues. I can see where some people might want a computer connected to their TV, but that's not what I, or most people really, want.
Also, fighting with the mini to get the digital surround sound passed through is not my idea of being better.
My requirements were to replace an ATV. Anything that is "better" should be able to at least replace the product its better than, right?
Thanks for an actual suggestion, I will check that out!
What I'm saying is that even a used Mini is better than a brand new AppleTV. And it's true, Mini's are rare in the Refurb Store, but they are always on Ebay.
My Mini is BOTH a computer and a media player. Also, you have to have another computer to be able to use the AppleTV. Talk about costs!!!
Can you watch live TV with an AppleTV? Maybe with a hack, I honestly don't know. Can you watch live TV, a DVD and internet video at the same time with an AppleTV? No. Can you watch a video and play music at the same time with an AppleTV? No. Can you surf the web and watch a video at the same time with an AppleTV. No. It's not a better media player. Period. Most people want functionality when they connect a device to their TV sets. Most people don't want an AppleTV in its current state, just ask Tim Cook.
Not sure what you're talking about here. The Mini has a digital optical out. Some of the Handbrake devs have posted in this thread, and they should be able to attest that it's a non-issue.
Absolutely. The Mini is better. You should try it. Again, it does cost more, but with it, I've been able to cancel my cable subscription. It has saved me $100 every month that I've owned it and I haven't missed one show that I watch, or a live sporting event, or live news. It is hands down the best device I've ever attached to my TV. The Mini will pay for itself in 6 months. In a year, I could buy two Minis with the amount I've saved on cable.
The wife loves it. My 1 year old loves it (mostly due to the Plex Sesame Street App). I love it. It's better.
Uhh that is totally incorrect. If you want to stream videos / music to it then yeah, sure, you gotta have a computer to stream the video / music from, but if you want to buy or rent TV shows, movies and music from the iTunes store and watch them you can do so without an additional computer, the files are stored on the internal drive. No external computer required.
I set this up for my sisters kids. I bought them an ATV for Christmas and replaced the internal drive with a much larger one and filled it up with all the cartoons I had, Flintstones, Jetsons, Thundercats, Scooby Doo etc. Thousands of episodes. They have no computer at home and are technologically inept, yet I didn't even have to show them how to use it.
That is the one great thing about the ATV, any idiot can use it, hell even my mom can use it and she can barely figure out a microwave.