Apple TV Why Should I Jailbreak my AppleTV? What are the Benefits?

[flyguyee]

Sal Bracco

I was thinking of jailbreaking my new Apple TV 2nd Gen, but I decided not to. I jailbroke my iPod Touch and I love it, but there aren't enough benefits for me to jailbreak the ATV. I have Netflix and Youtube on it which is plenty. I also don't want to go through the stress of having problems with jailbreaking. It took me many tries to jailbreak my iPod Touch. I wouldn't even be able to use Plex because I don't have a Mac. All I ever use is Netflix and Youtube. I don't need to stream videos.

 

[From A Buick 8]

I have JB my iPhone and I am enjoying the benefits of that. My next step is to JB one icky AppleTV's. I want to install plex so I can run Hulu and some of the network apps (or plug-ins) HGTV Food Network and the like.

 

[DrEnalg]

I have JB my iPhone and I am enjoying the benefits of that. My next step is to JB one icky AppleTV's. I want to install plex so I can run Hulu and some of the network apps HGTV Food Network and the like.

If you need help with JB, just post.

I'm actually curious if you can get Hulu running on ATV2 without use of PlayOn.... if you have any success running Hulu via Plex, let me know.

 

[From A Buick 8]

If you need help with JB, just post.

I'm actually curious if you can get Hulu running on ATV2 without use of PlayOn.... if you have any success running Hulu via Plex, let me know.

I can't seem to even get Hulu to play through Plex on my iMac, I am starting to consider XBMC

 

[cheeky9191]

I'm still a bit of a noob when it comes to Apple TV so please forgive me for these questions

I need to stream the videos on my macbook to my tv and was thinking of using ATV to do so. I understand that under normal circumstances ATV will only play vids that can be played in itunes (mp4 I think). I have movies I've downloaded off the net or ripped off my own DVDs and I would like to stream them through ATV... can I do so if I jailbreak my ATV?

If not... what other solution is there to stream movies on my macbook to my tv?

again apologies for the noob questions and if I'm off topicing here

 

[hafr]

I'm still a bit of a noob when it comes to Apple TV so please forgive me for these questions

I need to stream the videos on my macbook to my tv and was thinking of using ATV to do so. I understand that under normal circumstances ATV will only play vids that can be played in itunes (mp4 I think). I have movies I've downloaded off the net or ripped off my own DVDs and I would like to stream them through ATV... can I do so if I jailbreak my ATV?

If not... what other solution is there to stream movies on my macbook to my tv?

again apologies for the noob questions and if I'm off topicing here

Yes, you can.

 

[cheeky9191]

Thanks hafr!

Just need to purchase the ATV and jailbreak it... heard Green Poison isn't recommended and that I should go down the Redsn0w root

Again sorry for jacking the thread!

 

[marc11]

Thanks hafr!

Just need to purchase the ATV and jailbreak it... heard Green Poison isn't recommended and that I should go down the Redsn0w root

Again sorry for jacking the thread!

I used the untethered version of seas0npass. Works great, the only issue with the untethered version is you do not get Photo Stream, iTunes Match or ipad2 mirroring. I can live without all of those since I home share and do not have an ipad2. For me, the big draw was Plex and the Browser, now I can not only see all my media via Plex, but also iTunes media via Home Sharing and with the browser I have Veetle as well. Add in airplay from my iPhone and I have the NFL as well.

Hulu is my only last thing to over come, I really need to find a way to get Hulu Japan to work on the ATV2, it is stupid beyond stupid that we cannot airplay Hulu.

Considering what they charge in Japan for English TV (not American TV, just ENGLISH TV) and this set up is a huge win!

 

[WisdomWolf]

I used the untethered version of seas0npass. Works great, the only issue with the untethered version is you do not get Photo Stream, iTunes Match or ipad2 mirroring. I can live without all of those since I home share and do not have an ipad2. For me, the big draw was Plex and the Browser, now I can not only see all my media via Plex, but also iTunes media via Home Sharing and with the browser I have Veetle as well. Add in airplay from my iPhone and I have the NFL as well.

Hulu is my only last thing to over come, I really need to find a way to get Hulu Japan to work on the ATV2, it is stupid beyond stupid that we cannot airplay Hulu.

Considering what they charge in Japan for English TV (not American TV, just ENGLISH TV) and this set up is a huge win!

I don't know about Hulu Japan, but Hulu works just fine on AppleTV via XBMC. XBMC is the only reason I bought an Apple TV.

 

[marc11]

I didn't try xmbc. I'll try it.

 

[twikoff]

xbmc and icefilms rocks

 

[Bobbobjones]

Waste

Am i missing something here? I jailbroke my atv 2, installed Plex, XBMC, and Nito TV. it is the most garbage collected in one place ever. On a 16 mbps wired connection, about 90% of the vids dont play. If they do, it's the crappiest quality, if you're lucky enough for it to be seen at all.

What you'll get when everything is working correctly: Nitotv is worthless. Not one video from plex plays. Icefilms? Biggest POS of them all. Select a video and watch nothing play. Ever. Well, maybe 1 out of 100 that looks like it's from 196- 1920. Quick Silver? Garbage. NaviTV? I'd rather watch paint dry than try to get one of these turds to play.

It is actually laughable that anyone considers this a benefit to Apple TV. yea, let's watch a movie of some kid in a theater, barely able to see, coughing, talking and enjoy it!

Must be 12 yr olds who just think it's cool to modify something. I'll restore back to normal. I'd actually rather pay a couple bucks for great quality than click through a bunch of broken links, watch half of the movie, out of sync, find the other half an hour later and watch that in the worst quality possible.

If you are thinking about jailbreaking your atv, TRUST ME, it is a horrible move. There is NO benefit. Yes, you can install 3rd party apps, but that's the problem, they're 3rd party. They are worthless and not working. Just leave it - believe me, you will want back the time you invest.

 

[CocoaPuffs]

What is wrong with you? Get a life.

 

[cathul]

Am i missing something here? I jailbroke my atv 2, installed Plex, XBMC, and Nito TV. it is the most garbage collected in one place ever. On a 16 mbps wired connection, about 90% of the vids dont play. If they do, it's the crappiest quality, if you're lucky enough for it to be seen at all.

What you'll get when everything is working correctly: Nitotv is worthless. Not one video from plex plays. Icefilms? Biggest POS of them all. Select a video and watch nothing play. Ever. Well, maybe 1 out of 100 that looks like it's from 196- 1920. Quick Silver? Garbage. NaviTV? I'd rather watch paint dry than try to get one of these turds to play.

It is actually laughable that anyone considers this a benefit to Apple TV. yea, let's watch a movie of some kid in a theater, barely able to see, coughing, talking and enjoy it!

Must be 12 yr olds who just think it's cool to modify something. I'll restore back to normal. I'd actually rather pay a couple bucks for great quality than click through a bunch of broken links, watch half of the movie, out of sync, find the other half an hour later and watch that in the worst quality possible.

If you are thinking about jailbreaking your atv, TRUST ME, it is a horrible move. There is NO benefit. Yes, you can install 3rd party apps, but that's the problem, they're 3rd party. They are worthless and not working. Just leave it - believe me, you will want back the time you invest.

So just because you're not able to get it working it's the devices fault?

It's working fine at my home. XBMC plays everything i have stored on my Solaris based NAS. I just gave it a second thought about network setup and stuff.

So it must be clearly your own fault to not get it running.

 

[hafr]

Am i missing something here? I jailbroke my atv 2, installed Plex, XBMC, and Nito TV. it is the most garbage collected in one place ever. On a 16 mbps wired connection, about 90% of the vids dont play. If they do, it's the crappiest quality, if you're lucky enough for it to be seen at all.

Which videos are you talking about?

Not one video from plex plays.

Are you talking about videos that you have stored on a hard drive?

Icefilms? Biggest POS of them all. Select a video and watch nothing play. Ever. Well, maybe 1 out of 100 that looks like it's from 196- 1920.

Megaupload got taken down a few days ago, no wonder nothing works for you. Before that, everything worked and the quality was at the very least R5.

It is actually laughable that anyone considers this a benefit to Apple TV. yea, let's watch a movie of some kid in a theater, barely able to see, coughing, talking and enjoy it!

Haven't seen a cam in years, where do you find these rips?

Must be 12 yr olds who just think it's cool to modify something. I'll restore back to normal. I'd actually rather pay a couple bucks for great quality than click through a bunch of broken links, watch half of the movie, out of sync, find the other half an hour later and watch that in the worst quality possible.

What on earth are you talking about?

If you are thinking about jailbreaking your atv, TRUST ME, it is a horrible move. There is NO benefit. Yes, you can install 3rd party apps, but that's the problem, they're 3rd party. They are worthless and not working. Just leave it - believe me, you will want back the time you invest.

How many times did you have to bring your car to the shop before they told you R stood for Reverse and not Racing?

 

[dgalvan123]

Am i missing something here?
. . .
If you are thinking about jailbreaking your atv, TRUST ME, it is a horrible move. There is NO benefit. Yes, you can install 3rd party apps, but that's the problem, they're 3rd party. They are worthless and not working. Just leave it - believe me, you will want back the time you invest.

The two main benefits to jailbreaking the ATV2, in my opinion, are the following:

1. The ability to stream locally stored content from your computer without using iTunes. This can be done with Plex or XBMC for free, or the ATV Flash Black Media Player by FireCore for $30.

2. The ability to add additional internet streaming services that the ATV2 does not already have built in. For instance, Amazon Instant Video and Hulu/Hulu Plus can be added by installing the bluecop repository plugins in XBMC.

All I really use it for is Hulu streaming. It provides my TV with access to cable-channel shows like the Daily Show via the web for free (and legally!), and allowed me to cancel my satellite subscription, saving me ~$25 / month. Even if Apple eventually added Hulu Plus to the ATV, they would likely not add the regular free Hulu you can access on your computer web browser. By jailbreaking, you can have this content (high quality, licensed by the content creators, and paid for by a single 30-second commercial you watch before the program) on your TV for free.

If you don't find a use for jailbreaking, then by all means restore your ATV2. But I can assure you there are legitimate and useful results from jailbreaking.

 

[jwm2]

I loved it so much i went out and bought a second unit yesterday. My wife is watching all the shows she's missed in the past year or so since we cut the cord and i'm happy i get to tinker with a new toy. I love browsing the xbmc forums to see whats new. This is why some people should not bother and others like myself are very happy. If you don't have intelligence and patience then by all means return it and someone like myself will buy it cheaper as an open box item

 

[maturola]

I loved it so much i went out and bought a second unit yesterday. My wife is watching all the shows she's missed in the past year or so since we cut the cord and i'm happy i get to tinker with a new toy. I love browsing the xbmc forums to see whats new. This is why some people should not bother and others like myself are very happy. If you don't have intelligence and patience then by all means return it and someone like myself will buy it cheaper as an open box item

+1 i got my second one as open box, love it. I had to get a Roku Box for the Living roon since the ATV only output 720p, and it look so horrible on a big tv. But once this year revision is out, i will be replacing that Roku.

 

[jwm2]

It pains me to say i have 4 rokus still in my home. At the time the apple tv2 was not jailbroken (untethered) and the stock apple tv would not play hulu (which come to find out is not a big deal) or amazon prime video. But now i wish i had just went with apple tv in the first place. Ahh well.

 

[Fulltopuk]

Just did my first ATV JB and installed Firecore Black Media player. It is great, you can play ISO files with subtitles, use fast forward and rewind and the film data arrives automatically. Excellant stuff. I would say until apps are available on ATV why wouldn't anyone Jailbreak?

Fulltopuk

 

[gigaguy]

I'm a little in the same boat as Bobbo. Just got my ATV2, jb it fine. but I can not get file sharing in XBMC to work!, it's supposed to be simple.??!
I can't get even utube to work. (edit- it started working after 3 days of not working.)

The weather add-on I added at the top of the main screen, text is too big and the data fields are cut to one character. The Couch internet browser I added will not show yahoo mail when I log in, just a white screen. It will do the few other sites I tried. but is def not a full browser, but I just want to check my email! Yes I have been reading here and at XMBC forums.
and now Icefilms is shut down.
Have not tried to add Hulu yet, but may bail out from this project/experiment. I'm using it on the bdrm TV, I already have a Mac Mini hooked to the liv room HDTV and love that.
I have jb'd all the other Apple devices numerous times, I use Tmo on my iPhone. I just re-jb'd my iPad2. but the ATV2 hacks I find are not as user friendly or are low quality. If I can get file sharing to work that would help. Gonna keep trying.
I loaded ATV Flash black, Nito, and XBMC but most addon video is low quality.. ugh.

 

[hafr]

I'm a little in the same boat as Bobbo. Just got my ATV2, jb it fine. but I can not get file sharing in XBMC to work!, it's supposed to be simple.??!

What is it that isn't working?

The weather add-on I added at the top of the main screen, text is too big and the data fields are cut to one character.

Can you take a picture of it?

but the ATV2 hacks I find are not as user friendly or are low quality. If I can get file sharing to work that would help. Gonna keep trying.
I loaded ATV Flash black, Nito, and XBMC but most addon video is low quality.. ugh.

When you jailbroke(?) your ATV2, what were your expectations?

File sharing in XBMC is for some a pain in the butt since it's not really intuitive, and even guides can sometimes be so badly written that you have more questions after having read them than you did before. I mean, having to figure out that Zeroconf is where to go for AFP shares? Who was the genius who figured that would be a good way of doing it?

But if you can't even get file sharing to work in ATV Flash (black), then the problem is most likely that you haven't been able to properly share the drive(s) or folder(s).

 

[gigaguy]

thanks hafr, I'm trying to share a folder I have on my desktop with some movie files in it. On my mac I set up sharing files via SMB and AFP in sys prefs. My computer name is checked. in the shared folder I see my namexxxPublicFolder, and also I put the folder I created on the desktop with a few avi movies in it in the shared folders box. I checked 'Share' file on each folder.
in xmbc video, add files, under SMB I get nothing. under subzeroxxx, I can see my mac name +SMB, and my mac name + Samba, clicking on either does nothing. Not sure if there are more global/network changes I need. none of the tutorials I watch show anything else.
My main screen weather app fills the entire top half of the ATV2 screen, data shows as 'Temp: 5...' instead of 50, is set on Farenheit. data fields are showing only 1 character.
I'll keep plugging away.

 

[hafr]

thanks hafr, I'm trying to share a folder I have on my desktop with some movie files in it. On my mac I set up sharing files via SMB and AFP in sys prefs. My computer name is checked. in the shared folder I see my namexxxPublicFolder, and also I put the folder I created on the desktop with a few avi movies in it in the shared folders box. I checked 'Share' file on each folder.
in xmbc video, add files, under SMB I get nothing. under subzeroxxx, I can see my mac name +SMB, and my mac name + Samba, clicking on either does nothing. Not sure if there are more global/network changes I need. none of the tutorials I watch show anything else.
My main screen weather app fills the entire top half of the ATV2 screen, data shows as 'Temp: 5...' instead of 50, is set on Farenheit. data fields are showing only 1 character.
I'll keep plugging away.

For some reason, some people have problem browsing shared folders on their computers in XBMC on ATV2. I know I did I found this solution:

When I shared a folder called Videos on the desktop of my MBP, what I did was I activated file sharing in System Preferences > Sharing, then I went to XBMC and Add Files. Here, instead of browsing, I entered afp://myusername:mypassword@myinternalip/Desktop/Videos

In AFP, the folder names are case sensitive, so beware of that

I can't help you with the weather app though...

 

[jwm2]

You might want to think about a nas to store files on. I bought a 2 tb wd mybook live earlier this week and on a gigabit ethernet connection its been pretty much flawless. I can access my files easily on any pc in the house and i don't have to keep my pc running to watch shows or movies downloaded to it. It seems to work well with the atv flash and xbmc, so for sake of simplicity thats the route i'd take.