“Lost in all the hoopla over the iPhone at Macworld was Apple TV, sort of a cross between a Mac Mini, a wireless router, and a set-top box, which couch potatoes can use to connect a big-screen television with a Mac or PC,” Tom Krazit reports for CNET News.
“Apple’s intentions seem clear: It wants to be the company that finally figures out how to tie the television to the Internet and make video downloads as common as music downloads,” Krazit reports.
Krazit reports, “Rather than trying to convince people to buy a whole new PC for the living room, Apple is pitching a $299 price tag and promoting the hundreds of TV shows and movies on the iTunes Store. But, at least in its first incarnation, it’s unlikely that Apple TV will disrupt the entrenched players in the living room, according to analysts… ‘I don’t see where people are going to be willing to give up their pay TV subscription and go to the Internet for programming’ anytime soon, said Michelle Abraham, an analyst with In-Stat.”
“More and more people are setting up wireless networks in their homes, but configuring those wireless networks to handle video has been a more difficult exercise… This is where analysts believe Apple might have an edge. “One of Apple’s strengths is ease of use with elegant solutions,” said Chris Crotty, an analyst with iSuppli,” Krazit reports.
“For instance, you could think of Apple TV as a replacement for a DVD player, said Chris Whitmore, an analyst with Deutsche Bank. This was the analogy Apple used in its press release announcing Apple TV. Instead of heading out to Blockbuster or renting movies through the mail with Netflix, just press a button in iTunes and download the movie,” Krazit reports. “Apple has an established model in the iTunes Store for delivering content. And in Apple TV, it has a cool-looking device that could be easy to use: the same formula that made the iPod a success, Crotty said.
Full article here.
Related articles:
Apple CFO talks Apple TV, iPhone, Leopard and retail (link to full transcript) – March 07, 2007
PC Magazine: Why Apple TV matters – February 23, 2007
Bear Stearns: Apple TV and iPhone have changed the Apple story for the better – February 21, 2007
Deutsche Bank: Apple TV could take 30% of set-top box market within a few years – February 21, 2007
How do Apple TV and Elgato’s EyeTV work together? – February 16, 2007
Apple embraces casual gaming; iPhone, Apple TV to join iPod as gaming devices – February 09, 2007
Former GM of Microsoft’s Xbox Live Arcade: Apple TV to become video game console – February 08, 2007
ZDNet’s Graham: Apple TV hits a number of sweet spots, poised to make a big impact – January 25, 2007
Is Apple out to kill cable television? – January 25, 2007
RUMOR: Apple TV sales blowing away Apple’s internal expectations – January 25, 2007
Steve Jobs: Apple TV is the ‘DVD player for the 21st century’ – January 22, 2007
Apple TV beats out iPod, hits top spot on Apple Store sales chart – January 19, 2007
Report: first batch of 100,000 Apple TVs to ship this month – January 11, 2007
Steve Jobs moves to control the living room with Apple TV – January 10, 2007
Analyst Bajarin: Apple’s iPhone and Apple TV are industry game changers – January 09, 2007
Apple premieres Apple TV: movies, TV shows, music & photos on your big screen TV – January 09, 2007
RUMOR: Apple may enter video game market – December 05, 2006
Could Apple become king of game consoles? – September 26, 2006
“Apple TV concept may eventually catch on with consumers”
MAY catch on? It hasn’t even started shipping and it already outsells most Apple products!
I’m waiting for a Mac Mini with the new wireless (802.11N, I think) to be announced. Then, all I would need is the new airport extreme and I’m off to the races. Minimal, minimal, minimal….
Doesn’t Apple TV already include 802.11n wireless?
MW: feeling, asin I get the feeling it does.
Mdn that is just weird.
… For instance, you could think of Apple TV as a replacement for a DVD player…
If it’s region-restricted and can’t handle divx, no thanks.
@Less is more;
Most DVD players are region-restricted, even those installed in media PCs. wWhat’s your point? Try Handbrake and see if that will help.
…and you can download the divx plugin for Quicktime, and both Quicktime and iTunes will play divx formatted content.
Yes, the AppleTV has been announced that it includes 802.11N capability. See their specs page here:
http://www.apple.com/appletv/specs.html
Oh, and @Less is more:
The AppleTV is not the player – it is designed to receive streamed content from your Mac. If the Mac can play it, the AppleTV will be able to show it.
MW: provide, as in it’ll provide you with access to your content!
The Apple TV doesn’t make sense with out rentals. Think about it.
With Apple TV I have to pay $10-$15 per video that I get to keep forever, but will probably only watch once.
With my BLockbuster Subscription for that same $15 I get 2 movies sent to me by mail and then get to take those back to my neighborhood store for more any time I like. And I get much better quality, with true wide screen. Maybe I’m odd, but I don’t normally watch my DVD’s over and over again. I’m not a little kid anymore watching ‘The Lion King’. Only watching them once doesn’t bother me. If I want to see them again, no big deal, I’ll just toss them on my Q and wait a week, or go down to the local chain and pick it up.
Movies are very different than Music. I’m surprised that Steve Jobs doesn’t see this.
‘I don’t see where people are going to be willing to give up their pay TV subscription and go to the Internet for programming’ anytime soon’
You can count me in. Almost all the programing on TV is utter crap anyway. The only show I watch with any regularity is The Daily Show, and that will cost me a lot less to buy on iTunes than my cable subscription.
I don’t own a TV. If I want to see something, I download it. If I really like it, I go out and buy the DVD and watch it regularly. Only sucky movies are worth watching once.
Most DVD players are region-restricted <– Maybe in your neck of the woods; not mine.
rahrens: The AppleTV is not the player – it is designed to receive streamed content from your Mac. If the Mac can play it, the AppleTV will be able to show it.
I don’t think so.. if iTunes can play it, not if the Mac can play it. There are lots of formats iTunes doesn’t support, most notably Windows Media (some) and DVD discs.
Is AppleTV restricted to H.264 or can it do divx/avi as well? From what I have read so far, it seems only the former but FrontRow supports divx/avi which gives me hope that so too will AppleTV.
Any solid info would be greatly helpful!
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nukeman: http://www.apple.com/appletv/specs.html
“For instance, you could think of Apple TV as a replacement for a DVD player, said Chris Whitmore, an analyst with Deutsche Bank. This was the analogy Apple used in its press release announcing Apple TV. Instead of heading out to Blockbuster or renting movies through the mail with Netflix, just press a button in iTunes and download the movie,”
This is not a good comparison when All you can do is buy content on iTunes
There’s very few movies I want to own. I’d much rather rent them. I finally got a Netflix account and it’s pretty convenient. I hope Apple adds rental capability to iTunes/AppleTV.
“Apple TV concept may eventually catch on with consumers..”
And the propellor on the top of your beanie cap may eventually help you fly.
Some talk as though all development for Apple TV will stop once it’s out the door and for anyone to suggest that Apple TV is now a replacement for the DVD player is clueless and premature.
With very few exceptions, many of Apple’s products have continued to evolve for the better. Those products that failed in the market were neither cost-effective or timely and were dissected and repurposed for other uses. The Cube is one example.
Any viewpoint that suggests this product will never find a place in their home because it offers no advantage over their current viewing habits is perfectly acceptable, but to suggest this product will fail in the market because YOU don’t want one, is pure ignorance.
Apple products evolve! Get that.
iTunes Store and Apple Inc., once known as iTunes Music Store and Apple Computer respectively, changed as the products, processes, and philosophy that underlies their namesake evolved.
One tenet of this evolution process that was imprinted on Apple came from Steve Wosniak who was constantly trying to improve a product by reducing its components and processes to its most simplified form. Imagine Steve Jobs holding up a Mac mini and telling his scientists he wants them to take Microsoft’s Media PC and reduce it down to fit inside a box half its size. With each drawing-board iteration, components are tossed or combined until it’s presented for market, but it doesn’t stop there! The evolution process never stops and that’s what separates Apple from the rest and endears Apple to the business community.
It will be years before a product like Apple TV replaces the read-only DVD but a product like it will, and the DVD will go the way of the floppy disk; not that floppies aren’t still in use today but, everyone I know has moved on.
If techno-history has taught us anything, it’s shown that those who cannot adapt and overcome will be trampled underfoot and left for dead.
MDN MW: behind. As in bygone.
“And the propellor on the top of your beanie cap may eventually help you fly.”
That would be so cool!
Especially if you wanted to crap bomb your neighbor’s house.
Apple TV (and iTunes) are missing a few major elements to be competitive either with cable or DVD.
I’d LOVE to give up my expensive cable service, but iTunes video programming doesn’t contain subtitles or closed captions (10% of the population is deaf or hard of hearing, including my wife) and movie downloads don’t include special features, deleted scenes and the like (in addition to captions or subtitles).
These are deal-breakers for me. Maybe version 3.0 will include them.
Also, not every show I enjoy watching is available as a download — especially shows on HBO (Real Time with Bill Maher) and Showtime (Dexter).
I gave up cable. I just couldn’t stand the commercials anymore, and paying for 80 stations i don’t watch in order to be allowed to pay for the 3 or 4 i do watch felt like getting mugged every month. Now i spend less than my old monthly cable bill on DVDs – movies and series.
If someone let me subscribe to commercial-free content on a title by title or small package basis and gave me a discount on high quality archive copies (DVDs) of titles i’d seen by subscription, i would gladly give them my money.
No commercials within the programs.
No forcing me to buy what i don’t use for the priviledge of buying what i do use.