We’ve received many questions about Apple’s new iTunes Movie Rentals, so here’s the deal in a nutshell. Apple’s U.S. iTunes Store now offers movies you can rent. You can play rented movies in iTunes on a Mac or Windows PC, on your iPod or iPhone, or using Apple TV (once the new Apple TV software arrives. It will be available as a free automatic download to all Apple TV customers later this month).
Users with broadband connections will be able to begin watching rentals within 30 seconds of initiating the rental download. Standard definition DVD-quality iTunes Movie Rentals are priced at US$2.99 for library titles and $3.99 for new releases.
According to Apple’s iTunes 7.6 Help page “Renting Movies from the iTunes Store,” Standard definition DVD-quality movies downloaded via iTunes on a Mac or PC can be transferred to an iPod, iPhone, or Apple TV. Either device remembers where you stopped watching on your computer and picks up right where you left off. After the movie downloads to your computer, to transfer the rental to an iPod, iPhone, or Apple TV, connect the device, select it in iTunes, click the Movies tab, select the movie, and then click Move. After you transfer a rental, it is removed from your iTunes library.
To rent movies from the iTunes Store:
1. In iTunes, click iTunes Store.
2. Select the movie you wish to rent.
3. Click Rent Movie.
Movies downloaded directly via Apple TV are only playable on Apple TV. If you plan to watch a rented movie using Apple TV, you’ll get the best-quality video by renting it via Apple TV. High Definition (720p) movies with 5.1 Dolby Digital surround sound will be downloadable later this month only via Apple TV and will cost $3.99 for library titles and $4.99 for new releases. Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound is not available with all HD rentals. Standard definition DVD-quality iTunes Movie Rentals will also be available for Apple TV and will be priced at US$2.99 for library titles and $3.99 for new releases.
Use the included Apple TV remote to browse rentals by Top Movies, Genres, and All HD. Or search for what you want to watch. Apple TV displays a movie poster for every rental. When you find a movie you like, click it to view a detail screen with a plot summary and a list of cast and crew. Choose your rental by quality and/or price and sit back and enjoy.
A rented movie expires 30 days after you rent it or 24 hours after you begin playing it, whichever comes first. Movie rentals disappear when they expire, so they won’t take up storage space.
Uhhhh….OK. Thanks MDN.
This is not what I have read ,
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/08/01/15/first_look_apple_tv_2_0_and_itunes_movie_rentals_photos_video.html
“Now, users can rent and buy movies, as well as buy music, music videos, and TV programs directly from the iTunes Store using the simple remote control. While music and video purchases can be synced back to a desktop iTunes library, just like the new WiFi Store on the iPod Touch and iPhone, video rentals ordered on Apple TV can’t.
You can rent movies directly from iTunes for playback on iPods, but those can’t be synced to the Apple TV. Therefore, you have to choose whether a rental you order is something you want to watch on TV or anywhere else, before you actually rent it. Given that rentals are $3.99 and $4.99, that decision isn’t as deeply ponderous as it might initially seem to be.”
Before I read this, I rented a movie via iTunes, and can not get it to AppleTV, and if I have read this correctly, I will not be able to,
but what if it’s on your ipod and the 24 hours passes after you start it? does it disappear?
The way I read it, and many others on Apple forumns, you have to decide if you want it on hand helds (iPhone iPod) or computer, you down load thru iTunes, if you want it on AppleTV buy from there.
I purchased a rental thru iTunes, and can not get it to AppleTV, and no one else has either
Would it have really killed them to have a 48-hour watch window instead of 24?
it looks like the higher quality “DVD quality” id DL on AppleTV, and the older 640 is on iTunes , and of course HD on AppleTV
While watching periods of greater than 24 hrs would be great, I’m sure that the studios balked because of existing VOD services that function this way today. The only advantage over existing VOD is legal portability of video content.
I just found out today that my 9 month old iPod 5th Generation 80GB (with video) CANNOT PLAY ANY RENTALS. Apple confirmed this in an email. They told me to upgrade to a Classic at the least to play rentals.
Andrew:
Wow, that sucks. I have the same model iPod and from what I understood in the specs I thought it would play rentals.
Apple has both the power to amaze and to irritate…
cepin I rent movies on my cable video system as a ppv and I record it to my dvr. It stays there for as long as I want and we have watched it over and over and over and over. Yeah well you know kids they can watch a movie like cars or toy story ad infinitum. I have literally kept a movie on my dvr for 6 months or more. No 48, or 24 hours etc.
I hate the time length. I would like to see the rental as 30 days, period. Then I can watch it as often as I like, at my leisure and I am not depriving the users at the itunes store of my copy.
The big boys just don’t get it, there are too worried about collecting duckets and not pleasing the consumer.
What if you just reset your computer’s clock? I do it with my VMWare Windows virtual machine all the time and it isn’t smart enough to notice. There has got to be some way to fool a Mac or an iPod into thinking that the 24-hour window is still open.
If downloaded to a MAC will Time Machine keep a copy?
Someone answer iDont’s Question. Awesome if it does…
Gee.
Movie rentals.
Never heard of such an innovative thing before. My god, think of the possibilities!
This is going to revolutionize living! Humankind is on the verge of an evolutionary leap — the likes of which has never been witnessed during the age of the earth!
OH! MY! GOD!
Snore…..
Snickering like Mutley the dog.
Maybe I’m old fashioned, but one of the great things about seeing a movie in the theater is having to watch the movie from start to finish, in one sitting. Also, when I rent a DVD, 9 times out of 10 I’m going to watch the movie from start to finish, maybe pausing once to go to the bathroom or take a phone call. Therefore, I do not see the 24-to-watch limitation of Apple TV as a bad thing at all.
Have our attention spans become so short that we aren’t capable of watching a rented movie in one sitting? Seriously. People here at MDN – and on the Net generally – who are whining about not having a rented movie for longer than 24 hours strike me as people who fall into this category; having short attention spans.
@Yawn-Snore
Yes, yes, it’s fun to be cynical and snarky. But in your haste to make fun of movie rentals as nothing new, you’ve missed the long term implications.
Right now TV and movie content are piped into your home via cable or Satellite or delivered to your home via Rental store or rentals delivered by mail. Apple is setting up iTunes as the new, digital, way to deliver all content – TV, movies, music, podcasts, pictures – to your iPod, computer or big screen TV. There are three major distinctions between iTunes and current content delivery methods. iTunes is 1) Ala carte purchasing of content; 2) distribution of content to TV AND computer and portable iPod like devices; and 3) convenient (instant ordering and no travel).
Make fun all you want. But it only shows your ignorance. You are watching the beginnings of an entirely new and revolutionary way to purchase and watch content.
gzero: I do not think it is about not being able to watch a movie in one sitting. It is about the freedom to watch a movie several times over a weekend or, if an unexpected interruption occurs, not having to finish by the same time the next day.
Apple and the studios would not lose anything by having it be 48-72 hours.
The 24 hour rental is unreasonable and won’t last. For me, it is a no go. Sit tight & don’t rent. Apple will eventually change it to a more reasonable time, e.g. 72 hours.
Having to choose your device before downloading is pretty dumb. The possible reasons are:
1. Apple paternalistically deciding that you don’t want to use so much drive space on your computer/’pod; and
2. Apple wanting to create an incentive (i.e. force people) to buy tv.
oh, maybe 3. The ‘Pods don’t have the processor power to decode those massive complex files that include the best picture quality…
It just seems like the whole selling point for Apple over Netflix or Cable is the broad eco-system in which you can view the movie. As soon as they start limiting that variety they lose…
Besides, doesn’t anyone remember from the keynote that Steve said something like, “So you can start watching on your tv and if you need to catch a plane you can transfer the movie to your iPod and finish watching there”?
I could swear he said something like that.
That’s stupid. If I rent a movie from Amazon I can watch it as many times as I want before I choose to return the DVD. So I can watch it, then my daughter can watch it, then my wife, etc. We don’t all have to watch at the same time/within 24 hours. That’s a deal breaker for me.
there’s understandable griping about the 24 hour window. I think even just extending it to 36 hours would make a huge difference. Or even 30. If you’re watching a movie and don’t finish it, you’re likely to want to finish it at the same time the next day…say 8pm. a 24 hour window won’t let you do this, but a short extension of this would, and, I think, make a big difference in the success of this.
Keynote: 48:05-48:25
“You can order them for your computer your iPods or your iPhone right on your computer, you can order them for your wide screen televisions right on your television from AppleTV.”
Keynote: 32:00-32:12
“You can now order television shows and music right from your AppleTV. And if you’re using a computer it will automatically sync them right back to your computer.”
Seems like there’s a difference between movies, television shows and music…
While watching periods of greater than 24 hrs would be great, I’m sure that the studios balked because of existing VOD services that function this way today.
With my cable on demand service, I get 24 hours to initiate watching the movie. If I rent at 6 PM Monday and watch the movie, I can at 5:59 PM the next day start watching it all again from the beginning. Apple’s terms sound as if I would need to start watching the movie the second time the length of the movie earlier than 6 PM Tuesday. If this is the case, well, that’s just bad. It would mean that I would have to forgo watching the movie on Monday for the length of the movie so I could watch it again on Tuesday at 6.
NB- Your local library probably has a very good collection of DVD’s.