Apple TV 2nd Generation

So today my Apple TV (2nd Generation) turned up, and I have to say I’m pretty impressed.

Anybody who knows me or has been reading these my post, will know that over the last couple of years, I’ve become an Apple fan boy I’ve gradually replaced my MP3 player, my phone, my PCs and even my entire network with Apple products, and as time has gone by, I’ve organised my entire music collection to be “iTunes friendly”.

I’ve been toying with the idea of an Apple TV for a while now, and very nearly bought one of the 1 generation ones about 2 months ago.

I’ve been using a piece of software on my MacMini called MediaLink, to stream my iTunes content to my PS3, which to be honest has been working pretty well, apart from the fact that it won’t play DRM media.

So the announcement was made early in September that a new Apple TV would be out shortly, so me being me ordered one.

So what’s it like ?

Now this is the first time I’ve used an Apple TV, so some of the features I’m raving about, might have been in the first generation.

First of all, it’s size, this thing is tiny, it literally fits in the palm of my hand.

The device has a very small white light on the front, the flashes with the remote press. The rear has a USB port, a HDMI port, power port and an optical output.

Setup, as with any Apple product was painless, plugged it in, selected my language, added my apple ID and that was it, good to go.

So what is an Apple TV ?

Basically, it’s a device which allows you to stream content from the web, and a PC or Mac which is running iTunes home sharing (please note, you have to have iTunes 10 installed for it to be picked up)

The main menu gives you a few options.

Movies, and then the sub menu of Top Movies, Genres, Search and in Theaters.

The movie collection is huge, and everything I searched for came back with a result (kinda like the movie selection in iTunes)

The “in Theaters” option was essentially what you get on Apples trailer site, all the trailers for whats in the cinema right now.

The next tab is Internet, with the option of YouTube, Podcasts, MobileMe, Flickr and Radio.

The Youtube option will allow you to sign in and see your subscriptions.

The podcast option does what it says on the tin, it opens up the content as found in the iTunes store and splits them into Audio, Video or all. You can then “add to favourites”, which will let you know how many unwatched episodes you have, it also remembers your position which I thought was a good feature.

I don’t have a MobileMe account, but assume if I had, I would be able to stream from this.

The Flickr allows you to subscribe to public users and view their content. I can’t see a way of signing in, as this would be perfect as I’m a Flickr pro subscriber and have my entire photo collection hidden online, it would be nice to be able to access these.

Finally there’s the radio, which is the same content as the Radio tab in iTunes.

The next tab is Computers. Basically any machine that you have iTunes on (version 10 or above) with Home Sharing enabled, you can stream all you content from them.

Finally you have the settings tab, which you can…..well change the settings

2 interesting features in the settings are the AirPlay, and Remotes.

The Airplay allows you to use the Apple TV as an Airport Express, and the Remote option allows you to use you iPhone as a remote control. As your probably aware, the iPhone remote app has recently been upgraded to support the Apple TV. The app works with gesture controls, swipe left and right for fast forward and backward, tap to pause and play, and the godsend was being able to type in when searching. There is also flick up to get to chapter, and 2 finger left swipe to roll back 10 seconds, you can even move the onscreen content using this !

The AirPlay is pretty cool too, now granted, to play media from my Mac by selecting Computers > Mac Mini > Music > Album > Play or I also have the option to connect to my MacMini via the Apple Remote app, select the Album > Play > select the Apple TV as the speakers. This will not only output the audio to the Apple TV, but it will also display the album art and ID tag of the track being played.

Now I subscribe to a lot of podcasts, and it’s nice to see that if I’m looking at my Computers library, I then watch or listen to a podcast, this syncs back to the library. There was nothing more annoying than watching something using MediaLink, then having to Screenshare onto my MacMini to mark them as watched. This seems to be the same for Movies and TV too.

So far I’ve very happy with this device, and I guess I’ll be spending the next couple of months converting all my DVD’s to mp4 format and adding these to my iTunes library.

For anyone who uses iTunes for their media content, and if you have a spare £99, I suggest getting one of these.

As always, unboxing photos are below.

Tags: Airplay, apple id, apple product, apple products, apple tv, apples, content, entire network, fan, fan boy, genres, HDMI, iphone, itunes, light, MacMini, menu, mp3 player, music collection, optical output, option, palm, palm of my hand, phone, piece, play, player, podcast, power, PS3, Size, software, tab, theaters, time, usb port

Apple TV 2 ? Apples Games Console ?

At present, I’m awaiting delivery of my Apple TV (ETA Monday 4th October 2010).

I was thinking last night of the future of the Apple TV, and how this is could be a lot more than a TV, and might be Apples version of a Games Console.

Why you may ask ?

• Ok, I’ve read on multiple blogs, that the device runs on a version of iOS 4.1, there should be no reason why games designed for the iPod Touch, iPhone and iPad shouldn’t be able to run on it.
• Introduction of the Game Center, which is a cross device “Social Gaming platform”. Currently this only works on the iPod Touch and iPhone, but see no reason that this can’t also work on the Apple TV.
• Rumours of a Apple TV App store, this would make it possible to download and buy your favorite games you have on your current devices, and play them on the big screen
• The Apple TV has an internal 8Gb memory, don’t you think this is a little large just to host the Apple TV Front Row software. With the new Apple TV, all the media content is streaming only ?
• The Apple TV has the A4 chip, and 256Mb of Ram, making it the same spec as the iPad
• Epic Citedel. This demo looked amazing, it’s being pitched a online multiplayer experience, Could this be a launch title when the Game Center is switched on ?
• iOS 4.2 was announced last month, this would finally bring multitasking to the iPad, over the air printing etc, I do wonder though, could these features also be coming to the Apple TV ?. I did also note, that during the keynotes on the 1st September 2010. The Apple TV was mentioned, but the only focus was on the size and price of the device, the software wasn’t touched on at all ?
• I would assume that the controller for the Apple TV, would be any iThingy device, eg iPod Touch,  iPhone or iPad, and possibly work together like Nintendo attempted with the DS and Wii. If so, the iPhone 4 and iPod Touch 4G would make an awesome motion controller with the gyroscope

Anyway, these are all purely speculations, however there’s a lot of power in that little device, and it would be a shame if Apple didn’t do more with it that “just stream media”. If I’m right, I expect another Apple press conference some time before the launch of iOS4.2 in November

Tags: 1st september, Apple, apple tv, Center, demo, Download, favorite games, focus, front row software, future, game center, gaming platform, gyroscope, ios, ipad, iphone, iphone 4, ipod, ipod touch, keynotes, launch, media content, Monday, motion, motion controller, multiplayer experience, October, platform, power, reason, screen, social gaming, software, store, touch, tv rumours, wii

Huawei E585 MiFi Router

I’ve been toying with the idea of the MiFi device for a while (while since I moved from Nokia to iPhone and lost the ability to use the joikuspot software)

I get the majority of my internet fix when out and about using my iPhone, however there are occasions when I’m away from home and could do with connecting my MacBook to the web, when I’m not anywhere near a useable wireless network.

I had looked at paying for the tethering on my iPhone for these occasions, however both me and C would need to connect, which would mean setting up internet connection sharing, or something like.

So I decided on the Huawei E585 MiFi Router from 3 on pay as you go, as I only see myself using this on occasions.

The device is pretty awesome, it’s small and apparently will last 5 hours on a single charge.

The LCD display, show data usage, batttery, signal, and messages.

I’ve yet to put this to use as there seems to be a 10 foot “no 3 signal” cloud around my house (according to the coverage map on 3′s site).

All in all, very happy with the purchase, and will update once I’ve had a chance to use it.

Unboxing pics below.

Tags: ability, chance, coverage map, fix, foot, home, house, Huawei, idea, internet connection, iphone, JoikuSpot, lcd display, macbook, Map, MiFi, Network, Nokia, occasions, pay, purchase, Router, sharing, show, signal, software, something, while