new AppleTV 3 & Siri - Page 4

Actually don't think of myself that way! I like Apple products and have for a long time. But I also like other gadgets and systems. XBMC Eden and Plex on an LG TV are our current main media players. My next media player will probably be the new LG Smart TV Upgrader which did very well at CES. In fact, when it comes to media players it is really XBMC (and relatives) which I prefer by far.

philip

That didn't exist back then so there was no point in 1080p for the ATV2. Things change and so do the gadgets.

philip

I see no difference between the 1080p and 720p streams off Netflix. I have a Roku2 XD, an LG TV which streams the 1080p stuff and a 720p ATV2. If you see the difference then great. In my case I prefer 720p. It's always been reliable and I assume uses less bandwidth. Our TV stations don't even carry 1080p signals. Usually 720p or 1080i.

It's been well over a year since the ATV2. Hardly call that a fast replacement. Apple still treats it as an experiment. The really neat thing about it is AirPlay. Otherwise, the ATV2/3 is not mind boggling. The new interface reminds me of windows 8.

philip

That is actually very interesting.

You can't get Vudu on the Roku or the Apple TV, or can you?

No, not natively anyway.

So if I buy one of these new Apple TVs and jailbreak it to install XBMC would I be able to stream full bitrate bluray ISO and MKV rips over my local network? I figure HD audio might be out of the question since XBMC doesn't support it natively yet but would it be possible to install the necessary filters on an Apple TV install of XBMC or would Windows 7 still be required?

I have a Dune D1 running yaDIS and a Boxee Box right now but if I could get XBMC on my main TV for a reasonable price instead of having to pay for a full HTPC or building one myself, I think I would just cancel DirecTV, move the Boxee Box to the bedroom, and move the WDTV Live to my workout room. Then I could use XBMC on the main TV and the Dune D1 if I ever wanted to use the bluray menus or for stuff the Apple TV might not play.

I really like the XBMC UI and even though yaDIS presents a reasonable facsimile, it's still not close enough and the Boxee Box is only usable for anime viewing from the Files section and apps due to buffering and library issues that turned me off from using the TV Shows and Movies sections. Getting an AppleTV with XBMC and installing Hulu and maybe signing up for Netflix would save me about $80 a month.

I am a little disappointed that the ATV3 does not support more video codecs and make it easier for users to stream their home movies to their ATV without having to jailbreak. I understand Apple has kept the product Apple centric, but there would be increased demand if it was able to do more natively. Most consumers don't know or want to mess with jailbreaking in order to increase its functionality.

I was also hoping that Apple would put more gaming functionality into the remote via app utilization similar to the Roku XS. This isn't a major selling point to some, but to others it would be and it would cut into the Roku market share. These are just things I see that would make it more appealing to a broader group of consumers and make the ATV3 more of a "must have" item.

I agree. No MKV support sucks...

Old - old - old complaint and Apple is not going to change, ask iPhone users about flash. Apple sells you what it thinks you need, not what you ask. As Steve Jobs once said, he's not interested making Android users happy.

But back to topic. How hard is to jailbreak anyways? (really I want to know). As Apple makes available firmware updates (how often?), the jailbrakers then have to compile a new breaker version for that update? I can see where I tell iTV, do not update automatically then pick my time to manually update the thing, maybe 1-2x/year, and I can deal with that.

Most people who buy ATV's are not asking for native mkv and xvid codec support. They want it to just work with their iDevices and iTunes. Apple settled on m4v/mp4, h.264. We don't need a zillion codecs and container support. This is not the Sound Blaster audio card era.

The jail breaking process is not difficult and most people can easily manage it, though most won't be bothered. The backdoor opening that is there for these devices has to be a way to placate users who want more flexibility while at the same time not alienating content providers who look down at mkv and xvid.

For the life of me I can't understand why someone that mainly wanted to run mkv, xvid, iso, blurry rips, etc... would even consider an ATV. If that's your thing there are so many better alternatives.

philip

The solution to the more codec problem is to get rid of the unnecessary codecs, not to keep encouraging them. They are simply no longer needed. It has nothing to do with keeping things Apple centric though I see nothing wrong with Apple making sure its products work together.

AirPlay more than makes up the game aspect of the Roku 2XS which is not a cheap product. The advantage the Roku has is mainly native Hulu+. Put that on the ATV and things would change quite a bit. I do admit that the Roku2 is a very interesting streamer. The ATV(), Boxee Box and Roku2 seem to be the only really interesting ones out there but the Boxee Box is too expensive and had that Intel SoC noose.

I really don't think games would add anything to the ATV. AirPlay is there for light games. Even an app store wouldn't do much. Have a look at the Google TV pathetic app store. There just aren't that many apps that make sense on a TV. That is why AirPlay is a pretty neat solution.

It would be nice for the ATV to have native access to Hulu+ though after using that service for a while I find it hard to imagine the appeal. Poorly organized, strange movies, good TV shows, etc... It's a bit of a mess compared to Netflix.
Someone has to go in there and organize their service. There are gems to be found in there but they aren't easy to find.

philip

Am not into buying mode yet but I will in 8 months. I look at an ATV because I KNOW it will have an EZ to use interface. Are the alternatives EASY TO USE? I don't want to push 10 buttons and scroll 20 times to find what I want.

I want it for mainly this reason.

I have a Mac and an iPhone. I love AirPlay, iCloud, photo stream, integration with my aperture photo library, the quick UI, etc.
The only additional thing I want is to be able to play my local mkv files.

So, atv with 1080p jail broken to run plex sounds perfect to me! Built in mkv support would be great though. 1080p is a must, since most NAS units running plex don't have the horsepower to transcode down from 1080p to 720p for the atv2. (I know some can, but most readynas, qnap, etc cannot)

There's more to the ecosystem than the file format.

Personally I have no issues with transcoding (with Handbrake). How many movies am I buying per week that this is such a hardship? And I still have the BR for when I need the ultimate presentation. Meanwhile any computer in the house with a USB port and a 2tb hard drive can host several hundred movies no problem just by leaving iTunes running.

Sorry for being unclear. I watch Vudu through my Panasonic blu-ray player. I do see a fairly big difference in PQ when watching Netflix thru my 720p only Roku unit on my 720 LCD and on my Panasonic 42ST30 plasma using the new 1080p Roku 2 XS. There's actually no comparison.

I don't see any difference. I have gone from the LG client which does 1080p, Roku2 XD, ATV2. All this on a new 55" LG. I have tested several people and they can't see it either, or they get it wrong. On a 42" TV you'd have to sit 12" away to see the difference.

In any case, it may be that a plasma TV does show the difference. There are a lot of variables.
The other thing is that it really is the bitrate that matters a lot here. It doesn't do any good if the 1080p is a low bitrate and compressed more.

I'm sure there are large TV's that show the difference just as some people seem to have hearing approaching that of dogs. The whole 1080p and HD audio thing seems to be ripe for the marketing folks. These are the people who try to hide the LCD nature of LED TV's.

Philip

You have a good point. Most people don't look at it that way though. In any case I continue to feel that the vast majority of mkv and xvid files don't originate quite in that way.


Philip

If you are running Plex then the container is not an issue. As long as your mkv files has an h.264 video stream that will not be transcoded and even my lowly Acer Atom WHS can serve those Plex files very easily. The only stream that might be transcoded is the audio one depending on the client hardware. The only real work is turning mkv into mp4 which is not CPU intensive.

A Synology 411+II can easily feed an ATV2 Plex or LG client. I am pretty sure that any Atom based NAS or WHS can also do it. Now the moment you have to transcode HD video in real time is when you need more power.

By the way, it is trivial to turn an mkv file into an m4v file which is natively supported. I guess there are good reasons for encoding to mkv as it seems to be a more flexible container, but wouldn't most people be well served by mp4?

Philip

Hey Philip,
I'm not sure I follow. I have plex on a readynas ultra4 plus, and it certainly can't handle transcoding 1080p to lower quality in real time. Others have the same issue. This all has to be in real time since I don't want to convert all of my movies. This is why native 1080p support will be great in the new appletv.

Do have have plex server running on an atom NAS that can transcode, in real time, a 1080p file to play on an atv2? I have never seen anyone on the forums able to.

Thanks!
Brandon.

Quick question about the ATV3's 1080p support. Will this be full 1080p support for high bit rate files like some of my 1:1 bluray rips that can have bit rates in the high 40Mbps or is it just for the low compressed bit rate 1080p files provided by the likes of Vudu and Itunes? I know this seems like a pretty silly question but I just want to cover my bases since this is Apple we are talking about and they would prefer you buy everything from the Itunes store instead of supporting your local files. I don't want to get my hopes up for this thing to be jailbroken and find out it still can't handle full blurays without mangling the quality.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I think the key thing is that it outputs 1080p. Then, any 1080p files served to it should pass through to the tv.

Well they do have an official support specification in terms of profiles and so on ...

As far as Plex goes you should be able to Direct Stream almost any h.264 video without any stuttering (with the new ATV3). Of course it will have to transcode if it goes from 1080p to 720p no matter which codec was used. For that you'd need a lot of power and your NAS won't handle it. Sorry if I gave a wrong impression. I keep thinking 720p to 720p. You are correct in that the new ATV3 will save you from upgrading to an insanely powerful one!

I am still unclear as to why people don't just use mp4. Is it the ability to use multiple subtitles or some audio issue? Or perhaps better ripping sw for mkv?

Philip

Encode time using handbrake for one. But for me, well worth it. Secondly, Shang hi'd material from the web usually can't be found mp4....hence the desire for a player to decode everything under the sun so the pirates can enjoy. That's why the streaming device market is getting beat up.

Isn't the encoding time the same whether you use handbrake or whatever, unless you have some kind of hardware accelerated help? Can handbrake deal with the hd audio that people want? Multiple subtitles?

The streaming market seems to be doing ok. Netflix is probably hurt more by the content providers than anyone else. The impression I have is that the video people seem to think they can retain control and manage digital distribution to end users. They are in a bind as most don't have the technical capabilities of Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and so on ... They seem to trying to play them off against each other. They want to protect cable distribution, retain ad revenu, use their DRM schemes and do on ... In much of the world there are few options for even paying for streaming. It's not as though people won't pay. They just don't want to be ripped off.

Anyway, I have gotten away from the mkv issue. Other than divx is there anyone else selling stuff in that format?

Philip

So for people who have current ATV2 that they jailbroke, are you streaming full bitrate bluray rips using XBMC and then having the ATV2 output 720p due to it's limitation or are there even issues trying to stream a file that big with such a high bit rate to the box? I browsed around on the XBMC forums a little and people were complaining about getting buffering streaming 1080P rips in the 10-12 gig range on the ATV2.

With the new model supporting 1080p and having a more powerful chip I'm hoping that there won't be any issue streaming full rips minus the HD audio due to XBMC's limitations. I've already been through buffering headaches with the Boxee Box which the Dune D1 resolved but I'm greedy and want the functions offered by XBMC intead of the Dune's pretty spartan UI and added functionality offerings even with yaDIS installed.

I think what he's wondering (or, if not, what I'm wondering) is why so much material out there is MKV in the first place, instead of MP4. Doesn't it take the same amount of time to rip and transcode to MP4 as it does to rip and transcode to MKV? (assuming any encoding is being done at all and we're not just re-packaging the DVD or BR into an MKV package)

As I said above, it's totally worth it to transcode to M4V so anything I get is ATV2 compatible, since we're only talking about a movie per week or so... letting a movie per week run overnight is not such a big deal, and lets me add it to the native ATV collection easily, and offers great quality.

All of my material is mp4 and I'm happy with it. And for me, Handbrake rips take about as long as the movie run time, while Make MKV is a little more than half the run time. I use a high RF factor though (19). I sidn't mean Tahoe streaming industry......sorry for the error. I meant a to say the Streamers themselves.

Can you get AnyDVDHd in the U.S. anymore?