You may now have seen ads for the Apple TV, Apple’s latest attempt to advance the iPod universe. The Apple TV is essential a simple box that connects to your TV (preferably HDTV, though minimal support for standard def is there) to allow you to play audio and video from your computer. Like the iPod, audio and video files are managed via iTunes. Your Apple TV can sync with your computer (either Mac or PC) over a wireless network and store the media on its 40 GB hard disk. Alternatively, it can stream the material over the network.

Is the Apple TV for you? It is useful if you regularly download video via iTunes and want to display it on your TV. A less advertised, and potentially more important use, could be for playback of digitize camcorder videos. Instead of hooking your camcorder up to your TV and fiddling with tapes, upload the video to your computer and stream it to the Apple TV on demand.

The major downsides right now that may be dealbreakers are twofold: apparent lack of surround sound support and limited availability of HD content available for download. Apple sells movies via the iTunes store, but these are inferior even to DVD, let alone the HD quality that Blu-Ray and HD DVD provide. I have no doubt that Apple will add these capabilities in the future, but for now, these drawbacks limit the appeal of this device.

Though these limitations are real, the device still has appeal for those less concerned with HD quality and surround sound. It’s moderately priced and easy to set up, and seems a more viable solution than Microsoft’s Media Center.

Bottom Line: Marginally Recommended

This entry was posted on Friday, April 13th, 2007 at 1:42 am and is filed under general. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.