Apple MA711LL/A TV with 40GB Hard Drive [OLD VERSION] by Apple Computer
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Our Price: $349.99 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $85.95 (click here) Category: CE See more digital camera details and other models |
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Digital camera reviews of Apple MA711LL/A TV with 40GB Hard Drive [OLD VERSION]
Digital camera Review: Excellent item and fast delivery
Summary: 5 Stars
I got prompt information from seller about status and warranty of the item. It arrived in few days. It is in excellent condition. I'm very happy of it.Digital camera Review: Fantastic!
Summary: 5 Stars
Classic Apple, easy to set up and use. Lets you get that cool stuff you find on the Internet onto your home TV with very little fuss.
Would have been nice if it worked with all video formats or had a converter built into iTunes so it would transparently convert to the right format for you.
Digital camera Review: Frees your music/video collection
Summary: 4 Stars
I've had mine for a couple of days. It works pretty well and is simple to operate. This is very much an iPod on the network. You need to know this otherwise some things don't make sense. I use it mostly for my video collection that is on my Macintosh and expected a device simply to stream video to my TV. I was initially confused with the source menu but now it seems quite simple. It helps unify multiple sources for your TV. If you are familiar with Apple's Front Row software this is very much like it. The software says version 1.0. I think there will be some updates fairly soon given that some of the simpler features of the iPod which this should support aren't there. Things for example like showing the first letter of the list of things you are going through while scrolling very quickly aren't there but should be. Being able to fast forward a podcast to skip over a commercial aren't there. The video quality could be better I think with the right files. Apple's material looks good if you aren't close to your TV or have a small TV (mine is 46"). I think it will require some experimenting to get the right settings for ripping your DVDs for it. Overall I'm quite happy with this and can see my satisfaction inching up some with software upgrades.Digital camera Review: Good (but not Great) product.
Summary: 4 Stars
I got this so that I could play all my home videos on my TV instead of just my computer (my camcorder records 1280x720 video in MPEG-4 format directly to an SD card). However, all my movies, which play well on my iMac, must be converted by iTunes before they'll play on AppleTV. The converted files have a resolution of 960x540 and do take a bit of time to convert. If I also want to watch them on my iTouch, I must convert again to 640x360 resolution (again, this is done through iTunes).
It does play all my music well, and I use this feature to send music to my whole house via the optical output. I can see what's playing by watching my TV screen, but it doesn't have nearly the same information as is available though iTunes. Unfortunately, music (and videos) which I had bought though iTunes would not play initially; I had to reset my AppleTV, de-authorize my account, sign off all my accounts, download a software update, and then it miraculously began to work. This is a problem well documented on the web, and it appears that some people never get it to work. I was surprised as problems like this usually only happen on my Windows computers; Apple products usually work without glitches like this!
My photos are all accessible and look good on my TV, although I would like a bit more control over the slideshow settings. Purchased music videos are great now that I've managed to get AppleTV to play protected content (see above).
I wish that one could add an external hard drive, but one can't. I also have a Mac Mini (which is a very capable and quiet computer with about the same small footprint as AppleTV). The Mac Mini is twice the price but can play movies directly through QuickTime, has all the features of iTunes, comes with FrontRow (complete with remote), has unlimited storage through external drives, and can do everything a regular computer can do. One could use FrontRow to make the Mac Mini play media without a keyboard, using just the remote, The Mini also has built in wireless and Bluetooth, and will network well with Windows based PC's as well as Apples.
In summary, AppleTV performs as advertised, albeit with a few glitches and limited funtionallity. If you're on a relatively limited budget, AppleTV is a decent product. However, were I to start over, I would probably just spend the extra money and go with a Mac Mini hooked up to my TV and stereo.
Digital camera Review: Good, but just a bit restrictive
Summary: 4 Stars
Apple TV
This is basically a great product, however, Apple is strong on copyright protection of Music & videos, thus they make it impossible to load copies of videos I have on my computer (such as Utube clips) and therefore can't play these via Apple TV.
It should be simple- anything that I have on my computer I should be able to play on my TV via Apple TV - that is what I understood on reading their information before I bought it - but it's not quite true. Shame.
On the upside - showing my photo-library and playing my music-library is excellent.