Version 2 of the hardware, version 2 of the thread.

The jailbreak for it came out today. At this point it just gets you a SSH login, but there are already some things in the works. It's nothing too exciting but here's a pic of a weather app.



Personally I bought one just so I could follow the things that the jailbreak community comes up with. I'm hoping for a media streaming solution that allows for at least 720p MKV files.

Also on the non jailbreak side of thinks, I'm really looking forward to the 4.2 iOS update which will allow you to send your iPhone and iPad videos, pictures, and music to your TV.

Anybody else got one or thinking about picking one up?

10/20/2010 8:38:05 PM

I think I will pick one up. At $99 dollars its pretty tempting even if it isnt super competitive with some of the other offerings. I am going to wait a little bit and see what is unlocked with the JB, I will probably also get a google tv for the hells of it.

10/20/2010 8:54:25 PM

The first jailbreak app arrives.

http://www.iclarified.com/entry/index.php?enid=12361

10/20/2010 9:54:42 PM

When it can stream an array of formats off my computer without itunes I'll think about picking on up.

10/20/2010 11:18:47 PM

It shouldn't be long now.

FWIW, if anyone is thinking about waiting, It's all but assured that Apple will very quickly close the security hole that allows jailbreaking and it's a possibility that it could take months for another hack to be found and released. That was another reason that I bought one early, I wanted to go ahead and make sure I got in before it was too late.

10/20/2010 11:48:37 PM

Quote :

"When it can stream an array of formats off my computer without itunes I'll think about picking on up."

... sadly I doubt that day will ever come.

I'm loving my WDTVLive, but it really needs to get on the ball with Hulu and Netflix integration.

[Edited on October 21, 2010 at 12:17 AM. Reason : without tversity/playon - I should specify... And when did tversity go to being paid? I donated ]

10/21/2010 12:15:34 AM

Quote :

"sadly I doubt that day will ever come."

Why do you think that?

10/21/2010 12:55:35 AM

Because they want you to purchase everything off of itunes and not just download movies/tv and stream it. This is nothing new from apple.

10/21/2010 9:39:01 AM

Do you think someone will be able to port the new ATV OS to the original ATVs?

10/21/2010 1:43:00 PM

^^Perhaps you missed the part where it's already been jailbroken? Apple is no longer in control of what happens.

10/21/2010 1:48:26 PM

piece o junk. Sad when a product's only value is after it's been hacked. I guess some people have more time on their hands than I do to continually fiddle with stuff. Sometimes I wish I could still keep up with all the hacking/tweaking/etc stuff.

10/21/2010 9:04:25 PM

Seems silly to be obsessed with jailbreaking it just so you can hopefully get the functionality that 3+ products already offer at a lower pricepoint.

10/21/2010 9:11:43 PM

^^It's just a hobby. And as far as hobbies go, a cheap and relatively non-time consuming one. A few minutes on some message boards a day and maybe an hour or two a week for installing and configuring stuff. As far as hobbies go, I can think of tons of dumber ones.

^It might be silly if your end goal was only to duplicate the functionality of those other products. I've got my hopes set a little higher. Aside from real media streaming as a bare minimum, I'm also hoping for some iPhone/iPad specific compatibility that wouldn't be feasible on any other product.

Will any of the 3+ products you're thinking of will allow you to use a Wii or PS3 controller via bluetooth and play emulators or other games on them?

10/21/2010 11:10:12 PM

Decent article about hacking the Apple TV and the future potential.

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/11/apple-tv-jailbreak/

Quote :

"Dovey said he’s especially excited about the potential for hacks to take advantage of AirPlay, an Apple feature that will enable iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch to wirelessly stream content from audio or video apps to the Apple TV. “I’d be very interested in the possibilities of using AirPlay video to treat an AppleTV as an attached screen in my iPhone, iPad or even Mac apps,” Dovey said. Already, owners of the new Apple TV can hack their device to run an early version of Bradley’s software, NitoTV, a media player that promises to support every media format. That makes the Apple TV seem weak: It only plays a few iTunes-compatible formats, such as H.264-encoded MPEG-4 videos. Bradley is also working to get some of his old Apple TV hacks working on the new system, such as an app that enables you to play Super Nintendo on the Apple TV, and an app that allows you to order a pizza. The Awkward TV community is compiling a list of potential capabilities that could be unlocked with Apple TV hacks, such as playing Flash videos, connecting a TV tuner for recording, or hooking up a CD/DVD player for playing discs."

11/2/2010 11:00:28 AM

http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/04/plex-arrives-on-jailbroken-apple-tvs-video/

11/4/2010 6:01:09 PM

Proof of Concept looks good

11/4/2010 8:28:14 PM

http://blog.firecore.com/3314



The first web browser looks to be almost complete. Looks decent so far. I still couldn't possibly care any less about surfing the internet on my TV but as far as web browsers go it looks like it...browses the web and stuff.

Interesting to note that it looks like the guys responsible for this also created their own installer. Seems like there is a lot of that going on right now in the early days of jailbreaking. I hope that one person/group ends up being the main/only installer sooner rather than later. I'd hate to have to install 8 different installers for 8 different programs. It would be nice to have just the one centralized location where you can add different repos but everything is funneled into one place. This is too reminiscent of the installer/cydia/icy/rock battles that happened early on in the iPhone jailbreak scene.

11/17/2010 10:21:53 PM

Debated on putting this in the iPad or iPhone threads, as it really could go in any of the three, but it does relate more to the Apple TV I suppose.



It astounds me that the hackers seem to have more of an idea about how the product should work than Apple does. All it takes is one line of code to get any third party Application working with the Apple TV, but it seems like Apple has no current plans to allow the device to be used for anything other than Netflix, Youtube, and videos you've bought/converted to iTunes. I'm sure a year from now they will have relaxed their restrictions, but I don't understand why they're limiting things so much right now for no other reason than to make a big deal about removing those restrictions down the road.

11/24/2010 5:02:18 PM

Quote :

"they're limiting things so much right now for no other reason than to make a big deal about removing those restrictions down the road."

Precisely. Nothing has changed.

11/24/2010 7:14:47 PM

Quote :

"but I don't understand why they're limiting things so much right now for no other reason than to make a big deal about removing those restrictions down the road. "

And also because it takes time to create polished software...

And i wouldn't be surprised if these first gen devices don't get these features. They weren't designed to run general purpose apps, and are probably underpowered memory and processor wise to really be great at it.

It probably won't be until the 3rd or 4th generation that it's really a great device.

11/24/2010 8:28:09 PM

Quote :

"I'm sure a year from now they will have relaxed their restrictions, but I don't understand why they're limiting things so much right now for no other reason than to make a big deal about removing those restrictions down the road."

Because they're Apple and they have a dedicated following that will buy anything they produce just because of the logo on it. They do this with all their products. It's not new at all.

[Edited on November 24, 2010 at 9:14 PM. Reason : I know you know this though.]

11/24/2010 9:14:37 PM

posting from my apple tv using the browser I linked to above and my iPhone as a remote. Its not half bad really.

12/3/2010 1:08:31 AM

Bump for xbmc. Worth the cost of the ATV alone for that. I do wish the remote was more full featured (read: more than 2 buttons) though. Would be nice to be able to use the media control buttons on my Harmony to control the video.

edit: on 2nd look, it looks like there's some settings that might allow for other buttons to be used (at least it mentions a harmony remote in the settings) but it looks like I might need to reconfigure the harmony setup a bit.

1/21/2011 3:56:37 AM

I'm trying to figure out what is so great about having xbmc on an apple TV

1/22/2011 4:05:43 PM

I guess you don't get xbmc

1/22/2011 4:09:13 PM

It makes the Apple TV a product worth owning if you're not wholly integrated to the Apple ecosystem.

It basically turns it into a marginally better version every other media player out on the market.

1/22/2011 7:36:05 PM

Wow, is there any noticeable jitter streaming 1080p x264 rips through XBMC on these? I will probably pick one up if not.

1/22/2011 8:15:22 PM

twice the price
half the features
8 times the marketing

1/22/2011 9:08:44 PM

It's $99.

1/22/2011 10:26:35 PM

Quote :

"Bump for xbmc. Worth the cost of the ATV alone for that. I do wish the remote was more full featured (read: more than 2 buttons) though. Would be nice to be able to use the media control buttons on my Harmony to control the video."

Totally agree. 99 bucks for a xbmc device that can play back 1080p video is a damn good deal.

1/22/2011 10:30:28 PM

Quote :

"It basically turns it into a marginally better version every other media player out on the market."

How so?

I think boxee still has it beat on a few counts, as does the wdtvconfusingacronym.

boxee works... out of the box, & handles 1080p content. Its twice as expensive, but i'd say $100 to $200 isn't a substantial jump, especially for the difference in feature set out of the box.

WDTV live is effectively the same price & streams your local content without jumping through hoops. Win7 "play to" is nice, & unless you like paying through the nose for iTunes movie rentals I don't see any advantages.

edit:

Quote :

"Totally agree. 99 bucks for a xbmc device that can play back 1080p video is a damn good deal."

from what I read on the internets it doesn't handle 1080p so well.

[Edited on January 22, 2011 at 10:35 PM. Reason : *]

1/22/2011 10:33:46 PM

Quote :

"How so?"

I agree with your post for the most part; the only advantage I'd say that the Apple TV has is that there's a larger homebrew community and it gives you all the jailbroken Apple stuff that people love so much.

That said, if the thing can't handle 1080p, you're right that there's a number of products flat out better than it.

[Edited on January 22, 2011 at 11:41 PM. Reason : Win7 Play To is awesome. I love it on my WDTV (mostly because the interface isn't awesome)]

1/22/2011 11:41:01 PM

I picked one up recently & haven't even bothered to setup any file sharing because of play to. It was the only reason I didn't grab a boxee box instead.

You're right that eventually the jailbreak scene kids will probably make apple tv a better device, it just isn't today. Don't worry though, MS will have a better solution out within two weeks.

[Edited on January 23, 2011 at 12:00 AM. Reason : *]

1/22/2011 11:59:24 PM

Quote :

"it doesn't handle 1080p so well."

ah, that blows.

1/23/2011 4:44:20 AM

Can any of these stream, espn3, atdhe.net, internet browsing?

1/23/2011 8:25:25 AM

Yeah, 1080p content doesn't really work out that great at the moment, although I have read on the xmbc forums that it can be optimized a little bit more so I'm hoping for full playback. Right now it stops for buffering about once every 15-20 seconds. Also the output is limited to 720p at the moment, so even if/when they get the 1080p decoding down it might not ever be able to actually output 1080p. There are conflicting opinions on this as well, with some people saying that the hardware will always be limited to 720p and some people saying that a 1080p hack is possible. Also in the first version of xbmc the audio is limited to 2.0 stereo, but support for more robust audio is on the way.

Quote :

"Can any of these stream, espn3, atdhe.net, internet browsing?"

There's a mac app that will send just about every internet streamed video directly to the ATV (non-jailbroken even) through AirPlay. It's not exactly the same thing as having the ATV do 100% of the work itself, but it does get the job done. I assume windows ports of this program are on the way (the mac version has only been out for a week or two and is still technically in beta.) There are also a shit ton of xbmc plugins that allow for various internet video sites to work. I'm not really sure what all sites work on there, but I'm sure eventually you will be able to get pretty much so anything working that way if it doesn't already.

1/23/2011 8:39:44 AM

Having just converted over 150+ DVDs to H.264 format with Weighted P-Frames (which I learned is not supported in my AppleTV v1 ) I'm considering moving to AppleTV v2.

Since I primarily stream already and all my movies are from regular DVDs (aka no higher than 720p) I don't think I'll run into issues moving to an AppleTV v2.

Can anybody think of a reason that I shouldn't upgrade?

[Edited on January 25, 2011 at 9:15 PM. Reason : Messed up face]

1/25/2011 9:13:01 PM

I've been wanting to rip my 500+ dvd's for a really long time, and have a device to play them back.

What is your guys setup like?

Basically, I just need a device that can play back my dvd rips from a central box in the house. Would the Apple TV 2 do that for me, or would i be better off getting a boxee?

I havent ripped anything yet, so format is irrelevant to me.

1/26/2011 7:35:52 AM

Just know that out of the box, the ATV isn't really designed to do what you're asking. It's gonna take some hacking and installing some non-Apple approved apps to do that (and even then right now those sort of things are in their infancy and aren't perfected yet). Personally I enjoy crap like that, but if you don't, I'd stick with a Boxee, Popcorn Hour, WDTV, or any number of other devices that are actually designed for what you're trying to do.

1/26/2011 12:43:55 PM

Nacho, what forums are you following the atv development on? I want to pick something up in the next few days and I'm trying to decide between the atv & a roku. I'm split since I use both hulu & itunes. The recent XBMC stuff looks pretty good though.

2/9/2011 3:57:36 PM

I mainly just follow a dozen or so devs on twitter, a couple of Apple related websites on google reader and poke my head on a forum or two from time to time. The development for the ATV is slow enough currently that almost any new news gets posted immediately a dozen times over. I already keep tabs on the iPhone/iPad development scene (which is 100 times bigger at the moment) so I can't really think of any specific sites for just the ATV. Following the RSS feeds of engadget, TUAW and iClarified and checking out the forums over at XBMC and firecore should Be more than enough info to get started.

Btw, they just released the first major update of XBMC a couple of days ago. Lots of bug fixes and smooth overs. When they get Harmony support working, I'm probably going to start using it as my main media playback device.

2/9/2011 6:39:53 PM

UNTethered Jailbreak out. Pretty simple. Took me 20 seconds. Installs nitrotv

2/17/2011 1:13:14 PM

is there a work around for HULU yet?

2/17/2011 3:01:37 PM

Xbmc with playon. Using it right now. Full hulu

2/17/2011 7:04:09 PM

^ Are you paying for PlayOn? And how did you get it to work - I downloaded it, set it up and when I try and run it through xbmc it won't connect to anything. Xbmc is working fine for streaming video from my pc through the normal windows network connection so I don't see any reason why this wouldnt pick up the connection.

2/19/2011 10:03:03 PM

I'm trying the 14day trial right now. right now its well worth 39.99 a year. It should be under UPnP on XBMC. It shows all my Windows 7 PCs and PS3 media server through UPnP as well as PLayon. Only Problem i have found with Playon is ESPN3 still is a no go for some odd reason.

2/22/2011 10:10:11 AM

Can any of you watch Megavideo.com videos using playon or anything else?

2/22/2011 11:16:42 AM

I'm using this plugin for hulu: http://forum.firecore.com/topic/4109. Not sure how it compares to playon as I can't get that to work. It can be a little slow in searching at points but it works great otherwise. The advantage is that it is all run through the ATV and I don't have to have playon running on my pc.

2/22/2011 9:10:54 PM

^that's what I'm looking for

that put me over the edge, Apple TV will be here on Friday

[Edited on February 22, 2011 at 9:41 PM. Reason : a]

2/22/2011 9:17:35 PM

Yeah I love the little black box. Definitely not regretting canceling the cable TV. We get tons of channels through the basic cable thanks to the internet connections (Basically all the normal channels, HD versions of some), apple tv streams 720p hulu and netflix, download whatever else I need and play it easily through XBMC. It is awesome.

Whats the best community to stay up to date with in regards for new hacks/mods?

2/23/2011 9:58:01 PM