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I’ve had the Apple TV for exactly 10 days now … and I have to say, I’m still quite impressed with the unit and happy with my purchase. Despite some initial difficulties, I definitely stick by my original assessment that it’s a keeper. My thoughts after 10 days …

Content Quality

Content quality, and stories of fuzzy or pixelated content on high-definition television sets, have been commonly reported in many of the early reviews of the Apple TV. I have a feeling that this will continue to be an issue for Apple TV for a little while yet, even though it’s not an issue with Apple TV itself.

It would seem as though much of the content on the iTunes store varies in quality, when expanded well beyond iPod sized screens and up to 40, 50, 60+ inches. In my own experience, a downloaded episode of Battlestar Galactica was a bit fuzzier than I expected … and the motion of the video had a tendency to jerk a bit from time to time. In my initial review, I thought this was due to watching content via streaming, while the initial iTunes sync was taking place replicating all of my content. I guess this isn’t the case, and that the problem is in the media file itself - it’s just not encoded very well.

This reminds me of the early days of Music CD’s back in the 80’s (yes, I’m dating myself a bit here), there was typically a three-letter designation of the back of any CD you might purchase (known as a SPARS code) - AAD, ADD, DDD - with each letter referring to a portion of the creation process (initial recording, mixing, and final mastering) and whether it was done via analog or digital. So, of course when you bought CD’s in the 80’s you always looked for the “DDD” on the back of the case, assuming that would have the best audio quality. But the reality was that a studio could do a spectacular job with analog if they were good, and a poor job with digital if they were bad.

Same seems to be true for video content in the iTunes store, as some titles are a bit marginal (the aforementioned Battlestar Galactica episode) and others are rather well done - like the copy of The Prestige that I purchased. Of course, the movies in iTunes still are not in true high-definition yet … but on my 46″ screen, I would have to say they’re quite good.

Finding HD Podcast Feeds

Since high-quality source material is a bit harder to come by, it’s worth checking your favorite video podcasts to see if they offer a high definition or large format version. Overall, I would say they look rather good on the Apple TV, especially considering that most podcasts are produced on a budget that is a fraction of the cost of commercial content. Having all of my podcasts automatically synchronized with my Apple TV is making it easier for me keep up with the shows that I like, in the comfort of my living room. This is the feature that I like about Apple TV the most, and am looking forward to what new types of podcast concent will be created in the next few years.

Green Screen Workaround

Here’s the great news - I seem to have found a work-around for my HDMI green-screen bug, that I discussed in my last blog entry. I had mentioned in the video recording that I’d made that changing the resolution of the TV didn’t fix the problem. I wasn’t exactly accurate. I had tried going into the resolution settings and re-selecting 1080i as the resolution I wanted to use. This did not fix the green screen issue. However, out of curiosity the other day, I stepped the resolution down to 720p and this fixed the probelm — permanently. I can now turn the TV off and on, switch input sources, it doesn’t matter … the background color stays the proper black that it should be. Many thanks to all those who had come up with creative suggestions in my previous blog entry. I’m glad I was able to find a workable solution for me for now, and hope this may help anyone else experiencing this problem. Hopefully when I get my next television later this year, I’ll have more luck with 1080 (even though my TV supports 1080i, and is made by Toshiba - one of the founders of the HDMI specification).

Needs Rentals

The first thing I would really like to see Apple do is make movie rentals available via iTunes and Apple TV. The delivery mechanism for purchasing a movie works good enough for me for now - I select something on iTunes on my PC, and it’s available on my Apple TV shortly thereafter. But I really don’t want to pay $10 to $15 for every movie that I want to watch this way … simply because I don’t feel like owning every movie I may want to watch. I would assume that rentals are in the works over at Apple, and I look forward to the day they release them.

Conclusion

While I don’t think the Apple TV is going to get up to iPod types of market share figures in the near-term, it’s a solid platform that has a lot of future potential as Apple works to maintain their lead in the digital media market. if Apple can continue to execute with the Apple TV, with as much success as they’ve done to improve the iPod, they’ll be the act everyone will be trying to follow in a few years.