Will it play non-iTunes based 720p MPEG-4 AVC?

MPEG-2 Transport Streams?

DivX/Xvid?

Umm.. stream DVDs?

No?

F**k it.

I can't say this has ever excited me much.. it's not really new either, Windows Media Extender did a pretty similar job (though they've given up selling standalone ones and only included it in the Xbox 360, suggesting there wasn't a huge market).

No thanks. I would rather buy a xbox + mod chip and bigger HD for the cost and do everything the iTV does + more. Oh wait, I already have that.

I think you guys are missing the whole point with this thing. It's simply a way to play Apple purchased (or ripped) content on your TV/Home Theater.

That's it. That's all it does.

And it does it spectacularly well.

It doesn't play ogg. It doesn't play DivX, XVid, 3ivX, or any other odd format. It plays Apple's version of H.264. It probably never will.

And why is this? Two answers:

1. To keep it simple
2. To keep it closed (which is really another way to make answer 1 possible).

If you need more out of a product, then this obviously isn't for you. But then again, other than an actual MediaPC, there really is no other device at this time that does all of this in a sub $300 package. I'm sure that will change, if this market develops.

Keep in mind that most people have no clue about codecs, bit rates, DRM schema, etc. They'll just know if they buy something from Apple, it will play on AppleTV. It's really that simple.

I'm no apple-hater (I have an iPod and a macbook pro), but I'm skeptical about this initial effort.

As Jobs himself has stated, over 90% of the music on iPods comes from CDs, not from iTunes. Since there is no legal way to get DVDs onto the appleTV, I'm not sure how well received this will be, at least at first (of course, with HandBrake it's as easy to rip a DVD as it is to rip a CD, but I'm not sure most people know that -- and if they did, I bet a swarm of lawyers would descend on everyone tangentially associated with the project).

I think this product will become interesting when it becomes truly feasible to ditch cable altogether and buy TV shows a la carte from iTunes. I would be very interested in doing that. But even then -- I'll put a Mac Mini under my TV, not an appleTV.

Still, I wish them well.

isn't this essentially just a video capture card + wireless antenna?

How long till it gets hacked to run as a MythTV frontend?

What's next, Apple Fridge? Apple Dishwasher?

No Divx or MPEG2?

Makes it not much more then a living room front end for itunes. Maybe if you are a Mac person to begin with it'd be different. I do like the purpose-built nature of it though.