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Technology Stocks : Apple Inc. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: slacker711 who wrote (68987)	9/21/2007 4:40:32 PM
From: pyslent	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 213177

I'm not sure it's fair to say that Apple's video strategy is a failure. It's not as if any of the other digital video options are taking the world by a storm. It takes a long time to change consumer behavior. On the other hand, their video offerings are not particulrly compelling to me. Unless my DVR misses a recording, I don't see any reason to buy a TV show from iTunes as long as I'm already paying for cable. The second someone offers HBO shows online a la carte, I'm cancelling my $100/ month cable service. It's ridiculous how many bundled packages Comcast make you subscribe to just to qualify to pay for a digital premium channel like HBO. As for movies, Apple needs a rental option. Period.

To: slacker711 who wrote (68987)	9/21/2007 10:25:47 PM
From: JP Sullivan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 213177

The reason why the iPod is successful is that most of the content comes from CDs that iPod owners can conveniently rip to disk using iTunes. No such luck with Apple TV. You can't pop a DVD into your computer and rip it to iTunes. Also it ISN'T true that everything that plays in iTunes will play on Apple TV. I have received iTunes playable videos that won't play on Apple TV directly. The only way to get them to play is to convert them within iTunes -- when iTunes detects an Apple TV unit, it makes available in the Advanced menu an item called "Convert selection for Apple TV". This approach would be OK except for the fact that the process is as slow as molasses and the quality of the converted video is horrible. By contrast, Handbrake produces a far more decent rip if you select the double pass feature, but it only works with DVDs and not content that's already on disk. Apple TV will not realize its potential unless there is an easy way for owners to conveniently move content from their DVDs onto the device or convert existing video files without noticeable quality loss. Granted, people don't watch videos over and over like they listen to songs, but with the price of disk drives falling, it's convenient to have a bunch of good videos on tap and watch them again now and then without having to handle the DVDs. Why, just the other day I revisited the escapades of Hannibal Lecter with a nice bottle of chianti. Yum, yum ;) -we-

To: slacker711 who wrote (68987)	9/23/2007 12:27:34 AM
From: Wyätt Gwyön	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 213177

i must say i kind of like Apple TV. it's not a bad device as long as your expectations are not too high. (that would be a good, honest ad copy for the device). i got the 160GB version. it is a nice way to get a large audio/picture collection onto your home stereo and TV, and watch the occasional TV show if you miss the live show. the quality on an HDTV is quite good, almost DVD quality. it looks way better than it does on a computer. even Youtube looks better (although the Youtube search interface totally sucks). of course, it can in no way replace a DVR connected to cable or satellite service, nor DVD service like Netflix. i can't imagine ripping DVDs. i rarely watch a movie more than once a year; why would i bother ripping it even if storage were not a problem?