Comments on: Apple aiming for TV breakthrough

Tech companies haven't had much success in the living room. Can the iPod maker do any better with its Apple TV?

[cis02]

Apple TV - poor VHS like quality plus $$$ for DRM content!

Apple TV delivers very poor video quality using compressed mpeg4 files that is not even up to VHS standards. Huge step backward from HiDef TV. Tack on expensive and tedious downloads, and the fact that it's more expensive than better quality alternatives.
It's criminal that the payola Apple ponies up to get featured as "news items" on MSNBC, CNN, Good Morning America, etc. works. It just proves that the American media have no integrity and Apple certainly takes advantage of it.
Only a fool would buy Apple TV online without comparing it in the store next to the signal coming back from a (cheaper, faster, better) hi-def video recorder like Tivo.

[totallymaxed]

Apple aiming for customer lockin!

Apple TV is very strange product. It has a limited vision of how content will be consumed and looks very expensive compared to other similar consumer electronics products. Its a TV focused product but locks out an enormous number of customers by omitting the connectivity they need for their existing TV's. Hmmm... why? Have you ever purchade a DVD player that did that? Its a Tv centric product that only allows you to browse not purchase content from iTunes. It reminds me of an earlier Apple product... the Pippin. Another strangely limited product that was designed not to steal customer from Apple's desktop busines even though in its day it was almost identical in power to its Macintosh contemporaries. Similarly Apple TV is clearly powerful enough to be enable a full iTunes experience... but that would be dangerous territory for Apple as it would potentially damage there MacIntosh business. But without this additional capability Apple TV appears a weak but very expensive product that is a 'one trick pony'.