5 ms·

In terms of hardware, it isn't the winner for this sort of product. According to reports from a few days ago, the new Apple TV lacks 4K support. The Nvidia Shie

by knorby 11y ago

In terms of hardware, it isn't the winner for this sort of product. According to reports from a few days ago, the new Apple TV lacks 4K support. The Nvidia Shield runs Android TV, supports 4K (well), and has a pretty reasonable GPU in it. It costs $50 more.

chambo622 11y ago
The Shield is an amazingly good device but it will never sell at anything near the rate of Apple TV. It's targeted toward gamers and enthusiasts, many of whom already have a console already.
urda 11y ago
Most homes are not 4K ready and are not anywhere near it at this time. Not really a hurting point in this market.
- cheald 11y ago
  I generally agree with you, but Apple's brand image is "luxury"; it does seem odd that what is ostensibly a premium brand would not be targeting premium features. To put it another way, people who have 4k TVs today - the luxury market - may be put off of the new Apple TV because of its lack of support for their higher-end devices. I'm not sure that's a desirable effect.
  - aaronbrethorst 11y ago
    Apple's brand image is "luxury" That's their image, but supporting 4k would probably add a few bucks to the cost of the Apple TV, which would be unacceptable to Tim Cook. 4k will be included when it's achieved decent market penetration.
  - JohnBooty 11y ago
    I don't know if their brand image can be defined that easily. They sell their stuff at Wal-Mart, after all.
  - makomk 11y ago
    Especially since it's not that expensive a feature anymore. There's actually a $15 Pi-like ARM board called the Orange Pi PC that does 4k, because apparently ARM media SoCs with 4k support are that cheap that you can put one in a bargain-basement board that's not even aimed at media applications. Admittedly it's restricted to 30 FPS at 4k, but still, I'm sure Apple could do better if they wanted to.
  - rsynnott 11y ago
    They've done this before; the ATV1 didn't support 1080p, at a time when 1080p TVs were starting to exist in the semi-mainstream (though the vast majority of the market was 720p or 1080i still), but there was little content for them. Ultimately, it'd presumably add cost for a feature useful to few people. Connectivity for 4k also remains a mess; there's HDMI 1.4 (24hz at 4k, so not good enough; the interface presumably runs at 60fps like all other Apple interfaces), and HDMI 2.0, which does support 60hz at 4k, but which is somewhat rare, and has its own problems: http://www.avsforum.com/forum/168-hdmi-q-one-connector-world/1523994-hdmi-2-0-cedia-webinar.html http://www.avsforum.com/forum/168-hdmi-q-one-connector-world... I expect in a couple of years when 4k TVs are more common, content exists for them in significant amounts, and the connector standard (possibly HDMI 2.0a?) is sorted out, they'll support it.
  - lobster_johnson 11y ago
    I get where you're going, but I would argue that Apple's brand image isn't luxury at all. Apple sits squarely in the mid-to-high end bracket — anyone who's essentially "middle class" can afford Apple products, and their pricing indicates this. Examples of luxury brands that few people can afford: Hermes bags, Lambourghini cars, Cartier watches.
    - t0mbstone 11y ago
      You can buy a 50 inch 4K TV right now for only $750. http://www.amazon.com/VIZIO-M50-C1-50-Inch-Ultra-Smart/dp/B00T63YUJO http://www.amazon.com/VIZIO-M50-C1-50-Inch-Ultra-Smart/dp/B0... That puts 4K squarely in the "middle class" market, if you ask me, and if Apple TV doesn't support it, that means they aren't even targeting middle class. They are basically targeting poor people with an expensive luxury item that can run apps (half of which, like Netflix and Hulu, already run on most users' smart TVs). Their marketing strategy is borderline nonsensical.
    - rsynnott 11y ago
      I think it fits squarely into the 'affordable luxury' armed; it's kind of the equivalent of, say, Bosch or Neff for kitchen appliances. A little bit more expensive than the entry level brands, and not really that different, but it looks good, and the oven door feels a bit more solid. Apple's certainly not in the true luxury segment, except arguably with the gold watch.
  - derefr 11y ago
    There's a difference between "luxury" and (the visual equivalent of) "audiophile." People with money to waste buy Beats headphones, not Sennheisers. Thus why Apple acquired the former instead of the latter. Targeting the high-market buyer doesn't usually imply making your product capable of doing all the latest and greatest bleeding-edge things and beating the competition in a highest-numbers contest, any more than BMW sells its products as race-cars. Of course, some rich people are racing-car enthusiasts, or audiophiles, or whatever else—and it seems to be more common in the high-end, simply because more of the rich can afford to actually get these things when they want them. But that doesn't mean that the desire is a rich-people thing, or that making something super-duper-high-numbered will make it sell more to the rich. (Of course, if you give the thing a super-duper-high-numbered price tag, you might inspire some rich people to get it as a Veblen good, which can often look like a desire for the bleeding-edge. You'll frequently find things purchased in this way being underutilized—4K "Veblen TVs" purchased in order to watch 480p Seinfeld re-runs and so on.)
- knorby 11y ago
  I can't argue with that, but the Apple TV will hit obsolescence much quicker, particularly as 4K becomes more prevalent. I just find it odd that Apple totally excludes the higher end of the market...Android TV has a range of options at least.
- t0mbstone 11y ago
  It's completely unacceptable for the new Apple TV not to support 4K, when both Netflix and Amazon are releasing 4K content now. On top of that, the new iPhones can record in 4K, and the new iPad can edit 4K videos. You can buy a 50 inch 4K TV nowadays for under $1,000. 4K is going to explode in the next year or two, and if the new Apple TV doesn't support it, I won't be buying it. Period.
  - elif 11y ago
    I agree. I paid $600 for my 52 inch 4K... and it's not a cheap Chinese one, it's a samsung smart tv with native streaming, voice command, and multi-axis remote.. They are going to miss the boat if 4k explodes this black friday.
  - rsynnott 11y ago
    > 4K is going to explode in the next year or two At which time they will no doubt support it. Right now it'd be an extra expense of use to very few users, and they'd have to deal with the connectivity problem.
  - nsxwolf 11y ago
    What's the point of 4K on a TV again? So you can walk up to it and say "ooooh!", then go sit down and have it look like 1080p? Is that brief standing-too-close moment worth the massive increase in bandwidth required?
    - t0mbstone 11y ago
      Watch 4K content on a 75 inch screen, then play 1080p content on that same screen. The difference in clarity is huge. The only reason you can't tell the difference is because you are probably watching 1080p content that is being upscaled. Watch TRUE 4K content on a 65+ inch television, and it's like looking through window. It's amazing.
      - nsxwolf 11y ago
        At what viewing distance, though? I have a 65 inch 1080p set that I sit 12 feet from. Without my glasses, I can't tell the difference between 1080p and 480p at that distance.
dharma1 11y ago
Hey, need to leave something for next year's version ;)
xngzng 11y ago
I guess A8 chip can not handle 4k streaming or to the good user experience level Apple like. Apple TV uses older chip. It appears A9 in iPhone 6S can handle 4K thus you will see 4K support in next model. Anyway 4K content is not mainstream yet.
georgerobinson 11y ago
This is a genuine question. How many households do you suppose have an Internet connection that can support 4K? I don't know the answer for the USA, but I can see from a Ofcom report published at the start of the year, about 68% of households in the UK would not be able to stream 4K on Netflix due to insufficient broadband speed. Just 1/3 of households have connections with 30Mb/s or more (http://media.ofcom.org.uk/news/2015/broadband-speeds-november2014/ http://media.ofcom.org.uk/news/2015/broadband-speeds-novembe...). I'm not saying this a valid excuse for omitting 4K support. However, for the most part I don't think the infrastructure is really there for the wider population. I live out in the sticks and barely get 3Mbps. Perhaps we might see 4K come to the Apple TV next year either as a software upgrade on current hardware or with better GPU/CPU to support it.
- martinald 11y ago
  30% may subscribe but nearly 90% (in England) have it available to them: http://labs.thinkbroadband.com/local/?area=eng http://labs.thinkbroadband.com/local/?area=eng Probably a chicken and egg problem, why upgrade to fibre many people will think when you have no need for it apart from slightly faster large file downloads
  - georgerobinson 11y ago
    Thanks for the link! If 94% of the population can subscribe to BT's FTTC service and get at least 25Mbps then the state of broadband in the UK is much better than I had previously thought. That said, 25Mb/s is at the lower end of the FTTC service. I can imagine a lot of households will max out at around 40Mbps due to distance from the cabinet and cross-talk on busy lines (though vectoring should help somewhat). I would like to see what G.FAST can deliver but unshielded copper phone lines can only take you so far.
    - martinald 11y ago
      Don't forget that ~50% can get up to 300mbit/sec (by the end of the year) with Virgin Media. And probably 2-3% more can get direct FTTP with Hyperoptic, BT or Sky/TalkTalk or other altnets.

by knorby 11y ago

chambo622 11y ago

The Shield is an amazingly good device but it will never sell at anything near the rate of Apple TV. It's targeted toward gamers and enthusiasts, many of whom already have a console already.

urda 11y ago

Most homes are not 4K ready and are not anywhere near it at this time. Not really a hurting point in this market.

cheald 11y ago
I generally agree with you, but Apple's brand image is "luxury"; it does seem odd that what is ostensibly a premium brand would not be targeting premium features. To put it another way, people who have 4k TVs today - the luxury market - may be put off of the new Apple TV because of its lack of support for their higher-end devices. I'm not sure that's a desirable effect.
- aaronbrethorst 11y ago
  Apple's brand image is "luxury" That's their image, but supporting 4k would probably add a few bucks to the cost of the Apple TV, which would be unacceptable to Tim Cook. 4k will be included when it's achieved decent market penetration.
- JohnBooty 11y ago
  I don't know if their brand image can be defined that easily. They sell their stuff at Wal-Mart, after all.
- makomk 11y ago
  Especially since it's not that expensive a feature anymore. There's actually a $15 Pi-like ARM board called the Orange Pi PC that does 4k, because apparently ARM media SoCs with 4k support are that cheap that you can put one in a bargain-basement board that's not even aimed at media applications. Admittedly it's restricted to 30 FPS at 4k, but still, I'm sure Apple could do better if they wanted to.
- rsynnott 11y ago
  They've done this before; the ATV1 didn't support 1080p, at a time when 1080p TVs were starting to exist in the semi-mainstream (though the vast majority of the market was 720p or 1080i still), but there was little content for them. Ultimately, it'd presumably add cost for a feature useful to few people. Connectivity for 4k also remains a mess; there's HDMI 1.4 (24hz at 4k, so not good enough; the interface presumably runs at 60fps like all other Apple interfaces), and HDMI 2.0, which does support 60hz at 4k, but which is somewhat rare, and has its own problems: http://www.avsforum.com/forum/168-hdmi-q-one-connector-world/1523994-hdmi-2-0-cedia-webinar.html http://www.avsforum.com/forum/168-hdmi-q-one-connector-world... I expect in a couple of years when 4k TVs are more common, content exists for them in significant amounts, and the connector standard (possibly HDMI 2.0a?) is sorted out, they'll support it.
- lobster_johnson 11y ago
  I get where you're going, but I would argue that Apple's brand image isn't luxury at all. Apple sits squarely in the mid-to-high end bracket — anyone who's essentially "middle class" can afford Apple products, and their pricing indicates this. Examples of luxury brands that few people can afford: Hermes bags, Lambourghini cars, Cartier watches.
  - t0mbstone 11y ago
    You can buy a 50 inch 4K TV right now for only $750. http://www.amazon.com/VIZIO-M50-C1-50-Inch-Ultra-Smart/dp/B00T63YUJO http://www.amazon.com/VIZIO-M50-C1-50-Inch-Ultra-Smart/dp/B0... That puts 4K squarely in the "middle class" market, if you ask me, and if Apple TV doesn't support it, that means they aren't even targeting middle class. They are basically targeting poor people with an expensive luxury item that can run apps (half of which, like Netflix and Hulu, already run on most users' smart TVs). Their marketing strategy is borderline nonsensical.
  - rsynnott 11y ago
    I think it fits squarely into the 'affordable luxury' armed; it's kind of the equivalent of, say, Bosch or Neff for kitchen appliances. A little bit more expensive than the entry level brands, and not really that different, but it looks good, and the oven door feels a bit more solid. Apple's certainly not in the true luxury segment, except arguably with the gold watch.
- derefr 11y ago
  There's a difference between "luxury" and (the visual equivalent of) "audiophile." People with money to waste buy Beats headphones, not Sennheisers. Thus why Apple acquired the former instead of the latter. Targeting the high-market buyer doesn't usually imply making your product capable of doing all the latest and greatest bleeding-edge things and beating the competition in a highest-numbers contest, any more than BMW sells its products as race-cars. Of course, some rich people are racing-car enthusiasts, or audiophiles, or whatever else—and it seems to be more common in the high-end, simply because more of the rich can afford to actually get these things when they want them. But that doesn't mean that the desire is a rich-people thing, or that making something super-duper-high-numbered will make it sell more to the rich. (Of course, if you give the thing a super-duper-high-numbered price tag, you might inspire some rich people to get it as a Veblen good, which can often look like a desire for the bleeding-edge. You'll frequently find things purchased in this way being underutilized—4K "Veblen TVs" purchased in order to watch 480p Seinfeld re-runs and so on.)
knorby 11y ago
I can't argue with that, but the Apple TV will hit obsolescence much quicker, particularly as 4K becomes more prevalent. I just find it odd that Apple totally excludes the higher end of the market...Android TV has a range of options at least.
t0mbstone 11y ago
It's completely unacceptable for the new Apple TV not to support 4K, when both Netflix and Amazon are releasing 4K content now. On top of that, the new iPhones can record in 4K, and the new iPad can edit 4K videos. You can buy a 50 inch 4K TV nowadays for under $1,000. 4K is going to explode in the next year or two, and if the new Apple TV doesn't support it, I won't be buying it. Period.
- elif 11y ago
  I agree. I paid $600 for my 52 inch 4K... and it's not a cheap Chinese one, it's a samsung smart tv with native streaming, voice command, and multi-axis remote.. They are going to miss the boat if 4k explodes this black friday.
- rsynnott 11y ago
  > 4K is going to explode in the next year or two At which time they will no doubt support it. Right now it'd be an extra expense of use to very few users, and they'd have to deal with the connectivity problem.
- nsxwolf 11y ago
  What's the point of 4K on a TV again? So you can walk up to it and say "ooooh!", then go sit down and have it look like 1080p? Is that brief standing-too-close moment worth the massive increase in bandwidth required?
  - t0mbstone 11y ago
    Watch 4K content on a 75 inch screen, then play 1080p content on that same screen. The difference in clarity is huge. The only reason you can't tell the difference is because you are probably watching 1080p content that is being upscaled. Watch TRUE 4K content on a 65+ inch television, and it's like looking through window. It's amazing.
    - nsxwolf 11y ago
      At what viewing distance, though? I have a 65 inch 1080p set that I sit 12 feet from. Without my glasses, I can't tell the difference between 1080p and 480p at that distance.

dharma1 11y ago

Hey, need to leave something for next year's version ;)

xngzng 11y ago

I guess A8 chip can not handle 4k streaming or to the good user experience level Apple like. Apple TV uses older chip. It appears A9 in iPhone 6S can handle 4K thus you will see 4K support in next model. Anyway 4K content is not mainstream yet.

georgerobinson 11y ago

This is a genuine question. How many households do you suppose have an Internet connection that can support 4K? I don't know the answer for the USA, but I can see from a Ofcom report published at the start of the year, about 68% of households in the UK would not be able to stream 4K on Netflix due to insufficient broadband speed. Just 1/3 of households have connections with 30Mb/s or more (http://media.ofcom.org.uk/news/2015/broadband-speeds-november2014/ http://media.ofcom.org.uk/news/2015/broadband-speeds-novembe...). I'm not saying this a valid excuse for omitting 4K support. However, for the most part I don't think the infrastructure is really there for the wider population. I live out in the sticks and barely get 3Mbps. Perhaps we might see 4K come to the Apple TV next year either as a software upgrade on current hardware or with better GPU/CPU to support it.

martinald 11y ago
30% may subscribe but nearly 90% (in England) have it available to them: http://labs.thinkbroadband.com/local/?area=eng http://labs.thinkbroadband.com/local/?area=eng Probably a chicken and egg problem, why upgrade to fibre many people will think when you have no need for it apart from slightly faster large file downloads
- georgerobinson 11y ago
  Thanks for the link! If 94% of the population can subscribe to BT's FTTC service and get at least 25Mbps then the state of broadband in the UK is much better than I had previously thought. That said, 25Mb/s is at the lower end of the FTTC service. I can imagine a lot of households will max out at around 40Mbps due to distance from the cabinet and cross-talk on busy lines (though vectoring should help somewhat). I would like to see what G.FAST can deliver but unshielded copper phone lines can only take you so far.
  - martinald 11y ago
    Don't forget that ~50% can get up to 300mbit/sec (by the end of the year) with Virgin Media. And probably 2-3% more can get direct FTTP with Hyperoptic, BT or Sky/TalkTalk or other altnets.