Second generation Apple TV is here

by tomek on September 1, 2010

IMG 1256 Second generation Apple TV is here

There was one more thing coming at the end of Steve’s show today and this time it was one more HOBBY… The new Apple TV is here! This tiny matte-black box (80% smaller than the previous generation) will stream HD (720p) movies for $4,99 and commercial free TV shows for 99 cents  (ABC, ABC Family, Fox, Disney Channel and BBC America are on board;  all rentals, no purchases) and your Netflix content if you are a subscriber. It has HDMI, Ethernet, USB and optical audio ports, Bluetooth and dual band WiFi (802.11 b/g/n at 2.4GHz and 802.11 a/n at 5GHz). There will be no local storage. AirPlay – the new feature that will come with iOS 4.2 in November – will let you to stream movies from any iOS device to your HDTV through the Apple TV. It will be shipping within 4 weeks for the “breakthrough “ price of just $99.

There was one more thing coming at the end of Steve’s show today and this time it was one more HOBBY. The new Apple TV is here! This tiny matte-black box (80% smaller than the previous generation) will stream HD (720p) movies for $4,99 and commercial free TV shows for 99 cents  (ABC, ABC Family, Fox, Disney Channel and BBC America are on board;  all rentals, no purchases) and your Netflix content if you are a subscriber. It has HDMI, Ethernet, USB and optical audio ports, Bluetooth and dual band WiFi (802.11 b/g/n at 2.4GHz and 802.11 a/n at 5GHz). There will be no local storage. AirPlay – the new feature that will come with iOS 4.2 in November – will let you to stream movies from any iOS device to your HDTV through the Apple TV. It will be shipping within 4 weeks for the “breakthrough “ price of just $99.

    Tagged as: 720p, ABC, AirPlay, apple, Fox, hd, iOS, iOS 4.2, netflix, new apple tv, second generation apple tv, TV shows

    • Do not ask

      anyone got xbmc or boxee ported to the iOS yet?

    • Guest

      I wonder if this will be hackable via ATV flash

    • http://twitter.com/mmarkomarko Marko Nesovic

      I may be completely off the mark here, but due to the presence of a USB port, I am thinking that this thing is more like the old AppleTV than an iphone with no screen. AMD Fusion (with macos rather than ios) suddenly seems more feasible than it did a few days ago!

    • Shotaway

      i wonder if there will be an OS update for the older AppleTVs that are going to allow for many if not all of the same features….

    • Do not ask

      I know I stocked up on a few more last month just to be “ready” for this.

    • Mrrippey

      the new aTV has a usb port (although it is a microUSB port) it has one. Did they mention if it is running on an A4 chip and running iOS? I have not read that anywhere…..yet.

    • Guest

      I'm in the US until october, after that it will be back to europe for me.
      Do you know if the old Apple TV was everywhere the same in the world?
      Basically what I am asking is what are the chances the power supply will be a 50/60Hz one that I might take the new Apple TV with me and use it europe?

    • http://twitter.com/nitoTV nitoTV

      No this will not be hackable with any of the current methodologies, none of the current plugins will run either it is an A4 processor which runs ARM and not x86. Don't get excited about that USB port, it is a MicroUSB port meaning this is a USB device and not a USB host. The hacking will probably have to be done via hooking the AppleTV up like a hard drive, and I doubt it will be as easy as the original one. While this probably does run some flavor of iOS it is clearly not identical.

    • http://twitter.com/nitoTV nitoTV

      better stock up on the old ATV's while you can, it will be a while before the new one is as useful as the old one (if ever)

    • http://www.facebook.com/tonyvarin Tony Varin

      Unfortunately, Engadget somehow confirmed that the old AppleTV will not be getting an update to the software. I'm sure prices will update, but who cares about that on this site? I'm sure people will find a way to get netflix (the only thing I cared about) on the old apple tv (fingers crossed). the iPod/iPhone/iPad streaming to the AppleTV was cool too.

    • Nicko

      It is a Micro-A, a Micro-B or a Micro-AB socket? It's hard to tell from the photos since they all look very similar indeed. If it's an A or an AB then it can act as a host, if it's a B or an AB it can operate as a USB device. I suspect that since it's is presumed that the device runs iOS it probably connects for a Mac for “service and support” just like an iPhone or iPod Touch does connects. If someone works out how to get the device into 'recovery mode' then some tool like iRecovery will allow low-level access and someone is going to need to find a 'JailBreak' for this device just like every other iOS device.

    • http://profiles.yahoo.com/u/CKG2W4DZSVOAI53TPPUXOUJAFI Jo

      it must be running on iOS with that chip. so can it be jailbroken? have to wait and see …

    • http://twitter.com/nitoTV nitoTV

      Thats a good point, and where you are showing superior knowledge in your USB hardware because I've never seen one of those MicroUSB act as anything but B. Either way this device, as expected, is an underwhelming disappointment.

    • Eneasgar

      The power supply is 50/60Hz, 110~240 V, so it works in Europe. I've done that myself, so it's guarantied!

    • Geronymo

      i read this and think: no need for the features unless its jailbroken.
      yeah. a stunning photo slideshow is what everybody needs!
      “cool” ? hmm.. that means, i cannot cook on the ATV anymore? sad ;-> i sold my cooker…

    • EV

      I don’t know why they would remove purchasing for those who are linked to a computer. Although tv rentals make sense, I like to buy whole seasons of some of the kids shows for my daughter so she can watch them during trips, etc., and she’ll watch some of the episodes several times. Can’t do that with rentals. Guess I’ll stick with my old ATV for now.

    • Hmcknight

      I'm guessing any purchases will have to be streamed from a Mac, iPad, etc. I liked how the old Apple TV (gen. 2, I guess?) was able to be more or less independent from the computer.

      Still, it looks cool and is affordable.

    • TinkerTenor

      I just don’t understand why they decided to remove the “Buy Now” button. If they have streaming of TV Shows ready to go, then why can’t we buy an episode for $1.99 or $2.99, watch it on AppleTV via streaming, and then have the purchase available for download the next time we start up iTunes? Seems like the whole “rentals only” model is only reducing the functionality of the device. And why should I pay $0.99 to give something away?! For one more dollar I can have that episode forever. Saving a buck to throw it away in 24 hours seems like bad math to me…

    • davilla

      it's micro-b, you can tell by the wedge shape, micro-a is rectangular.

    • Sam

      I remember seeing a hack somewhere that allowed the old apple TV to run a full installation of OS X. It's too bad that the A4 chip will probably make that impossible on this new one — an ultra tiny sub-$100 mac would have been amazing.

    • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_N35LMCMZDRKRDR4W5RNVW7CYXA Irritated in Inwood

      I just don't understand why they decided to remove the “Buy Now” button. If they have streaming of TV Shows ready to go, then why can't we buy an episode for $1.99 or $2.99, watch it on AppleTV via streaming, and then have the purchase available for download the next time we start up iTunes? Seems like the whole “rentals only” model is only reducing the functionality of the device. And why should I pay $0.99 to give something away?! For one more dollar I can have that episode forever. Saving a buck to throw it away in 24 hours seems like bad math to me…

    • Dan

      Because without internal storage, it would be impossible to buy and store multiple shows. As for renting, only 1 show need be streamed at a time, which I think would require very little storage for buffering and holding the OS.

    • radovich

      Apple tv is useful. I won’t buy an apple tv, unless apple provide outstanding content for apple tv user which is different with ipad and iphone users. When I used apple tv, pc, apple tv, tv are necessary, I can do this with ipad as jobs did in its highly-anticipated press event, September 1st. So “Are you tempted by the new Apple TV?” Obviously, no! But according to ifunia news blog new iPods, iTunes 10 are charming.

    • Netshadow33

      Hi, actually some of the calculators from TI have B or AB microUSB ports as you can connect two calculators to each other using a mini to miniUSB cable. I heard you are able to play Battleship this way using two calculators but I've never really gotten into this too much as I found this to be too nerdy. I still hope the AppleTV will gain some more functionality using a “jailbreak” or something like it.

    • Mickalenoflynn

      From aTV forums… http://forum.atvflash.com/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=3502

      aTV Flash will continue to work on the current AppleTV and we will work diligently to add support for the newly announced model. We've already pre-ordered a number of dev units.

      Besides that, we've got some exciting features coming up for the current AppleTVs that should be available while we wait for the new models to arrive.

    • Irritated in Inwood

      I think you missed my point. The device doesn’t need to store it. Just add the episode to my iTunes store account to be downloaded later on a device that does have internal storage. Streaming-only simply means I can’t use the ATV to buy anything. And if I want to watch something I already have purchased, then my computer or other iOS device is busy while I watch TV. So now I basically need two devices working at once to do what I used to be able to do with only one using ATV 1G. In case I haven’t made it obvious this seems like a nearly useless device to me. $99 is robbery when I can stream Netflix and/or everything else in my library via my iPhone for free using a $30 cable. If not for this dumb device we could probably stream rentals off of the phone/iPod touch too.

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