AppleTVHacks.net and FatWallet.com have teamed up to offer a $1000 bounty for the first team to get an Apple TV to use an external USB drive for storage.

The bounty will be won by the first team to submit a verified process and patch, within the rules:

• Patch must allow a USB hard drive, plugged into the Apple TV’s USB port to act as the default and primary storage for the Apple TV.
• The Apple TV must still boot from the internal drive and cannot use a complete replacement OS (the kernel may be patched, and additional kexts added).
• Patch must allow the media to be accessed as it would be were the internal drive being used (i.e if you couldn’t see their was a USB drive attached you wouldn’t know).
• Patch must be able to be applied without opening the case.
• Patch must be able to be removed (and the Apple TV to original configuration) without opening the case.
• No commercial files can be used asides from those found on the Apple TV or Mac OS X Intel. All others must be freely and legally distributable.
• The process cannot have been previously published, or demonstrated / distributed publicly.
• Judges decision is final.

As usual entries should be made to submissions@appletvhacks.net, with the subject “USB Bounty”. Questions in the comments, please.

To get started, take a look at the USB page over at the AwkwardTV Wiki, ask questions at the Hackint0sh forums or in IRC at #awkwardtv on irc.moofspeak.net.

FatWallet.com, sponsors of the bounty, offers Cash Back shopping and Coupons for many of the best online stores, and is home to one of the leading shopping forums on the web. Big thanks to them!

Wired have a story about the as yet unusued USB port seen on the back of the Apple TV. From the article:

Apple TV is all shiny and wonderful and hard to find, but it does have a few shortcomings, such as hard drive too small to hold more than a few HD movies.

Apple bloggers and analysts suspect that may not be a problem for long, noting the as-yet unitilized USB port on the set-top box and recent talks between Apple and Miglia, which makes a variety of TV and VoIP accessories for Macs and PCs.

All the Miglia products have disappeared from the Apple Store, so it seems something could be in the works. Rumors are abound.