Apple has now made it even easier to order movies directly from the sofa. Now, I love this for the “coolness factor” and for the fact that you don’t necessarily have to have a separate iTunes Server. However, I would be concerned that this would keep the laziest geeks on the couch with only the sporadic need to use the bathroom or satisfy those pesky cravings for food and beer.
One serious concern that I would have is the amount of space needed to store any descent size video library directly on the Apple TV. The smaller Apple TV Hard Drive is 40 GB…The largest capacity hard drive in any current Apple TV is 160 GB. Although you could fit a substantial number of movies on this unit, I wouldn’t be surprised if Apple released a 250 GB version in the near future. They recently launched a 250 GB upgrade option to the Macbook and standard 250 GB on the Macbook pro lines.. Will the Apple TV follow? We could also hope that sometime they add DVR functionality. I would expect that if Apple keeps the “hobby” going there will be incremental updates sometime soon. Apple TV sells for $224.99 on Amazon and $229.99 on Apple’s Web Site.
Actually, given the size of my iTunes library, I would hope we could have a 500Gb Apple TV now….
I would like to see DVR functionality from Apple TV as well. I got Google TV through the Logitech Revue from DISH Network because I work for them and knew they sell the Revue for much less than anyone else. The things I like most about Google TV are the apps. They have apps for Netflix, Pandora and even Twitter. Users can browse the internet using Google Chrome, watch videos on YouTube, or stream photos in HD from any photo sharing site. Now that’s what I call coolness factor!