AppleTV - A Story of Bandwidth...

This month I picked my latest (and possibly last... but more on that later) piece of gear for my home theatre setup, an AppleTV. Since having Foxtel I've cut down on the number of DVDs/Blurays I've been buying as most of the new releases I've been catching on the Foxtel Box Office. Although the sound quality on the Foxtel Service is not as high as some (but not actually that many) of the  Blu Rays (Dolby Digital vs TrueHD) realistically it's rare that I could have it at a volume level that it would make a difference.  This is where the AppleTV comes in.

Having never been big on *ahem* downloading movies I've never gone down the path of having a media server for my system. iTunes, however now offers a pretty wide variety of new release and older movies for download/streaming which makes the AppleTV pretty attractive. The cost of new releases is about the same as Foxtel (both SD and HD) but the big advantage of iTunes is they don't disappear off the watchable list after a period of time, they just get cheaper. You can also choose to download the movie on a more perminent basis for about the same price as a DVD.

The interface is great and you can start the movie as soon as you've queued enough of the show, which is surprising quick even with HD content (which is lucky as waiting for the full movie in HD to download could take a while... see D). I think it would even pass the Parental test for interface.

The big key though is that it's not just iTunes content available it also has all the podcasts and youtube videos so if you don't feel like shelling out for itunes content.

The only downside would be it's bandwidth sucking capabilities... 

My monthly usage

A - BSG Finale Episodes

B - Mad Men Series one and Eagle Eye

C - Dr Horrible's Sing along Blog

D - Prince Caspian in HD

Total - approx 19GB

On the plus side though I'm with iiNet which gives you all downloads from iTunes for free.

Overall I'm really happy with the unit, the interface is great and the range of TV, Movies, Podcasts and Youtube gives you endless viewing potential... oh and i almost forgot... the trailers.... so many trailers.

The reason it's probably the last gadget for my setup is because I've really run out of things I could possibly want.... JB Hifi is dead to me