Kate

What I don’t realize, is why everyone fails to see Apple’s potential. If Apple really wants to deliver a deadly blow to the nether regions of Microsoft, why not compete with the XBox itself? Apple is innovative to such an extent that it could easily leap into the next (or current) generation of consoles, bringing such brilliant innovations that even the Wii looks weak by comparison. I’m sure the folks at Apple could put their creativity to such a use.

I don’t think there’s any real validity to the ideas presented in that post. Just my opinion, but Apple has no reason to enter the video game market, and I don’t see it happening any time soon.

http://www.appleinsider.com/article.php?id=2282

I wouldn’t count your chickens…

Music and MP3s! oh my!

All they need to do is add sspport for non-MS codecs such as DivX/Xvid and I can dump my ShowCenter and never need to look at iTV.

MS is pursuing the gamer market as their toehold in the living room but for most consumers, it’s a non starter – not even on the radar.

First to market with rentals that disappear 24 hours after you start to watch it … this is a hobbled offering. No wonder the studios think it’s safe – it is, but it won’t make them much money.

If I want to get rid of cable, I also need a way to stream my college basketball games live to me. That also means looking at season passes for many tv shows that my family watches. So much for cheap…it’s not.

Sorry folks. This all sounds cool and all but it’s still going to be for those with money to burn. My 5th gen iPod on the other hand was well worth it and is proving to be a bargain for what I get out of it. Yes, I buy songs via itunes due to buying singles at a buck a pop and the convenience. Podcasts were the big seller though as I listen to them everyday. In my car I’ve not used the radio since last xmas just before I got the ipod.

Looking at it overall I’m having a hard time thus far seeing where the value of iTV, xbox360, and others come in if the expectations are for it all to grow like the ipod and online music did. It seems to me that perhaps not being first might not be so bad afterall.

1) You only need a Gold subscription to play multiplayer games and get “exclusive content” videos don’t fall under that category.

2) We can’t play games ALL the time

3) It’s here, it works, and it works nicely

4) It has _content_

5) Did I mention it is here?

The Xbox Live marketplace however is a great way to get video. You don’t have to worry about sharing bandwidth during a game because the download will pause while playing games and resume as soon as the Xbox is idle again.

In my opinion the Xbox has these advantages over the iTV device.
1) HD content iTunes videos are currently lower then DVD quality. I’m not paying for that.
2) It integrates with a Media Center PC. iTunes and iTV offer no PVR functionality out of the box. Unlike Steve Jobs I think this is important.
3) Xbox 360 also plays games
4) Free Xbox Live Silver account tracks friends, has voice and video chat, etc.. Right from you living room couch. I don’t think iTV will support iChat etc..

I think the iTV would have been a great device 6 months ago with a built in PVR, but as it is my money is on the Xbox 360 and Media Center.

I don’t think it actually compares to the XBox anyway. The target is different. It might sound ridiculous but I think that who wants to watch movies and pictures on his/her TV set won’t buy a game console. It’s pretty much the same concept as mp3 players: the iPod does only one thing, fairly well, well integrated in the apple platform. It sells.

I don’t understand people waiting for Apple to fall down and Microsoft conquering the last small percent of the market. I don’t understand the opposite argument either.
It’s just about consumer electronics. Just a cheap (in production) piece of plastic that powers up and entertains you in different ways. It’s not rocket science, it doesn’t save lives, it doesn’t help the designers to get the Nobel prize and it doesn’t make the mankind go one single step forward. It’s just a device, who cares who makes it, if you like it you buy it, if your friend likes the other this doesn’t make him either smarter nor more stupid.

Just my 2 cents.

PS: I recently tried the RC2 of Vista for development purposes. It sucks. It’s the worst piece of crap I’ve ever seen especially if I think how long it took to make it and how many smart people work at Microsoft. If that OS picks up, it’ll bring the mankind back in the medioeval ages.

The only reason the studios are going to the Xbox is that since it’s not on a computer, they assume it’s safer. It also probably has DRM, it’s not portable to anything else, and it’s essentially movie rentals.

No wonder the studios are flocking to Microsoft’s platform. That’s what they’ve been waiting for.

However, I am interested in streaming the contents of my Mac to my TV, and controlling it from the TV. I have an Airport Express that I use all the time, and love it. The obvious downside being that I have to go in the room where my Mac is to change songs [yeah, I know, get a laptop]. What we know about iTV so far, resolves that, and a lot more. Is that worth $299? Maybe.

What would make iTV a monster success for me, and probably in the marketplace, would be add-on hardware modules that would be networked and accessible by other iTV units in the house, and obviously Macs and PCs running iTunes. For example, an external hard drive that stacks under iTV. And, a digital TV tuner. Maybe a DVD player. This would give me multi-room DVR capability and placeshifting like a Slingbox, among other things.

After downloading the update for my 360 I was having a browse through the system to see what changes were made. I came across a greyed out menu that inferred that Zune inegration was already in place. I didn’t fully check it out, it’s not of much interest to me since i have no intention of buying a Zune. Just thougt I’d mention it.

In addition to this everyone seems to think that to stream an HD signal with any degree of reliability over that said wireless network will need to be using the next generation of wireless which the iTV supposedly contains but the XBOX currently lacks.

Anyway, I’m sticking with my XBOX Media Center rig, it’s cheap and it works like a dream : P