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Apple TV |OT|
- Thread starter wachie
- Start date
infiniteloop
Member
Yup. Looks good
LordOfChaos
Member
it being so much thicker makes me wonder what's going on inside. It's "just" an A8, but...Maybe a heatsink and fan to push it as far as it goes? Doesn't seem like the new port layout is solely responsible.
Then again, could be for better wifi/bluetooth, like the super tall Airport Extreme. And there's no visible vents.
Then again, could be for better wifi/bluetooth, like the super tall Airport Extreme. And there's no visible vents.
badcrumble
Member
Yep. It's sad but this same logic also applies to a controller that's better for gaming.
The remote for controlling tv volume.
But the device itself has no IR control?
It does but idk what it would be used for other than tv volume.
If true, that's highly disappointing ... and doesn't make this a good fit for many higher end setups.
What do you want to control with IR?
ironically (from many in here), I hope Volume works over bluetooth also 
Hitting volume over IR will work with my TV (hitting CEC on my receiver), but would be even nicer if it worked over bluetooth to just send my receiver the CEC message directly. eliminate all LOS issues.
Hitting volume over IR will work with my TV (hitting CEC on my receiver), but would be even nicer if it worked over bluetooth to just send my receiver the CEC message directly. eliminate all LOS issues.
LordOfChaos
Member
For the UI? Sure. For games? You can always use more power for the same panel resolution and spend it on different effects and filtering.
7th gen consoles, now mostly dabbling *under* 720p, have 190-240Gflops GPUs. The A8 was under 100, the A8X would just be closing on parity with 10 year old console hardware at 230, albeit with newer shader types. There's plenty else that goes into GPU performance of course, but using those for ballparks. In other more specific metrics things can look even less pretty (pixel fill, texture fill, bandwidth, etc) .
http://www.anandtech.com/show/8554/the-iphone-6-review/4
http://www.anandtech.com/show/8666/the-apple-ipad-air-2-review/2
And an existing smart TV box, the Shield TV, destroys the A8X, let alone the A8 in this.
I know gaming is more of a bonus than a focus on the ATV. Just would have been nice to at least have A8X or A9.
Marty Chinn
Member
High end setups aren't going to want to use the Apple TV remote. They'll want to control it through other means. So to answer your question, the Apple TV.
Sounds gross. But apparently it's possible. https://twitter.com/ifraaannk/status/645004794873184256
People with complex systems like using a universal remote.
Currently no universal remotes support voice, so inherently you'd lose that on this, Roku, and Fire TV. However in normal usage it's still preferable to control all other actions via your universal. In reality you aren't using voice search that often so grabbing the standard remote for that isn't a big deal. When actually watching content however - which is obviously what you spend the majority of your time doing - having to constantly switch between the standard remote for controlling the content and your universal or receiver remote for volume or any other functions is painful.
Roku 3 still maintains an IR receiver, and while Fire TV doesn't have one built in, you can use a USB IR receiver along with it. This isn't a theoretical quibble, I am using this feature daily.
What sounds gross, using a universal remote?
Ummm ... just the opposite. The point of a universal remote in a complex setup is that it makes usability far better lol. Having a basket full of remotes that need to all be used for even basic functions is what's gross.
As far as CEC goes, unfortunately that's pretty much unsable in complex systems. It's implementation is simply too inconsistent and problematic between different devices. It's a nice idea, but the CE's haven't done it right. Moreover, all that's been indicated as working is volume on your TV. Even if that works correctly it isn't what's needed here.
If only CEC was actually usable in complex systems.ironically (from many in here), I hope Volume works over bluetooth also
Marty Chinn
Member
Not gross at all. What's gross is the idea of having to use multiple remotes again. That tweet just says you can use it to control the TV, not that a universal remote can control the Apple TV.
No it doesn't. It says he can control his Apple TV with his tv remote, which I assume is universal.
And it sounds gross to me because I think many people will make use of Siri, which will require the Apple TV remote anyway. I can imagine the interface being slower to navigate as well without the touchpad.
That would only be helpful in a small subset of serious systems. Most people aren't controlling their volume by way of the TV.
The majority of your time is spent viewing content, not searching. During playback the most commonly used functions are controlling the playback (FF, REW, pause, Instant Replay, etc) and audio. During that time period, a single remote is preferable.
Volume? Who said anything about volume. The tweet said he can control the Apple TV itself, like you can with older models already.
Using CEC ... not IR.
No I'm pretty sure it's IR, as that's how harmony remotes control the old Apple TV.
What tweet are you looking at? The one you linked confirmed it's using CEC.
Marty Chinn
Member
The tweet says:
Where does he say Apple TV?
Many people don't have quality setups or fancy remotes. They deal with the gross fact of using multiple remotes.
Marty Chinn
Member
It has an apple logo before the TV part.
Apple logo doesn't show up for me. It just says TV when I click on it.
The one by frank. You're looking at the one by Lawrence, which is inaccurate because all commands aren't passed through CEC.
It has an apple logo before the TV part.
It doesn't matter ... look at the tweets below it
It's using CEC, which unfortunately isn't useful in most complex systems.
Marty Chinn
Member
The one by Frank doesn't say it's IR.
See where it says Learn Remote? That's the third party remote IR function: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201856
Well, it's there for those of us on Apple devices.
Via the conference, they explicitly state it can control your TV or Receiver volume and inputs via CEC.
All previous Apple TV's were IR controlled. The new one is not, and there's been no confirmation they are keeping an IR port to support legacy or 3rd party IR remotes. And given Apple history, there's little reason to assume they'd keep it. Much the opposite.
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201254
The 'Learn Remote' does sound promising, but until its functionality is confirmed ... can't state whether it will be a solution or not.
How quaint
everything you say is true of course. One point I'd like to make though is that the previous A8X performance benchmarks we have is for chips clocked and stepped to work with battery power. I really want to see benchmarks on this box, assuming apple has it beefed up slightly from constant AC power. Of course it will just be "closing the gap" further with gen7 consoles.. but still... closer performance, (720p rendering?), newer shaders... you "should" be able to put out some real games with this thing (well, not taking into account apple's horrendous touch control mandate)
I think "isn't useful" is a pretty broad overstatement. "isn't consistent" is much more apropos. When CEC works it's a god send. Fortunately between my Denon AVR, Bravia TV and compatible connected devices (mainly PS3 and PS4 right now), CEC pretty much works as advertised. Hoping for similar with Apple TV.
That's not correct. All the hands on articles after confirmed volume was through IR. That's why there's a transmitter on the remote. The only thing Cue confirmed at the keynote was that CEC is used to turn on devices and switch input.Via the conference, they explicitly state it can control your TV or Receiver volume and inputs via CEC.
All previous Apple TV's were IR controlled. The new one is not, and there's been no confirmation they are keeping an IR port to support legacy or 3rd party IR remotes. And given Apple history, there's little reason to assume they'd keep it. Much the opposite.
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201254
The 'Learn Remote' does sound promising, but until its functionality is confirmed ... can't state whether it will be a solution or not.
How quaint
And yes it's still unconfirmed what the IR receiver does, but what other reason is there to include it?
Marty Chinn
Member
I can understand where he's coming from. By not being consistent and unreliable, it'll likely get turned off to avoid any accidental changes. So the fact that you can't rely on it and you turn it off anyway means it is essentially not useful in more complicated setups.
Confirmation that older Apple TV IR remotes can control it: https://twitter.com/stroughtonsmith/status/644978513578225665
I don't see why a harmony wouldn't be able to then.
I don't see why a harmony wouldn't be able to then.
blu
Wants the largest console games publisher to avoid Nintendo's platforms.
Unless they migrated to a better fab node (unlikely), A8 is rated at 1.5GHz. And it never throttled in the ipad, so we can't expect any wins from less throttling and such.
Theoreticall, they may have overclocked it to 1.6GHz or thereabout, though (tall headspreaders, etc).
Apple TV 4 has IR Receiver built in. Remote has IR output. It's on the feature list on Apple's homepage.Via the conference, they explicitly state it can control your TV or Receiver volume and inputs via CEC.
All previous Apple TV's were IR controlled. The new one is not, and there's been no confirmation they are keeping an IR port to support legacy or 3rd party IR remotes. And given Apple history, there's little reason to assume they'd keep it. Much the opposite.
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201254
The 'Learn Remote' does sound promising, but until its functionality is confirmed ... can't state whether it will be a solution or not.
How quaint
Within the context of controlling your system, there is no difference. If it isn't consistent, it doesn't work. I'm glad it works on your system, but I never said it doesn't work for anyone. I said in most complex systems it doesn't work sufficiently. The more device you have in the chain, the more likely things are to go south.
Speaking of broad, I think you need to actually look at the situation a bit more broadly. Let's say in a given system the Apple TV actually does work with CEC. The question then becomes do all your other devices work properly with CEC? If not, you are still running into the situation where you have to turn off CEC across the board because having it on causes problems when using other devices.
This is of course before considering not everyone actually has CEC across the necessary devices for the Apple TV to work (or for convenience, your other devices).
So in all 3 of these cases, you'd want IR to fall back on since it's the standard used by universal remotes.
Alrighty! This is the confirmation we've been looking for.
Thank you. If it has IR and takes the same command, we should be good.
While not a complaint towards Apple per se (as most other CE's don't offer it either) ... I really wish more devices included a 3.5mm IR port.
Works soooooo much better than using IR transmitters taped to IR receivers or hoping an IR blaster gets the job done. I spent the better part of my weekend screwing around with my setup lol.
Works soooooo much better than using IR transmitters taped to IR receivers or hoping an IR blaster gets the job done. I spent the better part of my weekend screwing around with my setup lol.
I noticed it under tech specs when you had mentioned it as in the feature list a few posts back.
Wasn't aware it was up on the site earlier, which is why I asked the question.
Clearly if anyone else in this conversation was aware of it being there they would have linked to it instead of citing Tweets lol
I had looked on the main page for it and searched for IR / Infrared ... nothing.
sort of... often you can just turn off the offending devices I believe. Almost positive I can turn off any of my four existing devices independently if I needed to. Though that may come down to individual manufacturer.
but yeah, I may have just lucked out with my Bravia TV and Denon AVR working beautifully together. The end result is anything registered as a "player" in the CEC chain is actually on the other end of the chain from the TV, nowhere in the middle. CEC will even work on HDMI-passthru with the receiver turned off.. So all sound will route to the TV, volume on the device will adjust volume on the TV, etc.
Well sure, but that defeats the purpose. If your goal is to have one remote you can use a majority of the time, having to turn off CEC on some of your devices means you no longer can use one remote.
Of course the corollary is if some of your devices do not support IR, you then don't have the option to use a universal remote as your single remote either. Hence the prior discussion.
I don't think you're alone in this since it sounds like you have a relatively simple setup.
I would add though that CEC as an overall concept has an inherent issue in its present state. Even if we assume you have CEC on all your devices and they all play well together, it's not like any of the remotes that come with your devices that you'd use as the master remote have a ton of programmability. So what you are left with is only the most basic controls over CEC. And because of that there's a chicken and egg situation where no manufacturers are actually programming the ability to access advanced features and controls over CEC.
Granted I'm not familiar with how they implemented the master / slave command issuing of CEC across devices, so the above may not even be possible. But let's assume it is. The problem is the current usage is to only allow access the most basic of features - volume control, input switching, D-pad, etc. So even in a perfect world of everything you have 'working' , it's inherently inferior to IR in terms of what you can do with it.
Mr. Wonderful
Member
My bet is giant-ass heat sink. No way Apple would include a fan. Also, no vents for a fan?
Mr. Wonderful
Member
This post is full of misinformation. The A8 ran at 1.4GHz in the iPhone 6 and 6S. Only the trip-core 1.5GHz A8X was previously included in the iPad. A higher binned/upgraded A8 with 2GB of RAM running at 1.5GHz is in the new iPad Mini.
We don't know the clock speed of the A8 running in the new AppleTV yet, only that it has 2GB of RAM, so it likely at least runs at the 1.5GHz of the new Mini.
PhoncipleBone
Banned
Thank god. I am using an old Harmony 600 and want to upgrade eventually, but don't have a great need yet. Hopefully they do some updates to the Ultimate and add a mic to it.