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Apple Unveils 'iTV,' Will Ship Q1 2007 [UPDATED]

Tuesday, September 12th, 2006 at 2:00 PM - by

Noting that "it completes the story," Apple CEO Steve Jobs on Tuesday concluded his special presentation in San Francisco by offering a preview of a new device code-named iTV, which will connect to a TV and wirelessly stream video and audio content, as well as pictures, from a computer. Mr. Jobs acknowledged that "we need to come up with a better name" as he unveiled a box that resembled a Mac mini.

The device features HDMI, Wi-Fi, USB 2.0, Ethernet, component video, analog video, and digital audio connectivity. The power supply is built into it, rather than placed outside the device, on the power cord. Users control it with a Front Row remote, and the onscreen interface demonstrated by Mr. Jobs featured a Front Row-like look. Apple expects to ship it during the first quarter of 2007 for US$299.

4:21 PM EST, 9/12/06: Updated article with more information.

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stuartea said:

member since 08 Aug 2005 with 327 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 12, 2006 2:08 pm

They definitely can't leave it as iTV that would be very confusing in the UK : )

"What's on ITV? "Coronation Street", no, eeyee TV mum"

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Biff said:

member since 08 Apr 2004 with 1479 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 12, 2006 2:11 pm

Well that was a pretty pathetic event. I hope it was worth the air fare for everyone covering it.

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Small White Car said:

member since 02 Jul 2004 with 1960 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 12, 2006 2:15 pm

Biff wrote:
Well that was a pretty pathetic event. I hope it was worth the air fare for everyone covering it.

And what's changed in the last hour? This is exactly what we were expecting, no?

Well, except for the iTV thing. I'm very interested in that, although I guess I won't be too interested until 2007, apparently.

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Edison Carter said:

member since 10 Aug 2006 with 228 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 12, 2006 2:17 pm

Bummer that the the iTV will not ship until 2007, would have made a nice Christmas gift.

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BradC said:

member since 29 Apr 2005 with 81 posts, TMO Staff, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 12, 2006 2:46 pm

Pathetic? That's pretty harsh. I thought it was great, except for the conspicuous absence of a widescreen iPod. And I'm not just saying that because I wrote some of these articles. As Small White Car said, it was in line with expectations. Even exceeded them, when you look at iTunes 7 and the iPod games.

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Engine Joe said:

member since 29 Jun 2004 with 413 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 12, 2006 2:52 pm

Biff wrote:
Well that was a pretty pathetic event. I hope it was worth the air fare for everyone covering it.

Hardly. What did you want? Apple to have come up with cold fusion?

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mrmgraphics said:

member since 05 Sep 2003 with 825 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 12, 2006 3:39 pm

+

Pathetic? Hardly. I can't wait to try iTunes 7 (already downloaded), and I'm extremely anxious to check out the 640x480 videos. For me, that's one of the biggest announcements they made today, as the new 640x480 applies to all iTMS (iTS? the download store formerly known as Prince?) video content, including TV shows. I've previously purchased a season #1 Mythbusters, but was disappointed in the video quality (let alone lack of Kari Byron). At least Apple fixed the former. <g> Seriously, I don't think a four-fold increase in video quality at iTS should be overlooked. No one predicted that, but for my money, that's huge.

The iTV is also a great, great idea, and I plan to be first in line for one of those.

As for iPod announcements, I'm quite happy with my 30GB 5G iPod, but I'll be damned if those new nanos don't look sexy. I predict Apple will barely keep up with holiday demand, if able to keep up at all.

All in all, a great day for Apple.

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csimmons said:

member since 29 Oct 2003 with 28 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 12, 2006 3:56 pm

Biff wrote:
Well that was a pretty pathetic event. I hope it was worth the air fare for everyone covering it.

Why pathetic? Were you dumb enough tp believe the rumor sites? If so, then the Apple event was not the pathetic one....

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Biff said:

member since 08 Apr 2004 with 1479 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 12, 2006 4:38 pm

csimmons wrote:
Why pathetic? Were you dumb enough tp believe the rumor sites? If so, then the Apple event was not the pathetic one....
LOL. Darn, you figured me out! I was expecting an iPhone! Haha.

Why pathetic? The iPod updates were very nice. Those are sweet. But the invitations were "It's Showtime!" In other words the main point of this was movies. So what do we get? 4:3 low def movies for the cost of a physical DVD and a preview of a product that won't be available until next year. I get it. The 16:9 iPod and iTV will come out early next year and then we'll get HD movies. And we can hear Steve once again proclaim in the "year of HD." That's cool. In the meantime they will sell millions of these 4:3 things and that will get the other studios on board. Cool. Thats a good plan. If they had spun this thing differently ahead of time, I'd probably have a much different opinion of the event. Funny how that works. So just to make sure I'm clear, let me summarize:

-Actual things unveiled at event: Good.

-Contents of event compared to Apple-generated hype level: Bad.

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gopher said:

member since 28 Mar 2002 with 291 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 12, 2006 4:58 pm

Interesting ideas. Best thing was at least two of the features which weren't clear if they'd make it to the 5th generation iPod did. The popup letter during scrolling, and the gapless playback.

And the music/movie store is packed. I can barely get in. Apple needed much more bandwidth to start this service than they've given. Here's to hoping they add an OC128 soon.

The iTV is a great idea, though it could easily get confused with Elgato's EyeTV. Glad it is only an internal name, but seriously, I'd like it to also hook up to DVI, since my HD-TV did not come with HDMI, and only came with DVI. The phone and PDA are still two rumored devices that have yet to see the light of day.

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Intruder said:

member since 07 Jul 2004 with 3149 posts, TMO Mac Specialist, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 12, 2006 7:25 pm

Who generated the hype...Apple or the rumor sites?

All Apple did was send out an invitation. Not sure how that worked everybody into a frenzy.

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BradC said:

member since 29 Apr 2005 with 81 posts, TMO Staff, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Sep 12, 2006 7:37 pm

Quote:
Contents of event compared to Apple-generated hype level: Bad.

What hype? They sent out an invitation that was pretty low-key. The hype gets generated by the rumor sites and the media. You have people Photoshopping supposed photos of a banner to be used during the event, for crying out loud. Do you think Apple generated that dumb-ass photo?

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rynning said:

member since 13 Sep 2006 with 1 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Sep 13, 2006 10:05 am

I like the iTV except for one thing: Why would a 4:3 player not have an s-video port?

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geoduck said:

member since 30 Dec 2003 with 1922 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Sep 13, 2006 12:33 pm

I was not clear (to me at least) if the iTV would ONLY play material streamed from a Mac, or if it could also be used to download movies from iTMS (iTunes Movie Store) itself or if it could also act as a Digital Video Recorder off of broadcast or cable. Has anyone seen a feature set published anywhere?

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rwahrens said:

member since 19 Jul 2006 with 50 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Sep 13, 2006 12:52 pm

rynning wrote:
I like the iTV except for one thing: Why would a 4:3 player not have an s-video port?

Because the ports they give you will give adequate quality (vs the resolution provided), and they need to reserve something for the next iteration.

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Websnap said:

member since 17 Jun 2005 with 75 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Sep 13, 2006 1:02 pm

If you look at the photos with any of the movies, they look to be all wide screen aside from the demo of CSI. If WS iPods do come out, the movie section is prepared. Also why does anyone want an HD movie on their iPod? It's not like the screens (even tilted to run the face of the iPod) would run any higher than 640. The current video looked quite good from what I could tell.

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fultonkbd said:

member since 02 Mar 2004 with 123 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Sep 13, 2006 3:17 pm

I thought Apple did a fine job compromising with the movie studios. It isn't perfect and you can't please everybody... but for a first step it's excellent in my opinion.

I can't wait for "iTV". That was unexpected and much welcomed.

The iPods updates are nice. But I just bought one a few months ago, so I won't be taking advantage of them.

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geoduck said:

member since 30 Dec 2003 with 1922 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Sep 13, 2006 3:34 pm

fultonkbd wrote:
The iPods updates are nice. But I just bought one a few months ago, so I won't be taking advantage of them.

That's kinda' my problem. I have a great little 10Gb 2G iPod from 2003 that keeps running and running. I still even get 7-8 hours of battery life out of the thing. I'd like to get a new one that could do all of these cool video things, but can't justify $250 when I have a perfectly good iPod in hand.

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fultonkbd said:

member since 02 Mar 2004 with 123 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Sep 13, 2006 3:58 pm

geoduck wrote:
... I have a great little 10Gb 2G iPod from 2003 that keeps running and running ...

I just replaced my 10Gb (whatever generation had the buttons above the scroll wheel). It ran great, but the battery life ended up lasting only a couple of hours. I bought it used so who knows what abuse it took before I got it.

My new one is great - 20Gb/Black. That will last me awhile.

But that new iPod shuffle looks fantastic. If I had a need for a small player, I would get it in a heart beat.

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A guest said: (hide)

Wed Sep 13, 2006 4:46 pm

many of the complaints about the new ipods, and the itv product seem to echo the comments surrounding the first generation Ipod. Its too expensive. Its not CD quality. No one will buy it. And all those naysayers were proven wrong.

The itv, and the movie section of the itunes store has the potential to revolutionize video as the original itunes store did for audio. I think the relatively low key additon of the Disney studios will give them a chance to work out the bugs. As the downloads increase, other studios will come on board. I'd bet that some of the independent studios will be added fairly quickly.

There were not a lot of details about the itv device released. Hell, even the name will likely change. It would be smart to wait until more details begin to emerge, and see how the dowload service is working before passing judgement. The ipod is certainly not the cheapest digital player on the market, and the itunes store is certainly not the only download service. But the combination of ease of use and quality product have made it the industry leader by far. I expect that this new service and hardware will do the same.

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Tgossard said:

member since 07 Jan 2002 with 18 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Thu Sep 14, 2006 10:05 am

I know it's been said before (and before and before) but iTV "relates" to commercial DVDs, but also anticipates the death of the DVD format. My 2cts is DVD is already virtually dead and gone. So also are tvs themselves, and with them the familiar entertainment system model. These are exciting times to live in...tech-wise, that is.

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