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Hackers have cracked opened the latest version of Apple’s mobile operating system to install unauthorized apps on the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. Read More…

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I’d say that AirPlay is one of the best things about the iPad, letting you stream music and video wirelessly to speakers and screen. And I only use the audio version. But what if you want to use the iPad 2’s new screen-mirroring feature without the wire? Then you’ll need to do some hacking. Read More…

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Apple’s AirPlay streaming feature enables the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad to stream video and audio to the Apple TV 2. But why stop there?

Wired.com’s friend Erica Sadun has been hard at work hacking away at AirPlay to expand its powers. About a week ago she released AirPlayer, a Mac app to stream video from the the Apple TV to the Mac. And just recently she released AirFlick to do the reverse: stream video from the Mac to the Apple TV. No jailbreaking required.

If you own a Mac and the new Apple TV, you need the AirFlick hack. You already can stream video from the Mac to the Apple TV, but you’re limited to iTunes-compatible videos (.H264-encoded MP4). AirFlick adds support for a multitude of video formats that you wouldn’t be able to stream normally (such as AVI, MKV, FLV, WMV and RMVB).

The AirFlick and AirPlayer hacks are in very early development stages, so be warned: Some features might be buggy. They’re free downloads, though, so give it a whirl. See the video above for a quick tutorial.

AirPlay utilities [Erica Sadun]

Brian is a Wired.com technology reporter focusing on Apple and Microsoft. He’s also writing a book about the always-connected mobile future called Always On (publishing April 2011 by Da Capo).
Follow @bxchen and @gadgetlab on Twitter.

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Apple calls the Apple TV a “hobby” because it isn’t a big seller. But for a bustling community of hackers, jailbreaking and tinkering with the set-top box is the real hobby.

The recent release of the second-generation Apple TV is revitalizing a group effort to crack open the set-top box and expand on its capabilities with third-party software. In the next month or two, the rebellious coders say they hope to open an underground app store for the device, just as hackers did for the popular iPhone before Apple opened its official App Store.

“The Apple TV has been jailbroken for less than a month, and the amount of progress that’s been made on [hacking] it so far is absolutely phenomenal,” said Scott Davilla, a programmer who is working to get the Boxee TV platform running on the Apple TV.

Apple’s original Apple TV was cracked years ago, but there was relatively low enthusiasm in modifying the device because of some nagging technical hurdles. Hacking the first Apple TV required using a “patch stick” — installing software on a bootable USB drive that broke through the set-top box’s restrictions — and not all USB flash drives booted properly. Also, interest in modding the original Apple TV waned over time:Hacking the device’s software required a Mac running an older version of the Mac OS X operating system (10.4.7), and later versions of OS X broke software used to test Apple TV apps on a desktop computer.

However, this time around, the Apple TV jailbreak community, called Awkward TV, believes that hacking Apple’s set-top box will be much more popular and energetic.This is thanks largely to the fact that the second-generation Apple TV runs iOS, the same mobile operating system that powers the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. Hacking the device will be much easier for users: The Apple TV requires connecting with a computer by a USB cable and running existing jailbreak software to break its restrictions, just like users did with the iPhone. (In other words, the annoying patch-stick method is no more.)

And besides, hackers can’t resist the allure of modifying a $100 device into the set-top box of their dreams — a path that carries much less risk than, say, tampering with a pricier Mac Mini or a less aesthetically pleasing Windows PC.

Also, a major difference to the new Apple TV hacking scene is that many of these coders have been making apps for the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch — so now, the community is much bigger, diverse and more experienced. A lot of the groundwork has already been laid by iOS jailbreakers, and third-party apps served through the underground app store Cydia should be compatible with the device.

“Everything is kind of coming full circle,” said Kevin Bradley, an Apple TV programmer who works under the handle [bile]. “The old Apple TV is kinda sputtering and dying because it’s a 4-year-old product. Now you have all the people who have done amazing stuff on the iPhone working with us, and it’s made our jobs for the Apple TV a thousand times easier…. I think some really amazing things could come out of this.”

Indeed, the Cydia community is already working on an interface to launch the Cydia app store directly on the Apple TV’s main menu. Also, the “grandfather” of Apple TV hacking Jim Dovey (better known by the hacker handle AlanQuatermain), is working on a software development kit for programmers to code and test special Apple TV apps.

Dovey said he’s especially excited about the potential for hacks to take advantage of AirPlay, an Apple feature that will enable iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch to wirelessly stream content from audio or video apps to the Apple TV.

“I’d be very interested in the possibilities of using AirPlay video to treat an AppleTV as an attached screen in my iPhone, iPad or even Mac apps,” Dovey said.

Already, owners of the new Apple TV can hack their device to run an early version of Bradley’s software, NitoTV, a media player that promises to support every media format. That makes the Apple TV seem weak: It only plays a few iTunes-compatible formats, such as H.264-encoded MPEG-4 videos.

Bradley is also working to get some of his old Apple TV hacks working on the new system, such as an app that enables you to play Super Nintendo on the Apple TV, and an app that allows you to order a pizza.

The Awkward TV community is compiling a list of potential capabilities that could be unlocked with Apple TV hacks, such as playing Flash videos, connecting a TV tuner for recording, or hooking up a CD/DVD player for playing discs.

What are some Apple TV hacks you’d like to see once an unauthorized app store opens? Suggest and vote on ideas in the Reddit widget below, and maybe your wish will come true.

What Apple TV hacks would you like to see?

Show suggestions that are: hot | new | top-rated or submit your own idea

Submit an Apple TV hack

While you can submit as many ideas as you want, you can only submit one every 30 minutes. No HTML allowed.

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Photo: Steven Levy/Wired.com

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If you’ve ever publicly complained about a certain set-top box’s dearth of local storage or support of exotic media files, now you have a clear alternative. WD’s TV Live Hub doesn’t actually have much to do with live TV, but it will store and stream the stuffing out of whatever you’ve been keeping on your computer.

You want local storage for your movies, music, pictures and TV shows? How does 1 TB sound? Western Digital makes some of the biggest and best hard drives around, and this one packs a wallop. And for $199, the TV Live Hub only costs $70 more than WD’s entry-level 1 TB MyBook.

You want support for every file format you’ve ever dreamed about and video all the way up to 1080p? Here’s the list:

Video – AVI (Xvid, AVC, MPEG1/2/4), MPG/MPEG, VOB, MKV (h.264, x.264, AVC, MPEG1/2/4, VC-1), TS/TP/M2T (MPEG1/2/4, AVC, VC-1), MP4/MOV (MPEG4, h.264), M2TS, WMV9
Photo – JPEG, GIF, TIF/TIFF, BMP, PNG
Audio – MP3, WAV/PCM/LPCM, WMA, AAC, FLAC, MKA, AIF/AIFF, OGG, Dolby Digital, DTS
Playlist – PLS, M3U, WPL
Subtitle – SRT, ASS, SSA, SUB, SMI

I don’t even know what some of those are, but OMG, I am furious at any device that doesn’t support all of them now.

But wait — so far, it sounds like I’m just connecting a big-ass net-connected hard drive to my TV. Can it do anything cool with that internet connection?

Sure. The Live Hub is a fully-fledged media server. Once it’s on your network, you can stream its content to pretty much any device with a screen on your network: net-connected TVs, Blu-ray players, Xbox 360, PS3 — even iOS or Android devices using third-party applications. It can also share and sync media folders with PCs or Macs.

And the network isn’t just local: you can also stream content from Netflix, Pandora, Flickr and YouTube and upload content to Facebook.

The open question here — which I can’t really speak to without getting a chance to try it out — is the quality of the user interface. Unlike Google or Apple, Western Digital isn’t really a software company. What it definitely offers is a different — and I think compelling — model for how you configure your hardware throughout your home network, how you store and share content that ultimately is going to be displayed primarily on the biggest screen in your house.

Here are the positions each player’s taken on the board so far: TiVo wants to record live TV; Google wants to help you find it and give you apps for it; Apple wants to rent you streaming TV and movies and bounce it between your other Apple devices; WD wants to give you a big hard drive and share it around the house; and everybody wants to let you stream Netflix. Does that sound about right?

On the one hand, both Apple and WD are avoiding TiVo and Google’s attempts to bring software to bear on live TV. On the other hand, their approaches couldn’t be more different.

Apple’s world is all cloud: a box with a tiny footprint that makes as little noise as possible, offering lightweight, streaming rentals that disappear. If you’re storing a library of data, you’re doing it somewhere else.

WD’s approach might seem more conservative, because it’s still about building and storing a digital library of files in lots of different formats. But you could say it’s actually much more radical.

It suggests that your entertainment media isn’t going to be pumped into your house through a box OR live on the computer you use to make spreadsheets. The digital hub isn’t your PC, and it definitely isn’t a server somewhere sitting lonely in your office or basement.

The digital hub is your television — the one screen in your house that always stays in one place. And now, your television can talk to every other screen that comes into your house.

WD TV Live Hub Media Center [WD Press Release]

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While everyone was focused on Apple ditching software discs with its forthcoming App Store for Mac, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings was busy digging a grave for optical media. Steve Jobs just threw a shovel full of dirt on top.

“Three years ago we were a DVD-by-mail company that offered some streaming,” Hastings told reporters and investors Wednesday. “We are now a streaming company, which also offers DVD-by-mail.”

Software discs haven’t actually mattered for a long time now. The real innovation of Apple’s App Store for software sales isn’t online distribution. It isn’t even creating a central marketplace. It’s putting that marketplace in a client right on the desktop. For Apple, it’s having that client not be iTunes, an already overstuffed monster well overdue for dismemberment and redistribution.

The real front in the battle over optical media remains video — with Netflix, Apple, Hulu, TiVo, Xbox Live and others on the side of the cloud, and Blu-ray, 3D televisions and most game consoles on the side of the disc. Microsoft is the only company that is nearly everywhere pursuing both approaches equally all at once.

Netflix has been able to become a streaming video company by partnering with nearly everyone who makes a net-connected box or screen, from TVs and set-top boxes to tablets and smartphones.

Reportedly, Netflix accounts for more than 20 percent of US downstream internet traffic in peak times, with the heaviest traffic falling between 8 p.m. and 10 p.m — traditional television prime time.

That’s only likely to rise as Netflix streaming becomes available on a greater number of less expensive devices attached to television sets. And it’s a good reminder that while software discs vs downloads is a battle that’s virtually over, streaming media over the internet vs streaming media over cable or broadcast has in some sense only just truly begun.

In Canada, Netflix already offers a streaming-only video plan, with regular or Blu-ray DVDs as an extra, optional feature. Its CEO’s comments suggest the US will likely be next.

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We hate our remotes. Every electronic media device comes with its own remote. We lose them and can’t control our stuff without them. They break. We confuse them with each other. It’s too hard to do simple things. It’s way too hard to do hard things. We ask too much of them. The batteries die, and they all take different batteries. They’re uncomfortable. They’re unresponsive. What we do with our hands don’t match what’s happening on the screen. And the software on the devices themselves that’s controlled by the remote is frequently terrible.

And occasionally, as with Sony’s controller for its upcoming Google TV, the remotes just boggle the mind with their ugliness and complexity.

We’re not alone in disliking remotes. The above litany of problems comes from what readers told Consumer Reports in an article titled simply “Readers Dislike TV Remotes.”

Now we have an emerging class of internet-connected media devices with powerful software designed to make navigating TVs and movies easier. Google TV, Apple TV, TiVo and Roku join game consoles like Sony’s Playstation 3, XBox 360 and Nintendo’s Wii in providing multimedia content on the biggest screens in our house.

But however sophisticated the software, all of these devices still need a hardware device for us to control them. It’s quite likely that some of these devices won’t be dedicated remotes at all, but phones, tablets or other handheld media devices running apps. We might use these apps to control not just our TVs, but our entire house.

That’s one vision of the future of remote control.

Here, we want to examine the other side of the equation: dedicated hardware controllers. From traditional remotes to mini-keyboards, video controllers and devices that combine all three, here are fifteen devices that offer you a glimpse of everything that’s good and bad about the current generation of remote controls.

Above: Sony’s Google TV Controller

Wired: Sony’s controller offers all of the control you could want. Full QWERTY keyboard for text entry, which is essential for search — sure to be a key part of the Google experience. Raised buttons with different feel make it easier to use in the dark. It’s even got tab, control, number, and function keys — not dependent on software to get it done.

Tired: The sheer size of the thing will be a deal-breaker for some. In different shades of gray, it doesn’t look like a device from 2010. Too many buttons could be confusing or intimidating to non-expert users.

Image by ABC News

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Source:wired.com

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Apple TV may not have native apps yet, but AirPlay provides a workaround to run apps on your TV — so long as those apps involve streaming video or audio.

Ars Technica’s Jacqui Cheng wasn’t able to try out AirPlay video streaming to the Apple TV in full — that won’t be possible until iOS 4.2 ships in November — but she did unearth two important bits:

• With iOS 4.1, you can already easily stream audio to the Apple TV, including audio from movie files;
• Every iOS app using Apple’s standard audio and video profiles can stream to Apple TV. Not just your iTunes library.

Some of these applications are no-brainers, like Netflix and YouTube. Since both apps run natively on Apple TV anyways, this might appear redundant; still, it’s nice to be able to seamlessly throw video from your phone to your TV in the middle of watching something, without having to start over and search for the same video again.

Other iOS apps add content that Apple TV doesn’t have. Ars Technica mentions sports applications like MLB at-bat and internet radio. You might be able to preview a movie you’re editing in the iPad’s iMovie mobile app on the big screen without plugging in.

Of course, applications that either don’t want their content streamed to Apple TV or don’t want to put in the work to reformat their video into H.264 will be left out — just keep your video and audio in a format that can’t be streamed. For others, there’s nothing else they have to do on the software or hardware side to make their applications AirPlay compatible.

That prospect could be exciting for both developers and users — at least until full-fledged iOS apps for Apple TV come along. Or Google TV’s apps sweep through and steal the whole show.

Source:wired.com

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Roku’s streaming media players can shake off the “Netflix box” tag once and for all. TiVo, too, keeps its spot high in the set-top food chain. Both Roku’s three new devices and TiVo’s Premiere and Premiere XL boxes will be able to stream network shows with Hulu Plus this fall.

Hulu Plus, a $9.99/month subscription service that offers additional premium content in addition to the network TV shows and backlist films offered through the free Hulu web site, is already available for streaming with net-connected Samsung TVs and Blu-ray players, Boxee’s set-top boxes, and Sony’s Playstation 3, with announced support for XBox 360, other Sony devices, and some Vizio TVs and Blu-ray players coming either this fall or in early 2011.

The announcements from TiVo and Roku did not specify dates on which the service would be available on either device. Roku currently offers access to Netflix Watch Instantly, Amazon Streaming Video, Pandora, and other streaming media channels. TiVo offers DVR capability in addition to most of the same services. Apple’s much-anticipated new version of Apple TV offers Netflix access and rentals through iTunes, but not Hulu at this time.

The emerging model for set-top boxes appears to be devices that offer a wide range of streaming services, whether free, for purchase, for rental, or through subscriptions. Either the boxes are inexpensive and dedicated for this purpose, like Roku and the new Apple TV, or relatively expensive but offer additional services like gaming, web browsing, or video recording, like TiVo, PS3, or XBox 360.

The devices have differentiated themselves according to three features: 1) price; 2) some exclusive features, as in the case of game consoles; and 3) the strength and ease-of-use of their interfaces — both the on-screen software and remote control capability.

All can be used in conjunction with traditional cable and satellite TV service, but some users are beginning to find the offerings of internet video rich enough that they can forego cable or satellite altogether. Hulu Plus on TiVo and Roku may be what pushes many of them over the edge.

Image via Hulu.com

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Apple’s cheap, puny Apple TV set-top box shares many of the same internals as the iPad, according to a teardown of the device.

The nimble engineers at iFixit cracked open the Apple TV earlier this afternoon and found the same type of Samsung flash chip that’s also inside the iPad, holding 8 GB of capacity. iFixit speculates this storage will be used to for caching while streaming TV shows and movies.The teardown also revealed that the Apple TV features the same A4 processor and amount of RAM (256MB) as the iPad.

Of course, the Apple TV has connectivity features that the iPad doesn’t: Ethernet, HDMI output, an AC adapter and an optical audio-out port. But it’s pretty interesting how similar the two devices are otherwise. Perhaps this is a clue that the Apple TV and iPad will be very tightly integrated in the near future (going beyond the AirPlay streaming feature we’re already familiar with).

An 8-GB drive doesn’t sound like much, but it’s pretty good considering the Apple TV’s $100 price tag. And because the Apple TV’s focus is streaming media, 8GB should leave more than enough room for extra third-party apps, if Apple later decides to open an Apple TV app store, which some have speculated to be a possibility.

A full step-by-step teardown of the Apple TV can be found on iFixit’s website.

Photo: iFixit

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The new Apple TV could be Steve Jobs’ best sleight-of-hand trick yet.

During his modest introduction of the device, Jobs called the Apple TV “one more hobby.” But a closer look at the code and the hardware powering the Apple TV reveals that there’s a lot more going on under the hood than the CEO shared.

Interestingly, Jobs didn’t mention that Apple TV runs iOS, the same operating system running on its flagship product, the iPhone, and some other big hits the iPod Touch and iPad. And there’s more, too: The Apple TV’s software might already be jailbroken, and some hidden software should eventually allow you to share the Apple TV’s media with other iOS devices.

These secret ingredients could be the recipe Apple needs to shake up the television industry. For years, Apple executives have labeled the set-top box a “hobby” product because of its mild success compared to blockbuster sellers like the iPhone and iPod. Now that Apple TV has been revamped into a streaming rental service with an arsenal of stealth features, maybe Apple has a chance to change the TV business if not today, perhaps later.

“The most importanthint ofApple’s real ambitions in the living room come fromAirPlay, whichputs iPhones and iPads in the driver’s seat and makes theTVjust an outputdevice for theAppleecosystem,” said James McQuivey, a Forrester analyst, in a recent e-mail statement. “ExpectAppleto gradually push more and morein that direction, but as of this moment in 2010,Applehas not yet made asignificant play for control of theTV.”

Here, we round up the juicy tidbits we’ve heard about Apple’s mysterious new set-top box.

iOS and third-party app support

There’s more than enough evidence proving that the Apple TV runs iOS. Dispelling any doubts, Apple recently posted a build of iOS 4.1 specifically for the Apple TV.

This piece of information about iOS is important because of a new feature called AirPlay, which streams media from your iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch to the Apple TV. When Jobs demonstrated AirPlay, he only showed the feature working with an iPad’s built-in video player, photos app and music library. Now that we know Apple TV runs iOS, it’s likely that third-party apps such as MLB at Bat or ABC Player will be able stream media to the set-top box, too.

DaringFireball blogger John Gruber confirmed that an AirPlay button is showing up in the MLB at Bat app, and he adds that apps using the built-in media controller will be able to integrate AirPlay.

Long story short, you’ll be able to wirelessly stream media from some third-party apps straight to your Apple TV with an AirPlay button. AirPlay is shaping up to be Apple’s secret weapon to reshape home entertainment.

In addition to AirPlay, the fact that Apple TV is running iOS means that — in principle, at least — it may someday be able to run applications from the iTunes App Store. For now, that capability is not included in Apple TV, but the underlying operating system certainly supports it, so Apple might open a TV App Store in a future software update.

Jailbreaking hacks

Third-party app support will probably be limited for the Apple TV, but that’s where the jailbreakers come in. In the same way that we’re able to override restrictions on the iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch with a jailbreak, we should be able to run unauthorized apps on the Apple TV — something Jobs would never advertise, of course.

In fact, hackers already have a head start, because a tool called Shatter, which was used to jailbreak the newest iPod Touch, already works with the Apple TV, according to the iPhone Dev Team. That means we should be expecting hackers to code some unauthorized apps soon to unlock additional capabilities such as video-conferencing via your Apple TV.

On top of that, existing hacks for the old Apple TV should work, too.Dev Team memberWill Strafach explained thatthe new AppleTV OS seems to be a mashup of the old AppleTV OS and iOS, meaning “frappliances,” plug-ins that add functionality to the old Apple TV, should work as well.

‘Lowtide’ app

The Unofficial Apple Weblog’s Erica Sadun, a popular iOS programmer, took a close look at the Apple TV’s software and discovered that it runs an application called “Lowtide” the software containing the set-top box’s media interface.

Sadun dug deeper and found lines of code that suggest that Lowtide might eventually be extended to other iOS devices. In other words, you should be able to share media from the Apple TV to your iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad, whereas originally we thought we’d only be able to do the converse with AirPlay. This functionality would be comparable to a Slingbox or an EyeTV.

Lowtide isn’t readily available for Apple’s iOS mobile devices yet, but iOS developerDustin Howett has already managed to load Lowtide on an iPod touch running iOS 4.1, demonstrated in the video above. He recommended against doing it yourself, though, unless you plan on reformatting your iPhone on a regular basis just to turn it back into a phone.

Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

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Image via Apple/iTunes

Today, Apple updated its iOS Remote application to version 2.0. The free Remote app is now optimized for the iPad’s larger display and supports streaming from shared libraries over wireless networks with computers running iTunes and the new Apple TV using AirPlay.

Earlier this week at CEDIA 2010, Sony showed off AV Receiver Remote, a similar (and similarly free) iOS universal remote application for its wide range of media appliances. While Apple’s Remote application allows you to control profiles for speaker volume, Sony’s allows you to do that, control room lighting, and stream internet, satellite, or broadcast radio. Christopher MacManus was able to record a hands-on for Sony Insider:

Just as Apple’s remote application leverages its strength in high-end computers and media players, Sony’s app leverages its strength in home theater appliances. Apple can send a movie to your television, but it didn’t make your television (or the receiver your TV might be connected to).

Last week at IFA 2010, Samsung used its new Galaxy Tab to demonstrate its Home Watcher app for Android, which leverages the Korean tech maker’s even more ubiquitous position in home appliances:

As Vivian Kim observes, writing for Apartment Therapy Unpluggd, Samsung’s “washers and dryers, refrigerators, microwaves, ranges, and home entertainment devices” can allow them to position their phones and tablets not as Apple imitators, but as genuine home automation solutions. You’ve never had a remote control for your refrigerator before — maybe you didn’t even know you wanted one. But once it’s within the realm not just of the possible — it always has been, for high-end early-adopters — but reasonably attainable for Samsung’s global middle-class consumer base, something has changed.

How much will we want to do with a single remote when that remote is not an infrared box wrapped around two AA batteries, but a powerful computer with an intuitive interface? In different ways, that’s the future towards which Apple, Sony, and Samsung are all pointing.

Source:wired.com

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A number of customers who ordered an Apple TV have bragged about receiving shipment notifications for their orders, despite last week’s rumors that the product might see delays.

Some Apple TV orders have been updated to read “Prepared for shipment” (meaning FedEx is packing the item into a box), so those who placed orders very early could get their new Apple TV as soon as this week.

Last week, some customers who requested expedited shipping received refunds from Apple, who cited a possible delay. It would appear that only new orders might take longer to ship, while the early batch of orders are on schedule for a late September delivery.

Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

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Either there’s trouble at the Apple TV factory, or Apple’s “hobby” is selling so fast that it just got upgraded to a full-time job.

The new video-streaming set-top-box was all set to ship in September, and Apple had already started charging credit-cards of those who has pre-ordered. Now, if you head over the the Apple Store page for the Apple TV, you’ll see it will ship in 2-3 weeks. Apple is notorious for pushing right up to the last minute of its own deadlines, but 2-3 weeks is as far away as the middle of October.

Another sign that all is not well come in the form of an email forwarded to Apple Insider, sent to a customer informing him of a refund:

Our records indicate that when you placed your order you paid for upgraded shipping. Due to a delay, we may have not been able to meet our delivery commitment.

So, if you want an Apple TV, you’re going to have to wait, that’s certain. What’s not so sure is why they will be so late. Could it really be that, like the iPhone 4 and the iPad, Apple has simply been surprised by a huge demand? The Apple TV hasn’t seen the hype of those iDevices, so who would be buying them?

For the answer, take a look at the Airport Express. It’s a Wi-Fi-enabled receiver that lets you send music from iTunes to a remote stereo. It costs $99, the same as the Apple TV, which does this and lots more. If you want the fancy network-extending and router abilities of the Airport Express, the Apple TV isn’t for you. But if anyone was thinking of buying it just for AirPlay, then the Apple TV is an obvious upgrade.

Apple issuing refunds for Apple TV rush orders, citing delay [AppleInsider]

Follow us for real-time tech news: Charlie Sorrel and Gadget Lab on Twitter.

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Competition is always good and the battle among streaming media players for the consumers’ living room is resulting in some new products and attractive prices.

Roku has announced three new media players that include HD streaming support of up to 1080p and improved connectivity to home entertainment systems.

The three Roku models will be the $60 Roku HD with support for 720p , the $80 Roku XD that includes wireless and 1080p HD, and the $100 Roku XDS that adds dual-band wireless technology.

“Customers can now buy an HD-capable Roku player with wireless for 40 percent less than the price of our original $100 Roku HD player,” says Anthony Wood, founder and CEO of Roku in a statement. “Or, think of it this way: for around the price of two Blu-ray Discs, a Roku player brings you access to limitless instant streaming entertainment choices available.”

Roku’s latest line-up is a response to not just the recently launched $100 Apple TV, but also newer products that are competing for consumer attention.

As more web users turn to web video–watching Hulu, Netflix streaming movies, and episodes of their favorite TV show–companies are trying to find a way to make it easier to pipe that content from the PC to the flat screen TV. Earlier this month, a company called VeeBeam announced a $100 streaming media player that would connect your PC to the TV. Google TV, Google’s streaming media box that aggregates cable TV programming and web video, is expected to launch next month. Even Intel has started integrating streaming media software into some of its chips and laptops.

Roku’s new players will continue to offer shows from Netflix, Amazon Video On Demand. It will also include sports from the MLB.TV site, music from Pandora, and photo and video sharing from Flickr and Facebook.

There are some new features. The $60 Roku HD will stream video at up to 720p and has built-in wireless and ethernet for broadband connectivity. The device is also smaller and sleeker. It is about 1 inch tall and less than 5 inches wide. It will come with composite A/V cables and an HDMI port.

The Roku XD and XDS versions will have 1080p HD support and include a feature called ‘Instant Replay’ that lets the viewer instantly skip back in 10 second increments without having to wait for a rebuffering delay.

Photo: Roku

Source:wired.com

Posted under Gadget Reviews

When we’re constantly barraged with new computers, smartphones and tablets, it’s hard to take the time to appreciate small details that have a lot of significance. Take AirPlay, for example: a feature integrated into Apple’s iOS devices to wirelessly stream content to the new Apple TV.

That feature has the potential to be killer, even at its most practical level, my friend Arnold Kim of MacRumors.com points out in today’s Tweet of the Day: “didn’t really occur to me before, but instantly streaming iphone 4 captured vids to appletv via AirPlay is a pretty killer feature.”

Think about it: You shoot some video of your kids running around in Disneyland, and when other relatives visit you whip out your iPhone, tap “AirPlay” and boom that video is streaming to your Apple TV and playing on the big screen. (You can do the same with a photo slideshow, or some new music you just bought off iTunes).

Sharing personal media isn’t normally so seamless: You usually have to attach a cord and copy a file onto a drive, or at least yank out a photo card and stick it into a reader to undergo some sort of uploading process. Streaming is instant.

Here at Wired.com we’ve pondered about the big-picture potential for the Apple TV to be a real game changer thanks to iOS and AirPlay. If third-party apps such as Hulu, Netflix or ABC Player are able to incorporate AirPlay to wireless stream online video content to a TV without requiring a mess of cords or extra accessories, then Apple TV might finally be a smashing hit. Turning the iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad into a multimedia remote was a clever move that effectively turns Apple TV into amedia ecosystem built around iOS mobile devices.Wired.com chiefEvan Hansen thinks this strategy will disrupt the cable industry.

But as marvelous as that all sounds, building up a major alternative to the traditional cable TV subscription is going to take a great deal of time, even for Apple. In the nearer future, when the Apple TV ships in the next week or two, the hassle-free convenience of being able to share your personal media with a tap of a button should be extremely compelling for gadget lovers.

Source:wired.com

Posted under Gadget Reviews

Well, color us surprised (and delighted). Apple has approved VLC Media Player for iPad, an app that plays a multitude of movie formats unsupported by the tablet’s built-in video player.

VLC has been a popular open-source app on the desktop, capable of playing a wide range of media formats at high resolutions, making Apple’s standard iTunes video player(which primarily plays .H264-encoded MPEG-4 videos) pale by comparison.

Wired.com’s Charlie Sorrel got an early sneak peek at VLC for iPad about two weeks ago and said it was one of the most polished video players he’d seen, despite a few bugs.

Why is this such an interesting decision? A lot of consumers get movies and TV shows through (cough) alternative means, and before if they wanted to load their videos on the iPad, they’d have to go through the trouble of converting files to be iTunes-compatible. Approving VLC eliminates such headaches and opens the door for some serious competition with iTunes video rentals.I’m personally more interested in what it means for the new iOS-based Apple TV, if it turns out that third-party apps can indeed use AirPlay, a new feature that enables iOS devices to wirelessly stream content to the Apple TV.

VLC Media Player is a free download in the iPad’s App Store.

Source:wired.com

Posted under Gadget Reviews

Apple TV image from Apple.com

There have been two mysteries about the new Apple TV. 1) Was it still running the old Apple TV’s “Back Row” version of OS X? 2) Just how small is its new pared-down hard drive? Mystery #1 has been solved: just like the iPhone and iPad, Apple TV is now running iOS 4.

This is important for two reasons:

1. Right now, there are no apps (and no app marketplace) for Apple TV. Now we know there could be — and not on some imagined next-generation device, but this one, in the not-too-distant future.
2. The new Apple TV could be amenable to the same jailbreaking techniques that have worked on the iPhone and iPad — so even if Apple doesn’t start a TV app store, someone could start their own if they’re willing to live on the wild side.

Both of these consequences, though, are still a teensy bit dependent on the answer to that other mystery. Until we get a teardown, nobody’s sure exactly how much storage the new Apple TV is packing. There might not be room enough to store a whole bunch of apps, even if you could sideload them through that teensy micro-USB port.

I’ll let Chris Foresman at Ars Technica explain how we know Apple TV is running iOS:

Apple stores configuration information about how various iOS devices can communicate with other devices over its dock connector in a file called USBDeviceConfiguration.plist. Entries in this file have revealed early evidence of new iPhone and iPod models, and an entry labelled “iProd” later turned out to be the first iPad.

An entry in iOS 3.2 was referred to as iProd2,1, and we suspected that it was likely an early prototype of a next-gen iPad. However, an updated configuration file in iOS 4.2b1 reveals the same numeric product ID is attached to an entry for AppleTV2,1, referring to the second major hardware revision of the Apple TV. This presents solid evidence that the new Apple TV is running iOS proper, instead of the other customized version of Mac OS X used for the previous onethat should save Apple from duplicated development effort.

So if Apple TV is running iOS now, why not announce it and invite people to start making apps for it? Wouldn’t that get everyone more excited about the relaunch of Apple TV? I could think of two reasons why they wouldn’t:

1. There’s no natural interface to run existing iOS apps on Apple TV: no touchscreens TVs, definitely no multitouch, no accelerometers, no camera, etc. Until one or more of those things change, or somebody writes some nifty code to make a remote control do the same thing, you can’t port apps over. If that changes, it’s off to the races.
2. The App Store is already fragmented; not all apps work on every device, or even the same device running different versions of iOS. Throwing Apple TV in the mix, with a bunch of TV-specific applications that might or might not work terribly well on the iPad or iPhone, just makes the store more confusing. And Apple’s trying to make its TV products, especially, as simple as possible.

Confirmed: ‘iProd 2′ is the new Apple TV (TUAW)

Source:wired.com

Posted under Gadget Reviews

The streaming media player bubble isn’t over. A new contender called Veebeam hopes to make customers reconsider how they want to get their daily fix of web video.

Veebeam wirelessly hooks up your PC to your TV so you can watch The Daily Show from Hulu, Netflix movies and The Big Bang Theory on a giant screen rather than a 22-inch monitor. The Veebeam player streams media in high-definition–780p or 1080p resolution–at speeds that can be up to four times faster than Wi-Fi.

Veebeam is competitively priced against Apple TV and the Roku box. A SD version of Veebeam costs $100, a HD version comes for $140. But for that price, Veebeam can do more than many of its peers, says Patrick Cosson, vice-president of marketing for Veebeam. Veebeam showed its product at the DEMO Fall 2010 conference Tuesday.

“Apple TV is a walled garden,” he says. “Most people’s basket of entertainment media consumption is broader so they need a platform that gives them that,” says Cosson.

It’s not a new pitch. Companies such as Google, Boxee and Netgear have been trying to tap into the growing pool of users who are now turning to web video for their entertainment. In May, Google launched Google TV, a new set-top-box platform based on Googles Android operating system that will have access to Flickr, gaming sites such as Club Penguin, music sites such as Pandora and traditional cable programming.

Other companies such as Roku and Boxee have been slightly less ambitious, promising just an easy way to stream web content from the PC to the TV. Boxee, though, is available only as a software program but the company has said it’s partnership with D-Link will result in a Boxee box this year.

And there’s Apple TV. Though long characterized as a “hobby” by Apple CEO Steve Jobs, Apple launched a new version of the device earlier this month. Apple TV now integrates Flickr photos, allows rental of TV shows from ABC and Fox and lets users stream media from their iTunes library.

“Apple TV is a 720p solution,” says Cosson, “while we can stream at 1080p so you can advantage of that HD TV.”

Veebeam uses wireless USB to stream content from the PC to the TV. Wireless USB is more powerful for point-to-point connectivity than traditional Wi-Fi because it offers more bandwidth and less interference, says the company. Veebeam estimates 420 Mbps speeds for wireless USB.

Customers have to plug the Veebeam box to their TV and attach the USB antenna that comes with the device to their laptop. Users can switch between the ’screencasting’ mode for sharing websites or photos and the ‘play-to’ mode for video.

Though services such as Boxee have had problems with Hulu–Hulu blocked Boxee at least thrice over two years–Veebeam is confident it can fly under the radar.

“It’s impossible for Hulu to block us,” says Cosson. “We take a series of little pictures of your computer and project it out to your TV so Hulu doesn’t know that the content is on the TV. They think its on the browser.”

That in a nutshell explains Veebeam. It’s a wireless USB hub in a pretty chassis. It doesn’t connect directly to the internet –it just streams what is on your laptop. Still, at its price it could be a cheap and painless way to get video from your notebook to your TV screen.

Photos: Dylan Tweney/Wired.com

Source:wired.com

Posted under Gadget Reviews

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This week’s episode of the Gadget Lab podcast is heavy on fruits. High on vitamin A, Dylan Tweney gushes over the pluot, a plum-apricot hybrid, while yours truly dishes out this week’s announcements of brand new Apple gear.

Apple’s iPod family all scored major upgrades. The iPod Nano has become a puny touchscreen badge with a built-in clip that should be ideal for athletes, and the iPod Touch is now up to par with the iPhone 4. The iPod Shuffle was refreshed as well also a badge-like clippable form factor, but with the traditional click wheel rather than a touchscreen.

Apple also announced a brand new Apple TV that’s about a quarter of the size of its predecessor. It streams movie and television rentals, but it faces one major limitation: only two television networks (Fox and ABC) are on board to offer programs for the device. For now, it’s not an adequate replacement for cable TV.

However, in a future software update, iOS devices will be able to wirelessly stream their iTunes videos and music onto the Apple TV by using a feature called “AirPlay.” We ponder on the potential for Apple to reshape the TV industry if the company eventually allows you to beam content from third-party iOS apps (such as Hulu) onto the Apple TV. It’s wishful thinking, but not an impossibility.

Finally, Samsung has officially launched a tablet to compete with Apple’s iPad. The Samsung Galaxy Tab is a 7-inch touchscreen tablet powered by Android OS 2.2, meaning it supports Adobe Flash. We share our impressions of the device after some hands-on testing.

Oh, and those pluots? They come from Frog Hollow Farm, and they really are delicious.

Like the show? You can also get theGadget Lab video podcast via iTunes, or if you dont want to be distracted by our smiling faces, check out theGadget Lab audio podcast. Prefer RSS? You can subscribe to the Gadget Labvideo oraudio podcast feeds

Or listen to the audio here:

Gadget Lab audio podcast #87

Source:wired.com

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Apple is preparing to announce a major revamp for the Apple TV and upgrades for the popular iPod Touch in an event scheduled for early September, according to a report.

Citing two anonymous sources, Bloomberg claims that Apple will hold a special press event on Sept. 7 in San Francisco to introduce the new products along with a new iTunes rental service for TV programs, as Wired.com’s Epicenter reported Tuesday.

Repeating previous rumors about Apple TV, Bloomberg said a new version of the device would cost $100 and include a smaller hard drive, as it will be designed primarily for streaming content from iTunes. Other reports have claimed Apple would rebrand the device iTV and ship it with its mobile operating system iOS, which could potentially mean the television device will have an app store to enhance its functionality.

Bloomberg’s report also claims Apple will announce an upgraded iPod Touch, sporting a high-resolution display like the iPhone 4. Previous rumors add that like the iPhone 4, the next iPod Touch will include dual cameras.

For several years, Apple has held an annual September event devoted to iTunes and iPods. It would make sense for Apple to unveil a new Apple TV at this year’s event, because a TV-streaming media service would likely be accompanied by a new version of iTunes capable of online storage.

It’s also likely that Apple will release a software update for iPad customers, iOS 4, which will bring multitasking capability, among other features, to the popular tablet.

Photo of Steve Jobs introducing the iPhone 4 at WWDC 2010: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

Source:wired.com

Posted under Gadget Reviews

Apple appears to be internally testing the next-gen iPod Touch and iPad, along with an unknown mystery device, according to configuration files buried deep inside the latest iOS beta.

Apple blog AppleInsider received purported configuration files of the next iOS beta, iOS 4.1., due to ship in “the coming weeks,” showing strings of code referencing “iPod 4,1″ an identifier that denotes a fourth-generation device. (A revision of the current third-gen iPod model would be labeled “iPod 3,2.”)

The configuration files also reveal an identifier for “iProd 2,1″ most likely the second-generation iPad, since the records showed the current iPad was registered as “iPod 1,1.” Most interesting is an identifier for “unknownHardware.” Perhaps this could be the rumored Apple TV upgrade based on the iOS-operating system, as New York Times reported previously.

Apple is expected to hold its annual iPod event in the coming weeks, where we’d likely see the next-generation iPod Touch, which is rumored to sport the same specifications of the iPhone 4 (minus the phone, of course): two cameras, a high-resolution display, an A4 processor and so on. Stay tuned this September.

Photo: JoeBaynham/Flickr

Source:wired.com

Posted under Gadget Reviews

In this week’s Gadget Lab video podcast, Brian X. Chen and Priya Ganapati touch on more wireless woes reported by iPhone users. Apparently in some cities the iPhone’s upload speeds were slowing down to a crawl. AT&T has responded and said the drop was due to a software bug that will be addressed but not before angry conspiracy-theorist customers accused the telecom company of purposely capping speeds for the device.

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In brighter news, Ganapati shares her hands-on experience with the Dell Streak, a 5-inch touchscreen tablet device that feels like a supersized smartphone. Perhaps this Dell is aiming to offer a tablet that will actually fit in a woman’s purse unlike the iPad?

And looking further in the future, Chen talks about recent credible rumors that the Apple TV may be getting a software overhaul to run iOS, the same operating system that powers iPhones and iPads. Such a change would pose interesting implications for videogames, TV apps and more.

Like the show? You can also get theGadget Lab video podcast via iTunes, or if you dont want to be distracted by our mugs, check out theGadget Lab audio podcast. Prefer RSS? You can subscribe to the Gadget Labvideo or audio podcast feeds.

Source:wired.com

Posted under Gadget Reviews

The Apple TV might receive a software overhaul based on the iOS operating system powering the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch, sources have told The New York Times.

While anonymous sources claimed the company was planning a software upgrade for the set-top box, they noted that it was unclear whether Apple would introduce new hardware as well. NY Times writer Nick Bilton also said he’d heard that Apple’s newest hires included people with a background in television.

Some of these claims come in line with a recent rumor published by Engadget, which said Apple was planning to introduce a $100 Apple TV running iOS. The blog claimed the hardware would be redone as well a minimal gadget described as an “iPhone without a screen,” containing only two ports: a power socket and a video-out.

In earnings calls, Apple executives have repeatedly called Apple TV a “hobby,” implying it has not been a breakthrough hit like the iPhone or iPod. Video entertainment has been a tough nut for Apple to crack, as the set-top box market is packed with competitors offering a multitude of ways to watch video. In addition, cable companies subsidize set-top boxes that include a DVR for recording programs.

An iOS-based Apple TV sounds feasible, though it remains a question as to how exactly such a device would work, since the interface is controlled by multitouch gestures. We would be surprised if Apple didn’t somehow incorporate its iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad as a controller. For gaming, the iPhone 4 is especially powerful as it contains a gyrosocope, making it even better than Nintendo’s Wiimote. However, it would seem strange if Apple sold an Apple TV that required a pricey iOS device as a controller.

Apple declined to comment on this story.

Image of a current Apple TV menu: Apple

Read Morehttp://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/05/rumor-new-100-apple-tv-takes-aim-at-the-cloud/#ixzz0sY3S5CA2

Source:wired.com

Posted under Gadget Reviews