I’m not sure this is the correct forum, please move if it is not.
We want to put a small flatscreen tv in our basement. Because of the layout of the room, we don’t want to run cable to it. We want to be occaisionally be able to watch a DVD, stream Netflix and watch stuff online.
In people’s opinions, which would be better: to put get a DVD player and Apple TV so that we can seamlessly connect to my wife’s ipad, or to put an xbox down there to watch DVDs and stream some content? We also have laptops, so we can always just connect one of those to connect to the Web.
I like my AppleTV setup. You can control it with your iPad which works much better than any remote or game controller. Plus the Airplay function is cool for your iTunes content and other stuff.
I’ve got an X-Box and I’ve found media streaming to be a bit time-consuming and cumbersome. I haven’t tried the new voice activation stuff yet, though, so that may improve things.
Keep in mind with a 360 you have to play for an Xbox Live Gold account in addition to whatever you pay Netflix for their service. On PS3 you don’t have to have a paid PSN account to access this sort of thing, just your regular Netflix account.
Wii also supports Netflix, but then you’d need an additional DVD player, as Wii’s don’t play DVD.
Another thing in PS3’s favor is it also does Bluray. Even if you don’t want/need that now, who knows, you may in the future.
I didn’t know you needed the Xbox Gold service for the TV access. I think we’ll just get Apple Tv. We have a wii in our TV room and we use that for Netflix, the hub for the basement is largely for watching something while on the treadmill or when one of us is playing the Skyrim on the PC in the basement (me) and the other one (my wife) would like to at least be in the same room as her MIA spouse.
The XBox service is pretty great, but the fact that you need a XBox Live Gold membership is a real problem if you’re not already using it for gaming. It essentially means you need to pay $50 a year for the privilege of paying $13 a month for Netflix and $10 a month for Hulu Plus. It’s a bit of a racket, however I like their implementation better than Roku or Apple TV. Plus the simple XBox streaming from all networked PCs is a pretty awesome perk, triply so if you use Windows Media Center as a DVR.
Also, you don’t need the Gold Membership for the TV access. You can use the XBox as a media extender right out of the box with no subscription. It’s just that the Netflix and ESPN apps happen to require a Gold membership, Zune and WMC are good to go with a free Silver membership.
Personally, I’d get used to the idea of connecting a laptop since as of yet none of the alternatives really are better so long as the laptop had a HDMI out. An Apple TV is probably the way to go only if you are already a hardcore Apple household, it’s benefits are somewhat limited if you’re not running iCloud and an AirPlay network. Roku looks like a good option as it’s platform agnostic and it’s got perhaps the broadest access to online video services but it’s a smaller company that might not survive forever. But, for a $100 it’s a small investment and it plays MKVs if that’s something you’re interested in.
You don’t need iCloud and Airplay is not a network. Airplay simply streams content from your iPhone or iPad to the AppleTV. You can use it to wirelessly listen to your music content through your stereo or watch your videos. No other infrastructure required.
On a related question - is there a way (without buying an Apple TV box) to control iTunes on the PC via Siri?
I can ask Siri to play a song on the phone. I can apparently use the Apple Remote app to manually control iTunes on the PC via my phone over the wireless network (though I haven’t tried it).
What I want to do, though, is ask Siri to play a song and for it to come out of the PC’s speakers (presumably by controlling iTunes like the Apple Remote app does).
It’s a network, a proprietary wireless network, but a network nonetheless. Apple TV requires a AirPort network to stream anything from a desktop computer. The point stands, unless you have AirPlay deviced and/or a AirPort network already in place Apple TVs’ benefits are limited compared to Roku.
I might do the Roku. In the short term, I’ll just plug my laptop into my tv. What the Apple tv offers is the ability to easily watch stuff on my iphone or my wife’s ipad on the screen.
I see after some reading that iOS 4.3 fixed this issue. So, if your iDevices are running iOS 4.3 or later you can stream without an AirPort network. You are limited to file types which iTunes can play.
Sony has a combination bluray player/google tv that might be your best option. You have the abilities of apple tv/roku with a bluray player, internet access, and a (limited) android market.
