Last week I eagerly tore into my new Apple TV and started using it. It is the now main component of my entertainment center, especially since I can’t have both a DVD player and the Apple TV connected at the same time. I rip DVDs using my Dual 2ghz G5 and then stream them over the wireless G.
Other than that, I’ve been getting all of my entertainment from either the iTunes store or from podcasts. NBC Nightly News and CBS provide a light overview of the day’s events, I watch 1 or 2 episodes of the TED and CoolHunting (fascinating!) podcasts, and sprinkle in a few cartoons and animations, plus shorts from PBS, Discovery, National Geographic, and a handful of amateur science podcasts.
As for paid programming, The Daily Show and Colbert are daily requirements, and then Heroes, Lost, and BSG when they’re available. I still haven’t purchased a single movie from the iTunes store and likely won’t until they either make the pricing more reasonable or come up with a rental scheme since I usually only watch most movies once, I can’t justify paying $10 for a low quality, stripped down version of a similarly priced DVD!
I have the HD capable, widescreen TV, the Apple TV, the HDMI cable to get them talking to each other, the surround sound. So what’s missing? There’s no freaking HD content! Even the Apple movie trailers are in a grotesquely compressed, low res format.
Yeah, shocking. So I have done the legwork and pulled together a list of resources for getting a little 720p action from your new honey. If you’re able to find something I haven’t listed here, let me know and I’ll update this post.
BBC in HD
http://www.bbcmotiongallery.com/Customer/index.aspx
They’ve got some great, free content over there in QT format.
Technology Evangelist
http://www.technologyevangelist.com/feeds.html
Fun tech geekery in glorious 720p. It’s a podcast!
MariposaHD
http://www.mariposahd.tv/
The world’s first HD internet TV show. Chicks in bikinis. Site may not be wholly SFW.
ItalyGuides.it
http://www.italyguides.it/us/roma/download_audioguide/podcast/hd_apple_tv.htm
These guys are marketing directly to you, you AppleTV owner you.
TrailerCast HD 720p
http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=213245269
HD movie trailers! This is a direct link to the podcast in the iTunes store.
Tecnocato
http://www.tecnocato.com/
They’re now producing an HD podcast.
That’s enough to get you going. There are a couple more on similar subjects that I haven’t listed here because I couldn’t find a link to their website, but just do a search in the iTunes store for 720p and you’ll find them.
EDIT
Reader Contributions:
Nasa in HD
http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/videogallery/hd_index.html
It has been pointed out that Mariposa’s HD version is only available in WMV and is therefore incompatible with Apple TV. I’ll leave it listed here for anybody who uses a Mini with Front Row instead.
Google translation is very bad but here you can find some info about: Italyguides
http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http://www.macitynet.it/macity/aA27674/index.shtml
Ciao!
You would think that Apple would have more HD content on the iTunes Music Store?
http://www.switchingtomac.com
You can play mariposaHD’s WMV-HD in MacOSX with Flip4Mac:
http://www.flip4mac.com
Not sure if it works with AppleTV though…
Missing Pages is pretty good.