Bobbis.net

So, today was Apple announcement day. All new iPods, nothing really impressive there. The real news is the iTunes Store now offers feature length movie downloads, and the Apple set-top box code-named iTV*.

iTunes 7

I have downloaded and installed iTunes 7 along with the new QuickTime. I have to say, the interface is very different. The biggest difference is the new views available for showing your music or videos. The Cover browser is a nice eye-candy way to view your files, and if you don't already have album art, iTunes 7 will now be able to download it, which is nice. The navigation on the left has been organized very well, separating Library, Store, Shared, Playlists, and Devices.

With the new iTunes comes the movie store. Right now there are only Disney owned movies (Disney, Miramax, Touchstone, Pixar) available. The quality is actually pretty good. I downloaded "Pirates of the Caribbean" so I can have something to show off at ClubFest tomorrow. I really would rather have have a cheaper rental offer than buying the content. I can get better quality, more content, and better reliability from purchasing a physical DVD. Having a movie rental operation online makes more sense to a cost vs quality vs value equation for me.

The download is actually pretty smooth. While I was downloading the movie, I was able to pause it, quit iTunes, restart the computer and resume the download as well as start watching the movie while it was still downloading. This made it almost instantaneous to start enjoying the movie after purchasing (that is an even faster purchase to consumption turnaround time than buying the DVD at Wal-Mart) .

iTV

When I learned about iTV, I was hoping that it would be the device I was looking for. However, it won't be out until sometime in the first quarter of 2007, which is still a long ways away. Also, it only does streaming of files from iTunes. As far as I know, it doesn't have its own storage system or ability to record stuff from TV. It is also over-priced for what it does. A player for $300 seem a little excessive. I hope Apple will come to its senses soon and make it more feature complete (Provide a DVR or storage capabilities) and if it doesn't make it cost less. From the way it looks, I'm still going to settle for a Mac mini for my media center device.