XBMC on AppleTV - Is is worth it?

I Recently ordered an AppleTV for a friend. Our intentions were to use the AppleTV unit with XMBC. He currently has XMBC running the Xbox and we are both huge fans of the XMBC interface.

After unboxing the AppleTV, I immediately used atbusb-creator to create the boot loader that could install XMBC. There is a Windows version, but I could not get it to actually write the image to a USB drive on my Windows machine. Fortunately, I also have Leopard installed, so I was able to boot into OSX and run the Mac version, which ran fine. I also ended up using 2 different usb drives because during my first attempt the AppleTV unit did not recognize my usb drive. On my second attempt, using my Kingston Data Traveller, it worked fine. My first usb drive was just a cheap, unbranded, 1gig drive that bought a few years back.

Patching the AppleTV was a snap. I just followed the documentation. Once I rebooted the AppleTV I had an XBMC menu, which then allowed me to download and install the latest version quite easily.

This is where the fun stopped. First, the AppleTV unit does not have a power off (at least nothing that was obvious), so, for every reboot, I had to unplug the unit. While this wasn't a huge deal in my test environment, it's going to be annoying to anyone that has a unit in their home entertainment cabinet.

The AppleTV unit takes about 1 - 2 minutes to fully boot, and put you at the main menu. I was pleased, and yet surprised, but the simplicity and plainness of the AppleTV main menu. It's just a simple rectangular menu without a background image. For Apple, I was surprised that there wasn't more, but at the same time, I was happy that Apple decided to forgo gimicky, and stick with functional.

I didn't spend too much time in the AppleTV UI, since it's not really a useful piece of software, unless you have iTunes installed, or you are willing to buy or rent DRM movies. I did try out the YouTube videos. It worked. I went into the Movies section as well, and played a trailer. It worked. Since the AppleTV unit can't actually play anything over the network, without iTunes, I wasn't able to try out any streaming videos.

So, after a few minutes, I decided to launch XBMC. Having used XBMC on the XBOX for a couple of years, this was the real prize for me. After XBMC launched, I was actually stuck in a window (not fullscreen). I then used the Settings menu to make the application fullscreen. I Also calibrated the screen, so that the UI could fill the entire area. I wasn't disappointed with the UI. It was responsive and worked pretty much like the XBOX version.

I immediately configured XBMC to connect back to my media share. In a few minutes, I had complete access to all my movies and recorded shows. Playing an SD avi file played fine. Only having a 6 button remote proved to be challenging. You don't realize the extent to which you use other remote buttons, until you only have 6 to choose from. Let's just say, that in XMBC on the Xbox, having the extra buttons is really useful, and I'm sure they'd be useful on the AppleTV as well.

To my disappointment, the XBMC on the AppleTV could not play any 720p x264 content in a mkv container. I tried about 10 files, and all files were un watchable. Audio was fine, but the video was completely jittery. This was a huge disappointment for me. The core reason my friend had purchased this unit was because he wanted to watch 720p content in XBMC. That's not going to happen with this release. It's not the fault of XMBC, it's a great product, but there's only so much you can do when you have decode and render in software on such a limited device. Apparently the device will play 720p content if you convert it to mp4, but who wants to convert video?

We both should have done more research into XBMC on the AppleTV before buying the unit. But, we were such fans, we rushed in. Given that XBMC can't play 720p x64 content (without re-encoding it), then he could have purchased and Xbox and put XBMC on that for only $50. You can already play 720p content on an Xbox, if you are willing to convert it to mpeg2. So, right now, we have 1 brand new AppleTV unit for sale.

Is XBMC on the AppleTV worth it? Well, if you're an AppleTV fan, and you have already purchased an AppleTV for the purposes of renting and downloading movies, then I'd say that Yes, putting on XBMC is well worth it. XMBC will add functionality to the AppleTV unit, and you won't be disappointed, until you try to play your 720p content. But, if you are looking at buying an AppleTV just to run XBMC, then buy a Xbox. For much less, you will get the same features.

A couple of weeks ago, I test drove a Popcorn Hour unit. Even though I was unimpressed with the performance of the UI, I would certainly choose that unit over the AppleTV, solely based on the fact that it played my 720p mkv files without an issue.

Recently, SageTV released a stand alone HD Player, which I suspect would be the better than both the AppleTV or the Popcorn Hour. I haven't tried it myself, but you can check out more on the SageTV HD Theatre (HD200) on GeekTonic. I currently own the HD100 that SageTV released previous to the HD200, and it plays all my current media without issue.

The Bad

• Slow boot time
  
• No cables (except for power)
  
• Only 6 buttons on the remote
• XBMC can't play HD files
  
• No power off button
  
• The unit runs very hot
  

The Good

• Simple AppleTV interface
• XBMC was easy to install
• XBMC worked well (as long you don't need to play HD)
• Slim and Sleek unit
  

More AppleTV Images

Movie Listings

The Mummy Movie Details