I wonder if you could make a TOTALLY sweet MythTV box out of this.

Or... somehow hack a wireless keyboard with something like Synergy and get full OS X on this thing.

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Man no kidding. This would be a great MythTV + Emulation station computer if we can get Linux running on it, and i cant see why it wouldnt. The whole thing is made of standard PC components. The 40 gig HD might be a little skimpy for a MythTV box, however.

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Perhaps Apple is using the GeForce Go 7300 to assist with H.264 decoding.

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That seems likely. 1GHz would be fairly iffy for 720p H.264. My guess is they included it for use as a DSP. Theres a lot of FMACs on even a low end GPU, which is really important for this sort of work.

Still, the whole package looks a bit thrown together. Theres real embedded parts you can use, rather then expensive laptop gear. You don't need an x86 CPU if you don't have a PC, a MIPS or ARM part with a fast DSP chip will do the same thing for 1/10 the price . . . if you've got time to rewrite your x86 codecs for a highly specialized DSP system. I guess Apple didn't.

Sort of reminds me of the Xbox 1. Lots of off the shelf PC parts, way more expensive to make then it should have been, but it did get MS's foot in floor and Sony isn't laughing so hard these days. Maybe Apple will pull if off.

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1GHz does indeed seem to being cutting it a bit close for high def H.264 although given how efficient coreAVC is perhaps they've just really optimised the decoder. If they have it'd be nice to see it in quicktime as that one seems very inefficient IMHO.

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quote:

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The cable itself is fine, but it's not wrapped in some ridiculously elegant way

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Why couldn't you run the tests first before tearing the whole thing apart? I think most people want to see how this new Apple widget performs, not what it is made of.

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Anandtech readers aren't most people :P

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I love to see what components Apple uses to run their gear. I think it gives perspective for all computer builders on what kind of minimal hardware you need to run a simple media PC.

I've got to ask Anand, were you one of those kids who used to tear things apart and not put them back together. If that's the case, I'll put your Apple TV back together if I get to keep it?

:D

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Whilst this device isn't for me (I don't have a HDTV, so nothing to connect it to, also I'd prefer a Squeezebox for my music due to the better DACs and not requiring a TV to see what you're doing) it is very interesting. It's a clean compact design, and nearly as small as VIA's nano-iTX platform (judging from the CD picture) but probably higher performing.

I expect that the second revision of this device will be extremely good.

I would have expected an AV cable of some sort to come with the device though - at least a HDMI cable! That's not exactly an out-of-the-box experience if you have to drive somewhere to get the cable.

The Intel CPU is very interesting, it's very small (the package, the die's large).

I'm willing to bet that the interface is extremely good, as per Apple's usual qualities. The remote is quite small, I'd be worried about losing it. How about a larger remote with a full iPod scroll wheel eh?

Bet if it had been a little bigger in all dimensions they could have put in a few more ports (useful for us SDTV owners) and a 3.5" hard drive... oh well.

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