How could this happen? And who would eat the Apple? And how could this be an article talking about any thing related to technology? Okay okay…no more puzzles…let’s see what it is…
As we talked in our last issue about
Google TV and mentioned its specifications and displayed the idea, this great idea that fascinated us, but it wasn’t the first trial to make this kind of TV’s.
Google TV was released in September 2010 just two months ago, but apple have presented the idea or a similar one in 2006 by introducing the first generation of Apple TV. But this isn’t what we are going to talk about in our article and based on the title, you can guess what happened.
After the Google TV release enhanced by more options, better specifications and the large number of deals, Apple was about to be eaten in the market by the great Google product ,but fortunately that didn’t happen and thanks to the product we are introducing today…the second generation of Apple TV.
So, let’s see what we are talking about now…the first thing anyone would notice about the apple TV is the extremely small dimensions as it comes in a square shape of 3.9” and 0.9” thickness. It’s so small that even your hand wrist can embrace it.
There are some simple requirements for the joy of using Apple TV that we are going to mention throughout the article. First of them is a wireless home network, this will enable you to log into your computers from your TV using the Apple TV, so when you switch on your Apple TV, at the menu screen you would find a sub-menu named computers through which you can access all the content on your computers at the same home network...photos, videos, movies or even music and browse them all from your large screen as much as you wish.
We can also see that the menu contains other sub-menus such as ‘movies’ and ‘TV shows’, these two are so much similar as you use them to watch you favorite movies or TV shows of course. All what you have to do is browsing the movies or TV shows, chose what you want, order it and that’s it. You have your movie and it’s ready to watch, it's simple.
The other menu as shown is the internet menu and to be frank, you won’t find too many options in there unlike what you can do with the Google TV as here you can only find: Netflix for the latest movies or shows, youtube for any kind of videos, MobileMe an Apple site for mobile stuff, flickr for photos and you will also find Radio.
So, as we’ve seen you don’t find so much of what you might be waiting from Apple, but compared to the 99$ price and the very small dimensions I think it’s worthy
Similar to the Google TV, you can install the remote application on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch and use it instead of the original remote.
There is no more to be said about the Apple TV except that you will need a Netflix account for browsing Netflix content and also an iTunes account for movies and TV shows’ rentals.
Last but not the least, the surprise that you all have been waiting for, in the box. In addition to the Apple TV, the remote and the power cable, you will find a sticker of Apple. YESSSS

, a sticker that you can put in your lecture notes or your disk! Can you believe this?
Now that we saw both releases of the new web TV product by two Titans in the field, It’s all now up to the customer…users are the ones who are going to decide which one is their type, which one fits their needs and which one makes their lives easier.
I know they both are not yet released in Egypt but I would like to know your views about both of them and which one would you prefer.
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Published at www.magnology.net | 21st Issue | 01/12/2010