Now that Apple has tipped their new, dual-core A5 SoC as the central cortex of the iPad 2, it’s reasonable to expect that the chip will start creeping down the rest of the iOS line-up later this year. That means an A5-equipped iPhone 5 in June, followed by an A5-equipped iPod Touch in September.
But even though it doesn’t look like one, there’s one other member of the iOS family: the Apple TV. Can we expect Apple to update their set-top box offering as well?
9to5mac muses that it’s pretty likely, noting that one of the big failings of the current Apple TV is that it is limited to 720p output. Meanwhile, Steve Jobs himself made a big deal about how the A5-equipped iPad 2 can handle full HD 1080p output.
It’s an interesting thought. Of course, the A4 Apple TV can technically handle 1080p, as could even the iPhone 3GS, but obviously it did not perform quite up to Apple’s specifications. I imagine the Apple TV will indeed adopt the A5 SoC this September, but I suspect it will be done with little fanfare. The Apple TV still seems very obviously a hobby product on the part of Apple, and what it needs isn’t a faster chip: it’s more full-featured software.
John Brownlee is a writer for Fast Company, and a contributing writer here at CoM. He has also written for Wired, Playboy, Boing Boing, Popular Mechanics, VentureBeat, and Gizmodo. He lives in Boston with his wife and two parakeets. You can follow him here on Twitter.
34 responses to “Will The Apple TV Go 1080p Thanks To The iPad 2’s A5?”
I’m happy with the 720p. No buffering problems over N Wifi, smaller downloads, smaller rips.
I just don’t see enough image quality difference to justify it on my 50″ Panasonic Plasma
I agree with Tyson. I would be more concerned with network issues than processing. 720 is adequate for Netflix.
man! 50″ plasma TV !! Then I’ll keep my A4 AppleTV, even if I’d change my TV (currently using a 720p 32″ Samsung LCD, with trumendous quality rips ;-) )
+1 to Tyson. 720p is just fine. Also, all the iTunes shows are only 720p anyhow. I would rather not download another 1gb just for 1080p.
I agree with the others here. I think it’s just psychological to want “the best” and get 1080 when the reality is 720 looks great on my 50″ tv as well.
It’s Apps and the like that’d persuade me to buy an Apple TV, not 1080p.
airplay will bring that functionality. Maybe more native apps and a store will come at an eventul point but I don’t see it any time soon.
I think you’re the person I almost bought iLife ’06 off of Kijiji. Funny coincidence. I’m highly in to Mac products as well. And the next gen. Apple TV “will” have 1080p HD. I know it.
What is the point having 1080p when most of ATV users are not able to stream that kind of content over the local network, or internet, but even if they can, is there any content provider that streams in 1080p?
Small World! In any case, I don’t see the value in 1080 over 720, like some of the others have stated. There isn’t much difference, iTunes content would have to match, it would hog more bandwidth etc.
I’ve got a 120″ projector. The only time I see a difference between 720p and 1080p is when I freeze frame.
Using a car analogy, it may be like having a muscle car. Sure it can go 250 mph, but the most anyone can, or would want, to drive at is 100 mph. Sure it can do 1080p, but for all practical purposes, everyone will use it at 720p.
I’ve never been to this site before but I have to say i like the way everyone thinks. I’m glad to hear other people going beyond the hype of specs and speaking reality as this is breath of fresh air. On a side note I’ve come to the same conclusion with 720p and 1080p and my preference is 720 when you consider projection size, network bandwidth, processing resources & memory resources. It’s nice to meet a thinking community. Hi everyone, nice to meet you!
1080p would be fine and I have to admit I was unaware until recently that the “HD” content from several sources wasn’t full 1080. That being said I am not sure that is the main problem with the ATV they need to be addressing.
For me it is the streaming previously mentioned by @
Vancouver Web Design
.
I run a network with only one computer connected to it along with my ATV and an airport extreme base station yet I can still get glitches when I stream video as is hangs up a little bit. I can only imagine how if would react with a full 1080 video stream.
If they do go to full 1080 then IMHO they would need to fix the ATV’s really big failing, the fact that it isn’t expandable to an external hard drive. Being able to hook up an external drive to your ATV and pull content straight from it would solve the streaming problem that the 1080 content would bring.
Come on Apple you can do it… 1080p and HD audio come on it’s fantastic!
Because they don’t care about quality…. Â Most people buy DVDs from the bargain bin at Walmart not blu-ray the cadillac of video….
It won’t make a big enough difference so I don’t see the point.Â