Apple announced today that sales of Apple TV are expected to top 1 million units this week. The significantly smaller, significantly less expensive Apple TV was introduced at Apple's annual iPod and iTunes event in September and released around the end of that month. With a focus on rental rather than purchase, streaming rather than sync, Hollywood rather than "amateur hour" and Netflix as well as iTunes, Apple's PR on the subject provides some interesting stats but strangely, no quotes from Apple execs:
iTunes users are now renting and purchasing over 400,000 TV episodes and over 150,000 movies per day.
While it took longer than iPhone 4 or iPad to reach the 1 million mark, is this any indication Apple TV might be poised to move beyond "hobby" status? Or will that still take Hulu, HBO, and major league sports deals?
[Apple PR]
Reader comments
Apple TV sales top 1 million
Got one, am a happy camper, still have to rent my first movie or TV show however, the Belgian Store is not open yet... A few things missing :
Farid
1 million in 3 months? IMO, terrible. I'll buy X-Box before Apple TV! Can't wait for iPad 2 with da cameras.
Title needs to be worded correctly. Needs to read "Apple TV sales Expected to Top 1 Million"
But this will be interesting.
I'm never one to care about starting numbers. I always look to see what the end of life numbers are.
How many where purchased by time it's done or a new one comes out.
But if they hit that number (along with Roku who is poised to hit 1 million), congratulations to them!
It needs Hulu and sports, other than that... flawless
It needs either a Hulu+ app on the device OR the Hulu+ iPhone/iPad app needs to support AirPlay. Having one of these features would sell me... and possibly even make me consider dumping cable. An added bonus would be having a Safari browser. Why this was not included is beyond me. However, the lack of Hulu+ is the bigger showstopper. Take care of that, and Apple has another $99 from me.
I have one and both of my kids do as well. Everyone in the house loves them. Even my non-techie wife loves the Apple TV. I ordered a Roku box because I want more content. Hulu, Amazon VOD and MLB TV to name a few. I am not even considering selling my Apple TV units, but being limited to Netflix, YouTube and video podcasts just isn't working out well for me.
I have the middle Roku box due here any day now. Can't wait. And I'll be waiting for Apple to open up the Apple TV. If they don't, I'll move on.
I bought one of them. :)
I have two and love them. I agree, it needs Hulu+ and it will be well worth the $99. I too would consider dumping cable.
Not enough content or things to use it for. Waiting...
My wife loves her apple TV and air play will be killer when we can use it from other apps.
If they get the NFL package and more content I may buy another one for me. At least gives the ability to read content off a share drive instead of having to put everything in iTunes.
if you stream your own contennt there is limitless amounts of it available
I like mine for Airplay and Netflix (although the Netflix selection is terrible) but I found something that totally sucks on it. Tried downloading an HD movie last night directly from iTunes on the unit (not iTunes on my laptop) and it took 3 hours to download. Netflix movies start up after a few seconds so what's up with iTunes? I searched for a solution online but only found a TON of other folks having the same issue. Need to get serious and send Apple Customer Service an email or something. It totally ruins the experience.
It is a nice device other than that...
Looks like Apple TV 2 is still a hobby (and just a less expensive hobby). And Apple hasn't found the right formula in the TV land yet.
@Andrew read something the other day about slow downloads when using google dns or opendns. Notnsure if this is your problem or not but you might want to look into it.
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