So i have a smart tv that lets me stream and airplay anything i want. Is there any benefit to getting an Apple TV besides the HomeKit stuff? Like do you better quality on the context? i have a mini led ( Neo Qled) Samsung tv, a 2021 mode
Yes
Things I benefit from:
Apple Ecosystem: easy to input text using your phone rather than on screen keyboard. One underrated feature is airpods. The spatial feature when using them is very very good.
Speed: It’s the fastest TV box/streaming device out there. Snappy and responsive. I have a Shield and I love it but only yesterday it crashed on an app and rebooted itself.
Codec support: I’m a heavy Plex user and via the device itself and an app called Infuse I consider it the best Plex experience regarding its UI and it flawlessly plays everything I have on my home server. Ethernet connection is also important to be, something a lot of streamer sticks tend to omit these days.
Mic: I personally think it has a pretty decent mic and voice assistant. I’ve had experience with the Shield (google) and Fire sticks (Alexa) and I never used their mics because they could never recognise what I was trying to say. The Siri remote is fantastic. I don’t use Siri in day to day life but on the Apple TV Siri does its job well compared to others.
It can do a lot more. It has a bit of a gaming ecosystem but you need to pair a controller for that, but that could be useful in a pinch. You can game stream to your TV with apps like Steam Link or Moonlight from your PC. The app support is pretty good, all the streaming services are well supported here.
Negatives: If you are a home theater nut with an expensive surround sound setup, the Apple TV 4K does not support lossless surround sound. Also, you cannot sideload apps on it, or at least you cannot do so easily. Android TV wins out by a mile if sideloading is your jam. Android TV has some great sideload apps like Smart Tube Next and SoundTV as just some examples.
I got two of the fancy $150 ones and I just can’t find any use for them :/
The $45 Other brand stick lets me stream to the one TV that has no desktop plugged in to it. The ATV version of the Xfinity app doesn’t work “out of home” but their app version works just fine. For everything else, the desktops are superior.
AirPlay is nice and about the only use I can find for it. I’ll probably gift the second one as I’m never going to use both at once. Any other good uses for these? I know about the cameras but idc, I get everything to my iPhones. Streaming games go to a great assortment of handheld consoles.
Then it’s not for you.
First and foremost they are streaming boxes with other QOL improvements that might mean a lot for somebody else but feel useless and pointless for you.
Having this as a home pod replacement to take voice input- would that make sense?
You could. But it’s not a direct replacement for the home pod. The speaker is similar to an Alexa speaker and is always on and waiting for you to say, “Hey Siri” or just “Siri”. The Apple TV does not have an always on mic. You’d have to use the remote and press it down. To be fair, I’m not sure if the remote is always listening. I assume not, I’ll check in a bit b
If using the remote only to toggle Siri options is enough then yes you could use it as a sort of replacement.
Biggest benefit is this… it’s ridiculously overpowered for what it is… a tv box
Why does that matter? Well every streaming box or tv you buy I guarantee you will slow down in a year or two… apple TV could last 5-10+ years and still be just as fast on day 1 as year 10
First off, apps open faster and are much smoother running, super fast navigation, picture quality is great, good UI and if in the Apple ecosystem the experience can’t be beat.
Apple TV 4K + Infruse PRO app = ❤️
What does this app do👀?
Go to youtube and search for it
Basically everyone here is right, I’ve been using apple tv for years now and it has replaced what would have been cable boxes. My older TVs apps have stopped working after a few years and no longer support the latest features of Hulu YouTube and other modern streaming apps and are annoyingly slow in comparison.
TLDR- Your TV OS is slow af. Apple TV is snappy af.
IMO … I’ve tried ALL of them, for streaming it is the best by a mile.
If only they had a USB drive for my nature videos ( 😏 )…
… I could finally bin my nVidia Shield.
Maybe the next one will have one… I’ll be first in line.
For me, it’s a much cleaner experience for everything from the UI, AirPlay, native Apple Music, and HomeKit integration to having the ability to disable HDR/Dolby Vision when they (quite often) look like garbage.
I personally like being able to pair my AirPods easily while gaining Spatial Audio. I like the ability to use my iPhone as a remote which is honestly better than the actual remote imo. I also like the ability to use Siri for almost everything.
The iPhone as a remote would be great! Especially because i keep losing mine
I’ve had an AppleTV for a while, but one new benefit (starting with tvOS 17) is built in VPN support. If you combine the support for VPNs with Tailscale, it becomes incredibly convenient/powerful.
Basically, Tailscale is a “mesh VPN” of your devices. All your devices get the Tailscale app and they can talk to each other like they are on local WiFi together, no matter where they are. The most amazing thing, though, is you can nominate devices to be an “exit node”, where you can route traffic through the exit node (and the AppleTV can be an exit node)
Of course this has been possible for a long time, but it has always required you to be a huge nerd and have a server in your house running at all times (not to mention configuring it all…). Now, you can just (for example), open the Tailscale app on your phone/computer and tell it to use the AppleTV as an exit node…now, no matter where you are, your internet traffic will be routed through you home internet connection.
I am Canadian, but I live in Spain now. To watch streaming services from back in Canada, you can use a commercial VPN, but it’s a game of cat and mouse (the services ban IP addresses from VPN services). Now, I had my parents install Tailscale on their AppleTV, and I can tell my AppleTV to use their AppleTV as an exit node…and bam, no more regional restriction…and the best part? I was able to get my parents to set this up in about 2 minutes over the phone :D
Oh! I hadn’t even considered VPN support
I’ve got the new Samsung QN90C and while it’s UI is fluid and fast, I still got the latest Apple TV 4K (2022); it’s just so much better.
I’ve noticed that on our 1080p model, Netflix looked far better than the built in app on our older model 1080p Sony tv.
I think it is funny that nobody has said it yet. I think you all have gotten used to things just being better.
Ads. There aren’t a bunch of spammy aggressive ads everywhere. If you don’t like the Apple promoted stuff, you can just toggle it off and get the up next instead. Android TV had a clean UI without a bunch of promoted content being hurled at you. Now it looks like a Fire TV.
Apple TV is just a less aggressive more comfortable way of watching TV.
I like the controls better. The ten second rewind and ffw are easier to use than the TV’s apps. In fact I haven’t figured it out yet on the TV apps. I used to love the integrated Up Next, but Netflix doesn’t participate and other services like MAX stopped working.
As an early adopter of TiVo I really liked their interface and features. I haven’t had it for many years, but just ordered their Stream 4k device. It promises to give that integration. I’m tired of keeping a list of shows and what service they are on.