So now that the Apple TV is apparently shipping, it’s highly feasible that people will use it to watch movies. Specifically, they will watch movies stored on a Mac, purchased via the iTunes store. Was it really only a matter of time before this Apple Support FAQ showed up in my news reader? Between answering Apple TV-related questions and likely crying over Apple TV-dissection pictures, the good folks at Apple Inc. have posted 23 questions that they assume people have about purchasing movies through the iTunes store, downloading movies through iTunes, and whether syncing movies to your Apple TV counts as one of your five iTunes store authorizations (Apple’s response: it totally doesn’t). Knowledge is power; for example, I’m glad to know that my ability to purchase video content is only limited by my hard drive space.
So iTunes movies do have surround sound: has anyone downloaded any to tell me what audio format they use I thought AC3 was the only one that works and thats an AVI container only format I thought???
I dont see the big fuss about the apple tv.. I still prefer netflix and blockbuster :\
OK, seriously, nobody has ever called Apple and asked "If I buy a new iPod with video capability or an Apple TV, will I have to purchase the movie again?"
I hate filler like that bloating up otherwise-helpful FAQ documents, as if there's a minimum number of questions that must be present no matter how ridiculous they are.
About Surround Sound:
There have been a lot of complaints around the tubes that the Apple TV does not do surround sound. In fact the movies on the iTunes Store does have Dolby Surround (encoding). If you have a Dolby Pro Logic (digital decoding) setup, then you will get Dolby Surround. If you have Dolby Pro Logic II, then the Dolby Surround will be upmixed. I would guess whenever iTunes goes 720p, they will probably include 5.1 surround which is decoded with Dolby Pro Logic II.
(Dolby Surround has Left, Center, Right and Rear channels. The rear channel comes out of the two rear speakers out of phase with each other.)