Video works on ATV1, but not ATV2. "An error occurrd loading this content"

I just updated to the 4.2.1 AppleTV update released today. Of course, this error was temporarily fixed last night, now it is back up again. Random movies, tv shows, etc. Why, Apple? How hard is it to get a product right the first time?

Does anyone know if I can restore my AppleTV by hooking up to iTunes with a micro-USB cable to revert to out of the box iOS? When I do a restore via wifi, it always does this but automatically updates to the moat recent iOS (4.2.1 as of today 3/22/11). Things seemed much better before the 4.2 update that happened as iTunes went to 10.2.1 and issues began...

Why would Apple continue to release software updates that do not address these issues? We have to keep leaving Apple feedback on this issue that is big enough that over 13,000 views on their own message board confirm this problem since the 4.2 software update a few weeks ago...

Tell your friends: http://www.apple.com/feedback/appletv.html

I recently had this same problem on my ATV2 and finally solved it! A week ago I moved all of my iTunes media onto my Time Capsule (TC) b/c my MacMini was nearly out of hard drive space. After hours of scratching my head, my spouse whining that we can't watch our movies, etc, and updating my ATV2 and OSX/iTunes software to no avail - I realized from reading another user's thread who was also using an external drive (in my case Time Capsule) something made me realize that after a while of non-use the TC goes into SLEEP MODE and the content that ATV2 needs from the external TC becomes unavailable - and hence you get the "An error occurred loading this content" message. Once you "wake up" your TC by accessing any file or folder, voila! your content becomes magically available to your ATV2 again! I hope this helps someone else 🙂

Tried that. No luck. I have an external HD (2 TB) attached to my MBP that is always on. I have had this issue since the Apple TV 4.2 update (same time as the itunes 10.2 update), but it never happened before those updates. Even after the 4.2.1 Apple TV update, same issue. Sometimes movies work, most times they don't. I had a streak of about two days, then when I came home a little while ago, I'm back to the "an error occurred loading this content. Please try again later" error message...

My question for Apple: When the F is later???

Sorry for the frustration, but this is ridiculous. Over 13,000 views and hundreds of posts on this issue and nothing from Apple. The "flicker issue" was viewed and commented on by as many people and within two weeks of the 4.2 update, Apple released 4.2.1 to fix that, along with other "bugs". No official word from Apple what these bugs are, but there is a clear issue with this problem, as well as the metadata "descriptions" issue that thousands have read about on this message board, and I am sure a few others as well. Come on, Apple. How hard it is to troubleshoot before releasing software updates? Throw a 4.2.2 Apple TV update our way to fix things asap. Pretty please, with sugar on top.

I had the same problem as well. What happened for me was that it was working well, but I bought a new MacBook Pro and transferred over my information. However, my new computer had the same name as my old computer. What it did was append a (2) at the end of the computer name. While digging through my system preferences, I found this in the Sharing option and saw it appended the (2).

I removed the (2) from the end of my computer name and it worked.

You all are far to kind about this.

I am so very frustrated right now. After bragging about how cool the APTV2 is, I turn it on tonight to screen a movie for friends in 1080P, and it doesn't work.

Furthermore, there have been posts on this FOR ******* MONTHS.

FIX

THIS

*******

PROBLEM

APPLE.

Thank you, from a very educated person who is thoroughly annoyed at this.

You all are far to kind about this.

I am so very frustrated right now. After bragging about how cool the APTV2 is, I turn it on tonight to screen a movie for friends in 1080P, and it doesn't work.

Furthermore, there have been posts on this FOR PHUCKING MONTHS.

FIX

THIS

PHUCKING

PROBLEM

APPLE.

Thank you, from a very educated person who is thoroughly annoyed at this.

I've been hit with this to - DEAD ANNOYED!!! and embarrassed!

Just like jamesghk I had some people round last night to watch a film so I could show off my AppleTV 2 (which I normally love by the way). The film works fine in iTunes.

One of my friends was thinking about buying an AppleTV 2 an other is an Apple hater and I wanted to show him what he's missing.

The result at the end of the evening was a good old laugh from the Apple hater and a potential purchase of an Apple TV out the window.

Please fix this!

I have had all the same problems but now I cant even play music on my ATV2. I also have a very hard time even seeing my library on the ATV2. This is BS!!

Add me to this list. Same error and rental expiration counting down. Haven't tried watching in a long while and had no idea it was an ongoing issue. And by "ongoing" I mean months apparently.

I just turned off IPv6 on my MBP (was set to "Automatically") and it did nothing to stop the "an error occurred loading this content, please try again later" error on my ATV.

If IPv6 is somehow related, wouldn't other equipment have to be checked as well? I looked in my TimeCapsule and the only choices for IPv6 (under Advanced/IPv6) are: Link-local only, Host, Tunnel, Router. "Link-local only" is selected and there is no 'off' setting.

SO, for me, this problem was caused by files which had more than one audio track (AAC and AC3) but no chapter markers. I fixed it by adding a couple chapters to the movie; the easiest way was to do it was create a plain text file with the following:

00:00:00.000 Chapter 1
00:00:05.000 Chapter 2

Save it as chapters.txt or whatever. Open the offending movie file in Subler (free, OSS, http://code.google.com/p/subler/) and then click the "+" icon in the upper left corner and select the chapters.txt file. Save and repeat. Huzzah!

I just tried adding a "chapter.txt" file (containing exactly what you have listed above) to one of my offending movies (which only had one audio track, AC-3, 6ch) and it still will not play on ATV2.

I have the same problem, but with me it ONLY effects rentals ON from the Apple TV. If I were to rent from my Mac in iTunes, I can play back by streaming from iTunes on Mac, but can not if rented directly from the Apple TV. It was never like this till about two updates ago!!

* EDIT: After re-reading the first few pages of replies, I tried changing my Dolby Digital Audio Out from "Auto" to "On" and my movies started playing again just fine. DOH! Guess it's just a bug with auto-detecting certain audio tracks and I didn't have to re-encode or mess around with creating frankenstein audio/video combinations after all... at least now I know.*

I finally got a video that wouldn't play to play!

Original .m4v contents:
H.264 video track
AC-3, 6-ch (yes, I know the tech-specs page for ATV2 doesn't list AC-3 at all...read on)

Using the Subler app, I created a new .m4v file and imported the video track from the movie that was not playing on the ATV2. I then saved it without an audio track and dropped it into iTunes as a test. It played instantly on my ATV2. Using Subler in this way does not re-encode the video. It simply creates a new .m4v wrapper around the existing video. So this proves the ATV2 doesn't like the AC-3, 6-ch audio track when it's the only audio track. I am now re-encoding the entire movie with the HandBrake application, using the AppleTV2 preset so it generates the appropriate audio track(s). Once it is done, I will create a new .m4v with Subler again, using the original video (who wants to see a re-encoded video? yuck) and the audio from this new re-encode and hopefully I will be watching the movie via ATV2.

I didn't check every single one, but every movie that doesn't play that I DID check had the exact same type of single AC-3, 6-ch audio track. I didn't find any movie that plays ok that also had only that one type of audio track. A few that do play have both an AAC, 2-ch & AC-3, 2-ch, but none had "just" an AC-3, 6-ch audio track. So I am assuming the issue (at least for me) lies with movies containing a single AC-3, 6-ch audio track. If this new frankenstein movie works, I'll try it on a second movie that currently isn't playing and will post my findings here.