First Bad Experience with an Apple Product

I'm back, sorry it took so long. Thanx for trying to help with this! So here's what I did:

1) I went to speedtest.net and picked a NY server. Got 7.9Mbps download, about 2Mpbs upload
2) Switched my Airport Extreme with my old Linksys wired router, ran the same test. Got 12.63Mbps download, about 2.5Mbps upload. But then I noticed my connection was hanging! Oh oh, seems my 10 year old cable modem was probably going south.
3) Bought a new Linksys CM100 cable modem (that's why I've been away for a couple days).
4) I just got it and plugged it in. Now, the new modem with old Linksys router and re-ran the same test. 22.3Mbps download and 6Mbps upload!! Holy $%&*! I should have gotten a new router a long time ago!!
5) Switched back to my Airport Extreme and re-ran the tests - but in the wired mode (not wireless). This time I'm only getting 18.5Mbps download but still get 6Mbps upload. My Airport is definetly slower! Still not bad though...

I'm going to try a movie again and see what happens. I'm expecting no problems. I'll watch it then switch to wireless and re-run the speed tests again and try to watch the same movie again.

I'll see if I can figure out how to configure my Airport to the 5Ghz band if it's not already, unless you can tell me where to check this?

Thanx!! I'll report back in a day or so and let you all know what happened...

Good you figured out your modem issue. Fast download rentals in Apple TV are just around the corner for you.

For the 5 GHz band, it depends on which revision of the Airport EXtreme you have. But you should find it under Airport section in the Airport Utility. Once in that section, select the wireless tab.

Then, depending on the version you have, you will either find it directly on that page where you can select the type of network used (802.11 n/b/g compatible, 802.11 n 2.4 GHz, or 802,11 n 5 GHz)

If it's not there (because you have the simultaneous dual band model) , you will have, in the same page, a button named "wireless network option". Under that, you will be able to activate the 5 GHZ network and give it a different network name (ex : Airport 5GHz). Also, make sure the wide channel option is checked.

On either one or the other, make sure you reconfigure your wireless network in the Apple TV to make sure you are connected to it on the 5 GHz.

If the Apple TV is not that far away from the router, you might find the 5 GHz band faster and much more reliable than the 2.4 GHz one depending on devices you have that can interfere and how many people in your neighborhood run a wifi router. There are 11 channels in the 2.4GHz band. Most of your neighbors who have a wireless router, they are set to auto channels which means that they will be mostly on the channel 6-1-11. If there are too many people around with that, they can interfere with your network and slow down the speed or just get your connection lost. The 5 GHz band have 149 channels and today, very few people run under that band.

Decently fast internet connection and a fast reliable wifi network are the key to comfort with iTunes store HD rentals. This is considering that your ISP doesn't throttle speed from iTunes store servers.

Looking forward to see your results.

Finally - SUCCESS!! I just finished watching Toy Story 3 in HD (really cute movie BTW). I had my Airport Extreme hard wired to my ATV2 though. I wasn't ready for the wireless leap yet! The picture quality was unbelievably clear. I now see the difference between Netflix - YUK!

When I started the movie, my heart sank though! It started out saying 5 hrs and 24 minutes until ready!! Then 6 hrs and 12 minutes. I couldn't believe it - now what? So as I sat there contemplating my next angry email to Apple, it went down to 4 hrs 10 minutes, then all of a sudden it said it was ready to play. All told, it took about a minute or so to start. So much for the accurate message Apple!

So after the movie, I unplugged my CAT5 cable and configured my Airport Extreme to the 5Ghz band per your instructions benoitgl2000. Thanx, I would never have figured that out on my own. I also bumped the "Multicast Rate" to 24Mbps just for the heck of it. Not sure what that does, but it sounded fast.

Then I restarted the movie. This time, no waiting at all - it started immediately! My iMac will still stay hard wired to my Airport, but I re-ran the speed tests again. This time I'm getting 22.84Mbps download and 7.37Mbps upload. The fastest times yet! I know this isn't measuring the Wi-Fi speed, but it's just a general health check on my equipment. There is a network speed test on the ATV, but it sends the results to Apple, so I don't know what the wireless connection speed is. How dumb - why can't they display it?

So in the end, I guess the new ATV2 does stream movies OK, but you have to make sure your equipment is working and configured optimally. Probably the bandwidth setting to 5 Ghz was the most beneficial.

Thanx benoitgl2000 for the help!! To everyone else, check your equipment settings because it does work. Unfortunately, unlike everything else Mac, this setup took a little manual effort to configure - reminded me of my PC days!

This is just another in what is becoming a long line of examples of people who initially think something is wrong with the Apple TV device and Apple and then figure out it is really something on their own end. I'm happy you got your situation figured out.

EXCELLENT !!! Glad it worked.

UPDATE: There's one caveat to using the 5Ghz. Although speeds are in the Gigabit range, certain devices will not connect, like my iPhone 4 and my older Airport Express! The movie still streamed OK though, so I'm OK with 2.4 - for now...

I just found this out late last night, so unless there is a way to configure my iPhone for 5Ghz, I have to throttle back to 2.4Ghz, N only. Can iPhones be configured for 5Ghz?

I too had a bad first experience with the new Apple TV product. I learned that the minimum network speed for success with this is 5 Mbps. Not the advertised speed, but actual throughput. I worked with Apple to resolve this issue, and I am here to tell you all that after upgrading my network speeds, I had to perform a Factory reset and download the updates again, but it was worth it. This Product works better than my DVR now. It is so responsive to the pause/play on the remote. I hit the menu button by mistake while watching my movie from iTunes and I went back to resume the movie. It buffered for just a few short seconds and boom, I was right back where I left off.

My guess is that the issues we are all complaining about in here have to do with networks that are running DSL speeds, but with home networks that are bogged down with other traffic as well.

All I can say, is there is no substitute for bandwidth. Make sure you are actually getting 5Mbps to the device and reset it. It works GREAT!!!

ScottS916 wrote:
My guess is that the issues we are all complaining about in here have to do with networks that are running DSL speeds, but with home networks that are bogged down with other traffic as well.

For the record, I have standard DSL and can watch a movie within about 2-3 minutes of ordering it. Just a data point.

Well ScottS916, some of us have been telling people that but they still insist that it's a problem with Apple. It seems more and more people are starting to report experiences similar to yours. You are correct that if you want flawless streaming with iTunes rentals you are going to need a minimum of 5mbps actual throughput while you are attempting to stream. Also, iTunes rentals stream in a higher quality than Netflix and include surround sound audio so it requires more bandwidth so even if Netflix is streaming fine you still may not have enough bandwidth to stream iTunes rentals without issues.

This computer is the only one in my house not on my local WiFi LAN....... ipad, Ipod, iHone, Macbook Pro, macbook, and 2 iMacs are on with 4 users....... Home streaming from iTunes to ATV@ doesn't suffer. When I purchase a new movie on my mac that is hard wired it takes 6-8 hours to download in HD. When I had ATV 1st gen connected to wifi it was the same. Granted I purchased the movies, but even if you rent them and do so ahead of time......... so they are downloaded, then a little planning stops all the negative vibes i see here. Apple is not magic, and degraded video looks degraded and sounds degraded..... so just decide whether speed or quality is your personal choice and proceed down that path.

I was trying to download a film but it said that my apple id was wrong. i couldnt download the film on the apple tv but i downloaded on my iphone fine. any suggestions?????