Q: anyone having trouble with renting movies with Apple TV?

Welcome to the Apple community.

Would you like to describe exactly what sort of problems you are encountering when trying to rent a movie.

I am having trouble tonight . . tried to rent Argo and it said it would take 4 HOURS to download. RENT, not buy. I rented a movie on Monday and it worked like a charm. Have NO IDEA why it is going to take 4 hours to stream a movie. I am on the phone to Apple support now . . .

The time is takes is dependent on your network.

What is your actual speed (spedtest.net)

Have you checked for interference (istumbler or netsrumbler)

Are you using your ISPs DNS

In the room with the Apple Extreme, the download speed is 22mbps. Where the Apple TV is located, the speed is 14. It worked fine on Monday.

Ok what about interference and DNS? Sometimes ISP can throttle too.

I am having exactly the same problem. Last night I tried to rent a movie from Apple but every time I selected a movie I got the spinning loop then back to the main screen. I had no problem watching a movie over the iTV from Netflix. Does anybody know what my problem is?

I did call AppleCare but the person I spoke to really didn't  have any insight. Just asked me to check my download speeds. Asked if I was able to download the movie to my computer and I said the reason I bought an Apple TV was to download the movie TO THE TV. I asked if 4 hours was 'normal' and he just said "I heard it does happen".

He did supposedly refund my money but said it could take a few days.

Today I received my receipt from Apple for the movie rental. I clicked REPORT A PROBLEM and then the only option is DONE or RESEND. I clicked RESEND and was told they could not complete my request at this time.

I am going to try to download the movie this morning but not watch it (as suggested by the 'tech'  - really the first time AppleCare has been less than helfpul) BUT I don't think there is any memory on Apple TV so is this even possible?

I am still under my free 90 days of phone support so will report back but really, this is not good. Netflix movies start straight away.

As stated it can be normal depending on network conditions, you still didn't answer the other questions. Netflix adapts to the connection in order to stream instantly. iTunes content is fixed and needs to load a portion before it starts.

Really sorry, but I am unable to answer your other questions. I'm just a normal Apple user, slightly technophobic, not stupid, but I expect Apple stuff to work. I set it all up. Played a movie on Monday. Wow, what a treat!

4 days later, I am unable to play a movie.

Logically what may have happened in 4 days to cause my new Apple TV to not work, when it DID just 4 days ago?

Sunspots???

You don't have to be, however it is a network streaming device and if there are issues it is due to your setup. Things can occur in a network, like interference that have now caused the issue. Using 3rd party DNS will cause delays,some ISPs are known to throttle the connection. There are other factors but those are the most common.

In regards to the download, you would need to do it on a computer if you don't intend to watch it

If you don't want to troubleshoot that's fine so we'll just close the discussion. It continues to work fine here and for the majority, not much else to say.

I appreciate you trying to help. However, I have NO idea how to check for a '3rd party DNS'. As I said, it worked flawlessly on Monday. Wouldn't that mean I was corrected properly?

I went to Apple TV support and in answer to rentaing movies it referred me with a link to this:

How long do I have to watch a rented movie?

You have 30 days from the time of rental to watch your movie, and 24 hours (in the US) or 48 hours (elsewhere) after you've started viewing to finish it. Once the rental period expires, the movie will disappear from your iTunes library.

This is a link FROM the Apple TV page. So I should have 30 days to watch the movie. Under Settings is a "Search for rented movies" option. Isn't that where you would find your rentals that you have not watched yet?

It's not that I don't WANT to troubleshoot. I just do not have a CLUE how to provide what you are asking for.

Thanks.

To check DNS go into settings - network and make sure its set to automatic

Yes that article is correct, however Apple TV has no storage so if you don't intend to watch it or in more than one sitting or to check the download it is best to try via computer. You can check for rentals on ATV but it will need to load it whereas its stored on the computer for 30 days until you hit play

In regards to interference you simply go to istumbler.net and download the program, run it and it will show you what interference/overlapping networks etc are occurring. They also tell you how to read if unsure

Thanks for the explanations vazandrew . . . I talked to AppleCare this morning. A very patient woman in Toronto helped me. Not sure it worked but we'll see.

Although I have a speed of 22 right next to my Airport Extreme, it dtops to 14 next to the Apple TV. She said this is a huge drop.

She had me go to

Apple > About this Mac > More Information > Network > Airport and check the channels of other internet connections in the neighborhood. She said most people are on 1, 6, or 11. I was on 11. So we changed it to 3. I guess this is what you refer to as interference?

We'll see if it helps. She said Monday night maybe no one was watching anything but on Friday night everyone was online . . .

Will report back . . . .