Album Art on Your ATV2

Correspondent Dave Reynolds was dismayed that he could no longer enjoy watching cover flow album art “dance” across the TV while enjoying his music. To his chagrin, the Apple TV 2 no longer has the screen saver that displays floating album art. So, he used Save Album Art to Album Folder to export his album art as files to a chosen folder (like ~/Pictures/iTunes Art/) and then pointed the Apple TV (ATV: Settings > Screen Sharing > Photos > Computers > the Computer to Use) to use that folder as a screen saver (iTunes: Advanced > Choose Photos to Share). Party on, Dave.

Boxee

We successfully installed Boxee on our Apple TV and it works like you read about. Couldn’t be more pleased. Just thought I’d pass that along.

AppleTV and Netflix Player

We just bought an AppleTV after months of having to sneakernet our iPods to the Family Entertainment Center whenever we wanted to watch iTunes Store content. I must say I’m impressed. Got it to work with the 550 Harmony Remote, too.

Tomorrow our Roku Netflix Player arrives. We have the six-disk-at-a-time/unlimited Netflix plan so we’ll be able to see unlimited “Instant Play” movies and shows. I know some people are saying that there’s not a lot of “good” stuff to watch instantly, it’s sub-DVD quality, no HD, yadda. But we have pretty esoteric tastes here and have been delighted with the lists of stuff that is available. Plus, can HD be that far around the corner?

Apple TV Works With CRTs

Paul Kafasis, big amoeba at Rogue Amoeba, has posted a great overview of Apple TV. My favorite observation is Surprise #2: The AppleTV doesn’t require a “Widescreen TV” or an HDTV. I have a wonderful Toshiba 32″ CRT that already loves PS2 and which I’m sure would make room in its heart for an Apple TV.

Update to iTunes Coming Soon

Probably not completely unexpected, but here are some clues. This recent AppleCare article on Windows Vista and iTunes compatibility: “iTunes 7.0.2 may work with Windows Vista on many typical PCs. Apple recommends, however, that customers wait to upgrade Windows until after the next release of iTunes which will be available in the next few weeks.” This time frame jibes with the AppleTV specs page that had at one time listed iTunes 7.1 as a requirement (it now just lists “iTunes 7″), and AppleTV is due to start shipping this month.