Apple's CEO Tim Cook has finally unveiled the long-anticipated new Apple TV 4K HDR on Tuesday night South African time in another of the "church of Apple"'s consumer theatre spectacles that also saw the iPhone X being introduced.
Apple's "revelation" of the newer, and improved Apple TV, as well as all the other Apple products like the iPhone X were all once again underwhelming, incremental changes with nothing revolutionary, game-changing or transformative within the TV industry or the smartphone business.
The Apple TV 4K HDR announcement as well as the other Apple products came at the 10th anniversary of the iPhone and was done from the Steve Jobs Theatre at Apple's revamped Cupertino campus and was streamed online worldwide.
Tim Cook called the roll-out of 4K television "an inflection point" in the history of television, finally bringing real cinema quality TV into ordinary consumers and TV viewers' homes.
As opposed to America, in South Africa the adoption of 4K television quality is barely non-existent with no TV channels available in 4K and neither MultiChoice's DStv, the Chinese StarTimes Media SA's StarSat, Platco Digital's OpenView HD or any of the streaming services like Netflix, Showmax, Amazon Prime Video or DEOD offering 4K content.
The Apple 4K HDR supports both 4K and HDV, as well as HD-10 and DolbyVision with a display resolution of 3 840 x 2 160 and 60fps.
With a 10x Fusion chip in the new Apple TV 4K, and Apple will automatically upgrade films to 4K but price it at the high definition (HD) cost. The Apple TV 4K box is 35 x 98 x 98 mm and weighs 425g.
The user interface (UI) of Apple TV has been redesigned and optimized for 4K resolution, including the screensavers that play when the device isn't being used, and the Siri remote control has also bee revamped and upgraded.
Apple said that both Netflix and Amazon video streaming services in 4K will be added to the Apple TV 4K "soon" and is finally adding Amazon Prime Video to Apple TV.
The Apple TV 4K will start selling from 15 September and start to ship from 22 September.
