The New York Times reports that the new Apple TV is expected to be announced this June during WWDC 2015. Citing an anonymous Apple employee “briefed on the product”, NYT claims the 4th gen. Apple TV will get a new, “slightly thicker” remote with a touchpad and will offer a web-based TV service.

When Apple introduces its new TV box this summer, the remote control will gain a touch pad and also be slightly thicker than the current version, according to an employee briefed on the product, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the device was confidential.

The touch pad can be used for scrolling around and there will also be two physical buttons, the person said. The remote’s thicker size is comparable to the remote control for Amazon’s wireless speaker, the Echo, the person added.

The new Apple TV is expected to be introduced this June during Apple’s annual conference for software developers, according to the employee briefed on the remote.

Apple has held talks with a number of leading television groups to offer an Internet-based TV service this year for its Apple TV, iPhone and iPad, according to people briefed on the company’s plans.

The service will offer a bundle of channels that is smaller and cheaper than the broad catalog of offerings in a typical cable subscription, according to these people.

Back in March, The Wall Street Journal reported that Apple is planning to launch a $30-$40/month online TV service in September.

According to BuzzFeed’s John Paczkowski the new Apple TV will also get Siri and its own App Store.

More on Apple TV 4:

• HomeKit devices are coming soon and so is the Apple TV refresh
• Apple finishing up work on a new, slimmer Apple TV with App Store
• Forbes: Apple TV will be the center of Apple’s smart home

Be sure to follow Apple TV Hacks on Twitter, Facebook or Google+ for all the latest Apple TV-related news.

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There are around half a dozen reasons why your Apple TV‘s little silver remote is acting weird and not doing what it is supposed to do. You might be thinking of taking it into a nearby Apple Store Genius bar but, fortunately, there are quite a lot of things which you can try yourself to troubleshoot the issues and snap the Apple remote back to life.

Here is a step by step approach for all those who face Apple TV remote not working issues, or if your remote starts controlling your Mac instead… (step D).

Step A. The preliminary steps for Apple TV Remote Not Working Problems

1. Make sure your remote has a clear line of view to till the Apple TV. Take it out of any cabinets, remove any obstructions and make sure the Apple TV’s front, where the sensors are, is facing the remote.

2. If you have more than one Apple TV remote at home, check if you’re using the correct one.

Step B. Check if your remote is working at all

This is a quite interesting part of this guide. The infrared rays emitted by the remote are not visible to human eyes. But your digital camera, even the one on your phone can capture it.

So pick up your iPhone, point the camera to the top edge of your remote and push any button on the remote. If you see a light flashing, it means your remote is working.

Step C. The major troubleshooting

After you cleared stages A & B if the problems persists, we are in for some cool troubleshooting.

Just press on any button on your Apple remote, pointing at the Apple TV. A white light at the face of the Apple TV will respond to your trigger, with a pattern of blinks. Carefully view the pattern to match with the following (don’t worry, it is way more easier than it sounds):

Case 1. Apple TV light flashes 3 times in quick succession : This means your Apple TV is paired with another remote.

Solution: You can easily unpair any other remotes connected with your Apple TV and pair your existing one. This takes only a few clicks and under a minute.

Use any Apple Remote: press and hold the Menu + Left buttons for 6 seconds. An image of a broken link will appear on the TV, signifying that the paired list is cleared.

Now, use your current remote (the one you want to pair with the Apple TV): press and hold Menu + Right buttons for 6 seconds and a chain link icon will appear on the screen prompting that the pairing is complete.

There it is, your unresponsive Apple Remote is now smoothly controlling the Apple TV.

Case 2. The light flashes with every blast of the IR Apple Remote but nothing happens on the television: In this case, the problem is most likely a temporary software glitch on the Apple TV.

Solution: Try restarting the Apple TV by following the below steps.

– hold down the Menu + Down buttons for a few seconds and the Apple TV will restart normally.

– if that doesn’t work, use the good-old technique of pulling the plug. Wait for at least 10 seconds and power up the Apple TV again.

Case 3. The light never flashes at all (or sometimes it does and at others do not): This usually occurs when the Apple TV remote battery has a low charge, which is shown on the television screen as a low battery alert.

Solution: You can turn open the back of the Apple TV Remote and replace the battery by following Apple’s simple guide.

Step D. My Apple TV remote controls my Mac instead of the Apple TV

If such a bizarre thing happens to you, don’t panic – this means your Apple Remote has paired with your Mac.

Solution: All you need to do is turn off infrared reception on your Mac.

– Go to the Apple icon on the top bar

– Select Security and Privacy from the View menu

– Click the lock icon and enter the administrator password when prompted

– Select Advanced and then “Disable remote control infrared receiver”.

Step E. My Apple TV Remote still doesn’t work

We have gone through the most common Apple TV Remote not working problems and included fixes. If you’re still having trouble, you can try updating your Apple TV software, if you haven’t done that already. If that doesn’t help either, you can take the Apple TV and Remote to an Apple Store for assistance.

In the meantime, you’re in luck if you’ve turned on Home Sharing on the Apple TV. If so, you will be able to control your Apple TV with your iPhone of iPad using the iOS Remote app. If you donot have Home Sharing enabled, you will need to connect your Apple TV to the router via ethernet cable to control it with the iOS app.

Holiday Gift Guide 2015: Best Accessories for Apple TV

Be sure to follow Apple TV Hacks on Twitter, Facebook or Google+ for all the latest Apple TV-related news.

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It was not long ago that we shared the news regarding Apple officially activating its Bluetooth hardware, via the 5.2 update, on their Apple TV 2 and Apple TV 3 devices. Though it seems that support is limited to Bluetooth keyboards, not Bluetooth remotes, only time will tell if Apple has a line of new peripherals on the way for us all. As exciting as the news is, having Bluetooth capabilities does no good if users are unsure/unable to utilize these features.

We also want to remind those of you that own an Apple TV 1, the silver box, that this guide will not pertain to your device as you have no Bluetooth hardware enabled by default. If you own an Apple TV 1, and would like Bluetooth support, you will need to look into other LINUX-based options (see our guide on installing openELEC) paired with Bluetooth dongles.

REQUIREMENTS

1. Bluetooth keyboard
2. Apple TV remote (hardware or software)
3. Apple TV (2nd or 3rd generation) updated to the latest 5.2 firmware
4. A desire for your media center to have additional awesomeness

LIMITATIONS (according to Apple)

1. Bluetooth support on Apple TV is for keyboards only. Headsets, speakers, and other devices are not supported.
2. If you are having difficultly connecting or using a third-party Bluetooth keyboard, contact the manufacturer to verify that it is compatible with Apple products and Apple TV.
3. The original Apple Wireless Keyboard (2003), that features a white case and uses four AA batteries, is not compatible.

PAIRING

The first thing we need to do, as is the case when using any Bluetooth devices, is “pair” our hardware. Pairing is simply the process of connecting the two devices to each other, therein allowing them to communicate with each other.

1) From your main menu, navigate to the Settings -> General -> Bluetooth

3) At this point, let’s go ahead and turn on the keyboard and set it in “pairing mode”

5) You will immediately see the word “Bluetooth” at the top of your screen with the word “Searching” next to it.

6) In a matter of seconds you should see your Bluetooth keyboard’s name pop up on your Apple TV.

7) Using the Apple TV remote, click on the name that represents your Bluetooth keyboard.

8) You are now met with a sequence of 4 numbers: type these IN ORDER on your keyboard.

9) Congratulations, your keyboard is now paired with your Apple TV.

HOW TO USE

Now that your keyboard is paired with your Apple TV, everything can be controlled by either the keyboard or your Apple TV remote. So, let’s assume that you now want to put away your remote and control your system via the keyboard – here are the basic keys that you would be looking for:

You can use your keyboard to:

• Enter text and other information (search, email addresses, passwords, and so on)
• Navigate Apple TV menus using the arrow, Return, and Escape keys
• Navigate recently updated aTV Flash (black)
• Jump to an item, title, or name on the screen by typing the first few letters (for example, when viewing your music collection, you can type a song title or artist name to jump to it in the list)
• Use media controls when playing music and video to play or pause content and select previous or next.

Volume, brightness, and other controls are not available for Apple TV. Apple TV uses the U.S. English keyboard layout regardless of the keyboard’s hardware layout.

DISCONNECTING

If you want to stop using your keyboard or disconnect it from the Apple TV:

• Select Settings -> General -> Bluetooth
• Select your keyboard and then select “Forget this device”

(This article is also available in Spanish / Este artículo también está disponible en español)

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Little by little the apps are coming to the Apple TV. Hacker and iOS developer Steven Troughton-Smith and a hacker called TheMudKip have made it to run iPhone and iPad apps on an Apple TV 2, jailbroken with Seas0nPass. Using @TheMudkip’s MobileX window manager for iOS, and @chpwn’s MobileLaunchpad launcher to go with it, they managed to get multiple iOS apps running natively on Apple TV, without AirPlay. Later on, they even figured out a way to run iPad applications at a full 720p resolution.

Using a custom springboard, the software that powers the app launcher, also allowed for another new feature: side-by-side apps. This lets you see on the big screen all the applications running at a time, e.g. different chat applications.

“Nick had written this amazing window manager for the iPad that replaced the entire homescreen, allowing you to run multiple apps side by side, and I realized this could enable iOS apps on the Apple TV for the first time. We’ve spent the past 2 days modifying everything to work really well on the Apple TV screen size, etc, and getting apps to run,” Troughten-Smith told CNET.

Since the Apple TV doesn’t have a touch screen, the hackers are using a combination of VNC, SSH and the Apple Remote to launch and navigate apps. However, Troughton-Smith said he is working to make it Apple remote-only.

The hack isn’t publically available yet. For any enterprising hackers who want to make a UIKit Apple TV app, Troughton-Smith published an input library needed to get started (to add Apple TV IR input to an iOS app).

You may also want to read:
Apple TV 3 or Apple TV set?
FireCore releases aTV Flash (black) 1.0 to supercharge the Apple TV 2
How to install aTV Flash (black) 1.0 on Apple TV 2

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