Movie rentals - are they streamed or downloaded?

I just watched my first rental movie and noticed that there were frequent 'judders' in the picture as it froze momentarily then caught up, although the sound appeared to run smoothly. I purchased the rental a few days ago and only got round watching it today. I had thought that the film would download and I would be watching it from the hard drive, but by the way it juddered and at a few points froze for a few seconds, it looked more like it was running on a stream. The experience has made me a little wary of viewing rental movies in the future, especially as I don't think the movie was HD. How does the rental thing work regarding streaming versus a download stored locally on the HD until viewed?

i scanned your issue as to be honest it was quite difficult to read with it all in 1 huge paragraph.
however, yes it should have downloaded fully within a hour or so (depending on downloads speeds at time).
if you had stuttering whilst playing back a locally stored movie then it could be a few things.
1) overheating appletv which would usually result on on-screen artefacts, but could also cause stuttering (unlikely though)
2) corrupt download
3) appletv needs a reboot
personally i would try number 3 first. you can also transfer the rental to your itunes library on pc/laptop and play it there to see if it stutters (however if this is an HD rental then you can't do that).
you said that you didn't think it was an HD movie? do you mean that it didn't look like it ? if you are comparing it to blu-ray then of course it won't look like that. blu-ray is 1080p, appletv is 720p.

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HT1657 cannot resume downloading movie rental. it just says download error

Cannot resume downloading a movie rental. It just says download error

Hello, willywon.
Thank you for the question. Here are a couple articles that will help you troubleshoot the iTunes Store.
iTunes Store: "Error (-50)" when downloading purchased content
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1583
iTunes: Advanced iTunes Store troubleshooting
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3297
iTunes: Possible iTunes Store errors
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1424
If you received a specific error number or message and the articles above do not resolve the issue, please reply with the specific error that you are receiving.
Hope this helps,
Jason H.

My movies and movie rentals are not syncing with my ipad? any ideas on why?

my tv shos, movies and movie rentals are not showing up on my iPad but do show up in my iTunes library. Any ideas or reasons why they aren't transferring to my iPad when I sync it?

At the moment, I only have a couple of movies in my "Videos" folder. About a month ago I did have 2 rental movies and they were in a subfolder which I think might have bee called rentals. After I watched them and aftet the 24 hour viewing period was up, they went bye-bye.
As to why you don't see any rentals, I don't think iTunes allows rental movies to be synced to another device. I know they don't allow transfer from ATV to an iTunes folder on a computer.
Did you actually rent these missing videos directly to your iPad? If so, they should be there. That's how I got the 2 rental movies that I had in my Videos folder.

HT1657 Where are my iPad movie rentals? They are downloaded and I've been billed but cannot find them

I rented two movies, they've been downloaded and I've been billed but can't find them on my iPad anywhere. Not in the iTunes library or anywhere in iTunes. I give Up.where do these things get stashed?

They belong in the videos app.
Have you looked there?

IPad 2 Downloads for rented movies - where are they?

I rented a movie on my iPad 2 and under the Video icon, it says that I have rented this movie but it hasn't been downloaded. Go to Downloads to manage your downloads. Where are downloads?

I have the same problem, but there is no " downloads" at the bottom if the iTunes Store screen. There is a button that says purchased, but my rental movie is not in it. I definitely paid for it (I have the receipt). I have tried using search on the ipad, but apparently no such thing as "downloads"? I'm on the latest software too. Any ideas??

Rented movies: where are they on my mac?

Where are my rented movies on my mac? Can only find my purchased movies
Where are my rented movies on my mac? I can only find my purchased movies and tv shows. Rented movies are in my account history, so I have definitely rented them
where are my rented movies on my mac? They are in my account history as rented, but i can only find my purchased tv shows, not any rentals

I now think I understand your issue. Did you rent it on your mac or on the Apple TV? If you're trying to find rentals on the mac the sekect the "Movie" tab in the upper left corner. Once there you will see the dropdown for Movies. Selct that and then "Rentals" will show in as an option under the moives tab.

Movie Rentals, Are there More than 150?

Would really like to buy an AppleTV, but where are the movies?
Did a Power Search for All Possible Movie Rentals. Could only see 150 on the list.
Are there more than 150?
Is it me or is this the entire list of movies available to rent?

Jack-
It is confusing...as far as I understand there are movies that are available on your ATV (both SD and HD) and there are movies that are available on iTunes. Of course the 2 lists overlap to a great extent but I believe that there are some movies available on iTunes that are not available on ATV (conversely I think that all of the SD movies available on ATV ARE/ARE available on iTunes). To confuse things more you can only rent HD movies from the ATV not on iTunes.
Hope I haven't made things more confusing.
Bottom line though- if you like to rent movies ATV is great- I love it.

Two movie rentals are "stuck" into download section. They start downloading again and again. Should vanished days ago...

As they expired days or months ago I can't watch them again, I don't even want to... The two movies are just there in the ITunes download section and also in the videos app... Even if I delete them from the Video app, they appear again, as the movies start downloading again... What should I do? Thank you in advance!:)

Thanks for the pointers folks. Yeah, 1.5GB is pretty poor isn't it? There are other suppliers, but you have to get a their phone line installed to access the internet so it's an £85 setup fee plus a day off work for a guy to come round and drill a hole in your wall before you even get to the monthly costs.
Don't get me wrong though - I'm certainly not an Apple basher, but am equally frustrated with both them and the ISP.
Virgin Media spend all kinds of money advertising their broadband as the fastest in the UK, but don't tell you (up front anyway) that you'll be cut off if you actually try and use it.
Apple on the other hand carry on with their 'it just works' mantra, but with Apple TV this only applies if you meet certain criteria (again, not mentioned up front).
I guess it aint a biggie, as i was gifted my Apple TV, and love all the other stuff it does, but from the number of posts on this forum can see that there's a lot of angry customers out there who want explanations as to why they're having similar problems to me.
Will be very interesting to see if Apple release any kind of software update that turns the flash drive from a buffer to permanent storage, to at least ease some of the pain...
Message was edited by: McGinty

I just downloaded a TV series on iTunes. They don't seem to work unless I have wi-fi. Are they streaming?

I want to watch them on a plane trip. I paid for this series so that I could travel with it. What's going on!?!?
Thanks!!!

I guess I don't know. They do have an exclamation point next to them, which usually means something's not right.

My movie rental wont dowload, it says downloading but never moves from zero KB?

Iv purchased a rental download from the iTunes store. in the downloads part of my iTunes it says it is downloading but never moves from zero KB (even after 2 hours) pausing it, restarting iTunes or even restarting my laptop doesn't help. Anyone have any ideas what I should do?

Does your phone have enough available memory for the movie? Maybe you will need to clear some space.

Since I updated my I phone to iOS 6.0.1 I can't find the movies that I have on my phone, my tv shows are in videos but not my movies, where are they?

I have always had movies on my I phone, I used to find them in music then in videos, since my last update I now have music folder and video folder, only my tv shows are in the video section & I can't find my movies anywhere

I have good news!! I was waiting until I had adequate time to try this recommended fix in case I had any problems with it. Then I decided to enter a new event in my Calender even tho it was showing "No Calenders". As soon as I entered the new event my whole Calender came back! Yeeaaa! I hope this helps someone with the same problem.

38GB of movies - where are they?

My system information tells me I have 38GB of movies taking up much needed space, but I don't have any movies on my laptop - how can I find out what/where these files are so I can delete them?
Would it be easier to completely wip the system? If so how do I do that?

Use the free utility OmniDiskSweeper
http://www.omnigroup.com/products/omnidisksweeper/
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Free sounds...but are they safe to download?

This is a website that has some very interesting free sounds. I had asked in this forum earlier about the safety of downloading something when you get a message that the "safety of the download cannot be determined".
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Your profile indicates you have a MacBook Pro retina display.
That is an Intel Mac, not Power PC.
Neither the v10.4 nor the v10.3.9 willl run on a MacBook Pro retina.
Which OS X is installed on your Mac ?
Click the Apple () menu top left in your screen. From the drop down menu click About This Mac.
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How is it that my Apple TV will instantly stream a Netflix movie yet it takes HOURS to load a movie rental?

I've tried everything. It makes no sense. So, Apple has made a Netflix device??? Anyone else have this problem and find a solution? I would really like to watch my movie right now rather than 1 hour and 26 minutes from now (currently the amount if time left before movie is ready to play).

AppleTV movie rentals are HD by default.
They are fixed size and weigh in around 3-4 GB size compared to 1-1.5GB for SD.
Enough of the movie has to download to allow it to play back without interruption - this is calculated and you get a 'ready to start in' figure. If you use the AppleTV for other things while waiting for a rental, unfortunately it seems to flush the part already downloaded so you have to start from scratch again.
If you go to iTunes Store Setting in AppleTV and disable HD rentals, it's likely any newer rentals (not existing ones) will play quicker in SD.
Test your sustained download speed somewhere like speedtest.net - you are probably getting around 2-3Mbps. A connection of around 6-8 Mbps is needed for near instant streaming. If your sustained speed is good it could be traffic shaping by your ISP, use of some DNS servers or even Apple's servers playing up.
Netflix on the other hand reduces stream quality for slower connections so plays almost immediately whatever the connection speed.
AC

12 hour download time on my movie rentals!!

Hi Guys, hoping someone can help?
Purchased Apple Tv 2nd Gen 3months ago and everything has been fine until recently.
My Sagem Sky router went faulty a month ago and I replaced this with a Netgear N-150. My movie rentals are now taking 12 hours to download!!
I used to be able to select a movie and within 2mins the movie would start playing. Now, the movie I select will have to fully download 12 hours before I even get to watch.
I am convinced I need to change a setting in the router but have know idea what.. In need of some serious help as I will not give up on my apple tv, I was great.
Jake

jakes7 wrote:
@Chenks - I will phone Sky and find out what package Ive got. It makes complete sence to have unlimited downloads.
you should know by the price you pay for internet access.
you can also find you by logging into mysky and it will tell you the package there.
As for the router change - we change clients Sky routers all the time to work better with multi-room audio systems and home automation systems. Sky just dont support any other router and do not give you the Login and password for the broadband but theres a web page out there that will generate one for you to do this.
yes i know the ways to do that (i did it in the past), and know of the problems that can be had by not using their routers. Sky are now also actively monitoring the connections and blocking access by non-sky routers - so be prepared. the official line is they don't, but real-world experience says they are. sky will replace you broken sagem router FOC so there is no reason not to use it.

Movie rentals - are they streamed or downloaded?

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