It’s been barely a week since the release of the Apple TV, the new box from Apple that allows for streaming video to a television, but hackers from coast-to-coast have already been able to turn the $300 multimedia box into a full-fledged computer.
The Apple TV comes with a stripped-down version of Apple’s OS X, but retains many of its basic features, such as directory structure and file format.
Hacking the Apple TV is the latest in a series of hardware hacks on multimedia devices, including the: XBox 360 and the TiVo. Each time, hackers hope to extend functionality of the device beyond its original intent.
TIn just over a week, hackers have been able to upgrade the Apple TV’s 40GB hard drive (derided by many as being too small for any serious media collection) and enable secure shell access (SSH) to the machine, among other things. Most recently, and the most practical hack so far to date (announced on March 29) is to enable the USB port, which had been disabled by Apple in software.
