On Friday, Apple launched its 6.0 software update for its Apple TV set-top box, but soon after, some users reported that the update bricked their devices while others were a bit luckier and just lost their connection to the Internet or had to restore their machines. Some users are also reporting extremely slow download speeds and many seem to have lost some or all of the movies and TV shows they downloaded from Apple’s servers. Now, it looks like Apple has pulled the update, which was the first to introduce its new iTunes Radio service to the set-top box.
Apple’s own support forums are currently full of complaints about these issues.
For some users with multiple Apple TVs at home, the update seems to work on some and fail on others. It’s unclear what exactly causes these issues, which seem to affect both the Apple TV 2 and 3.
While the Apple TV is typically a standalone device, getting it back to work may mean that you have to connect it to your PC or Mac to restore it. To do so, you need a micro USB cable, connect the box to the PC, bring up iTunes, select the Apple TV in the Devices list and click ‘restore.’ That’s not very complicated (and easy for anybody who has ever tried an Apple TV jailbreak), but it’s also not something most users would even think about doing. For some, however, even this procedure doesn’t work.
So far, we haven’t heard anything official from Apple, but it’s clear that the 6.0 update has been pulled for the time being (it’s currently not available for my personal Apple TV either). We will update this post once we hear more.