HN Explorer

Apple Bricked My Gen 1 Apple TV

11 points by anonymousisme ↗ HN
I've got a lot of Apple products, including three Apple TV boxes. The oldest one (Gen 1) had been sitting on a shelf for a few months since I moved a TV. Yesterday I re-connected it and it came up just fine. It showed that I was logged in, but some of my purchased content was not showing. I decided to try logging out, and then back in again. Unfortunately, Apple has now mandated 2FA and the Gen1 Apple TV does not support it. I phoned Apple Support and they informed me that 2FA cannot be removed from an account. This is a change they made a few months ago. The upshot is this: If you have any older (non-supported) Apple products that use your Apple ID, they may get bricked in the same manner.

6 comments

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gkbrk
This is a great reason to avoid closed ecosystems. A raspi box, or just connecting your laptop over HDMI or Wifi will avoid this issue and you will always have your content available.

Over time, the internet is filling up with horror stories about Google, Apple, [INSERT TECH COMPANY] systems locking people out while a Linux laptop with HDMI can keep working for years without a problem.

oftenwrong
Recently I was given a 4th generation iPad (released in 2012). It is shocking how useless it is today. Most apps I have tried to install are not compatible with the highest-available OS version. There is no way to install the older versions of the apps that would be compatible. The browser works fine for most sites, but not sites that depend on more recent web features.
joelkesler
You may be able to use this trick to download older versions of apps for older versions of iOS:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kqva2OGi18E

“Installing apps on older iOS devices using older versions of apps

Older devices running iOS 8, 9, 10 may not have any compatible apps available, but there are old versions that you can still download and use...”

oftenwrong
I appreciate the tip, but it does not work in my situation. I am using a completely new Apple ID, so I do not have any previous app downloads or purchased apps.

Ideally, Apple would permit anyone to download any old version of an app.

caddie
Have you tried to authenticate using another Apple device that's already logged in using the same account? Cause I can enter my ID password using my iPhone on my Gen1 Apple TV.