Munster on Apple’s mythical HDTV set: ‘It will be the biggest thing in consumer electronics since the smartphone’

9to5 Staff | Mar 1 2012 - 8:47 am PT

Pictured above: An Apple television concept render by Guilherme Schasiepen.

Piper Jaffray’s resident Apple analyst Gene Munster stands out as arguably the most outspoken proponent of an Apple-branded HDTV television set otherwise known as the mythical iTV. With all eyes now on Apple’s iPad 3 unveiling next Wednesday, the pundits are also keeping their fingers crossed for a much-needed Apple TV refresh with 1080p video output and a faster processor, especially now that Apple TVs are increasingly disappearing from shelves.

Piggy-backing on the forthcoming product unveiling hype, Munster shed more light on what he believes a full-blown television set adorned by the shiny Apple logo should be like during yesterday’s interview with Bloomberg Radio’s Tom Keene and Ken Pruitt. Munster is betting Apple will introduce the rumored product some time this year and is expecting fall availability. You will want to buy it, because:

It’s going to live up to some of the building hype. It will be the biggest thing in consumer electronics since the smartphone.

From a design standpoint, the iTV “will look different” than your regular television: “Imagine just a sheet of glass – no edges or bevels.” The analyst re-iterated his previous observations, including strong focus on content consumption (presumably delivered through iTunes/iCloud) and Siri voice control…

The analyst also expects the iTV will let you both channel surf the traditional way by using a remote control and navigate by using your voice (“show me sci-fi movies rated 8/10 and released last year”). He speculated this dual-mode navigation is “the code that Steve Jobs said he had cracked in his biography.” Last April, Munster asserted Apple would have to introduce a new video-focused service alongside the iTV—presumably serving scheduled/live TV plus movies and TV shows. The service is said to stem from an alleged array of super data centers that Apple is supposedly keen on building the world over.

Munster is well-known for touching on the subject of an Apple television in his notes to clients. A month ago, he claimed Apple was tapping a “major TV component supplier” and inquiring about “various capabilities of their television display components,” echoing an October 2011 report by the New York Times. The key, as always, is premium content. “Without a revamped TV content solution, we do not think Apple enters the TV market,” Munster opined while sharing a sentiment published in the Wall Street Journal.