Apple TV 2 4.1 Firmware Update Failure

     So I just went to update the firmware on my Apple TV 2.  The process was very straight forward, looking very similar to doing an iPhone firmware update.  Unfortunately it failed and my sleek little media streamer is now a sleek little white led flashing device.  It's rather disturbing to see that big "plug this thing into itunes!" symbol on your TV screen.
     Ok, so the firmware update failed, no big deal.  Maybe that's why apple makes you connect iPhones for an iOS update rather than doing over the air (even over wifi) updates.  I thought I'd just plug it into iTunes, the new firmware would download and away I'd go.  Not too much of a problem.  (Though I guess I'll need to drag the power cable out from behind my TV as well, sigh...)
     Now here's the really unfortunate bit, which Apple should be held accountable for.  They've chosen to put a micro usb socket on the Apple TV.  I've got no problem with them choosing the latest and greatest connector version - by all accounts the micro usb design is more durable than the much more common mini usb.  (Though I'd hope I don't need to plug my Apple TV into a usb connection enough for durability to be an issue!) But micro usb is still in it's very early stages.  I don't have any other devices that require a micro usb cable.  I'd expect that many people don't.  There's certainly nothing else in the Apple ecosystem that needs one.  Yet Apple didn't see fit to include one in the box.
     That's incredibly galling.  It means I've got a (temporarily) bricked device with no way of recovering it until I can get to the store and buy a cheap usb cable.  Way to fail, Apple.

     For those interested, my Apple TV connects to the internet via 802.11n from an Airport Extreme, running with WPA encryption.  I've seen some anecdotal evidence which states that the firmware update is more likely to fail over WiFi.  I'd recommend you don't attempt the update until you've got a cable on hand, just in case.

UPDATE:  Once I got a micro usb cable and plugged the Apple TV into iTunes the update went fine.  All updates since this one (up to 4.3.1 at the minute) have, thankfully, worked via wireless.

Kinect the dots.

     There's some neat IR video of the Microsoft Kinect peripheral for Xbox floating around on the web.  Basically the device shoots out thousands of points of IR light for the camera to pick up on.  I wonder how the algorithm which deciphers the dot pattern works?  They grid they form seems to be more random than structured from what I can tell.  I wouldn't have thought that the IR camera in the Kinect would have the resolution necessary to pick up on different sized dots for different distances.  (The light beams that Kinect shoots out aren't parallel, things closer to the Kinect have smaller dots.)  Does it pick up elongated dots and interpret them as angled surfaces?  Interesting stuff.
    This video seems to indicate that it just uses the IR grid for depth perception.  That's probably a lot simpler - it doesn't need to measure the individual size or elongation of the dots, only how far apart they are.  You can do this with a much lower resolution (i.e. cheaper) camera.
     Still, it's nice to see MS doing something interesting for once.