Revealing the 2011 sales figures for the company's existing TV content streamer, Apple TV, Apple CEO Tim Cook has offered a tantalising insight into the heavily rumoured Apple iTV television sets.

Speaking during his keynote speech at the Goldman Sachs Technology and Internet Conference Cook has described the current Apple TV offering as a ‘hobby’, whilst revealing the Cupertino based company shifted just shy of 3 million Apple TV units during 2011, 1 million of which came in the year’s final quarter.

Stating that Apple “doesn’t do hobbies as a general rule,” Cook revealed that the existing Apple TV unit was testing the waters of the television sector stating the company would need something “special” in order to make TV a “serious category” for Apple.

“The reason we call it a hobby is because we don’t want to send a message to you or our shareholders that we think the market for it is the size of our other businesses,“ Cook said of Apple TV. He added that he believed Apple could “find something that was larger” so that its ventures into the television industry “could go more main-market.”

Apple iTV Rumours

Far from confirmed, Apple iTV rumours have been circulating for a number of months kicking into overdrive following the publication of the official Steve Jobs biography in which the Apple co-founder and former CEO said he had “finally cracked” how to change the television market.

"I'd like to create an integrated television set that is completely easy to use,” Jobs reportedly said. “It would be seamlessly synced with all of your devices and with iCloud. It will have the simplest user interface you could imagine. I finally cracked it."

Further Apple iTV rumours have suggested Apple will offer a variety of screen size options when it launches its first own branded television sets later this year. With 37 and 42-inch Apple iTV models reportedly in the works, some rumours have suggested Apple’s Design Chief Jonathan Ive is currently putting the finishing touches to a 50-inch set.

Does all the talk of an Apple branded television set have you excited or are you happy with your current internet-connected TV? Let us know via the T3 Twitter and Facebook feeds.

Via: 9to5Mac