1. Even though the power cable is labeled 125V, it plugs straight into a Chinese outlet just fine.
If your TV is an older model with no HDMI port — only AV composite, S-Video or VGA — you can pick up a Langqiang converter and use it with the Apple TV. I bought one: http://item.taobao.com/item.htm?id=8080216931
In XBMC, if you want to switch audio tracks, subtitles, etc. during playback, long-press the round center button on the Apple Remote and an options menu appears. Audio track and subtitle settings live under that speaker icon (same as on a computer).
In the XBMC main menu, long-pressing the Menu button on the Remote over an item opens the context menu, just like right-clicking on a computer. Before I knew this, I was browsing my shares, typo’d an IP, and got stuck having to create a whole new connection — what a pain. Being able to open the context menu means you can just edit the existing connection.
Update: 4. After a few days of use, I feel the Langqiang converter is only barely usable — it loses a lot of color. A good saddle needs a good horse; an old TV deserves to be retired.
XBMC still isn’t stable enough, and there are plenty of rough edges (for example, during asynchronous operations it neither locks the UI nor shows a prompt, but it does make the app sluggish).
To watch 720P over your home network, the router can’t be too crappy. I’ve now switched to a TP-link W941N (11n, 300Mbps) and the speed is decent. Unfortunately its Ethernet ports are only 100Mbps, so paired with a WD My Book Live it can’t reach full performance.