Multiple AppleTV's at Business Questions - iTunes account required etc.?

[poppe]

Hey guys,

I work at a film school, and we want to integrate AppleTV in to our classrooms. They seem like the ideal solution for the students and faculty to easily stream content through our projectors.

Right now if an instructor wants to show a clip from YouTube, Vimeo or whatever, they must hook up their laptop to one of the bazillion connectors we have. Most of the instructors have iPhones, iPads and Macs so we think it'd be much easier on everyone if they could just use an Apple TV.

Questions:
- How would it work with say 15 AppleTVs on one network?
- Can you lock each AppleTV so student in Classroom A isn't jumping on to a Classroom B presentation.
- Not all 15 AppleTVs would be active at once but around 5 would, how problematic would that be, in a general sense, for the network? In a general sense.
- Does an iTunes Account have to be linked if all we want to do is stream/push from phones/computers/iPads.
- Can you push Netflix even though they have an App?
- Would it be easier and more secure to have an Airport Express that creates a self contained and locked down independent network with in the room?

I'm sure I'll have more, but any help, as I do not have one, would be great. I tried to research how other schools have been doing it, but the details haven't been that forthcoming.

 

[squirrelist]

There are two problem I would anticipate: bandwidth, which might not be a problem if you are using Wireless-N and if you don't have too many steams going on nearby at the same time. Certainly I would put the AppleTVs on the wired network. Second thing is security - Apple TV doesn't lock down any settings since it's designed for home use. Anyone could come in with an Apple remote and start mucking with things.

-With 15 Apple TVs on the same network, you would just have to give each one a different name, probably the name of the classroom.
-The only way to lock it to a classroom would be to have each classroom's network isolated and have shielding to keep people from getting on a neighboring classroom's network. Probably not worth doing unless this is spread out over a large campus. The good news is that once someone starts playing a video no one else can hijack it until the video stops.
-An iTunes account is only required for streaming iCloud content and for connecting with the iOS "Remote" app
-You can push Netflix if you have at least an iPhone 4S or iPad 2 and enable AirPlay Mirroring. It treats AppleTV as an HDMI output.

 

[Omne666]

Check this out:

http://www.williamstites.net/2012/0...ing-the-appletv-in-your-school-or-enterprise/



Also, I've read some where that the maximum number of devices on one apple ID is limited to 10. Could be old, but may be a bit of a spanner if so.

 

[poppe]

There are two problem I would anticipate: bandwidth, which might not be a problem if you are using Wireless-N and if you don't have too many steams going on nearby at the same time. Certainly I would put the AppleTVs on the wired network. Second thing is security - Apple TV doesn't lock down any settings since it's designed for home use. Anyone could come in with an Apple remote and start mucking with things.

-With 15 Apple TVs on the same network, you would just have to give each one a different name, probably the name of the classroom.
-The only way to lock it to a classroom would be to have each classroom's network isolated and have shielding to keep people from getting on a neighboring classroom's network. Probably not worth doing unless this is spread out over a large campus. The good news is that once someone starts playing a video no one else can hijack it until the video stops.
-An iTunes account is only required for streaming iCloud content and for connecting with the iOS "Remote" app
-You can push Netflix if you have at least an iPhone 4S or iPad 2 and enable AirPlay Mirroring. It treats AppleTV as an HDMI output.

- I thought I read the AppleTV can be password protected? Or do you mean the settings menu is not protected once you are in the AppleTV?

Check this out:

http://www.williamstites.net/2012/0...ing-the-appletv-in-your-school-or-enterprise/



Also, I've read some where that the maximum number of devices on one apple ID is limited to 10. Could be old, but may be a bit of a spanner if so.

Thank you for this.

 

[Cinephi1e]

OK, this is what we are doing at a university. The first issue is that Apple TV does not support WPA2 Enterprise security so that it cannot be connected to the university network. So what we did is to pair each Apple TV with an Airport Express. Each Airport Express creates a self contained network. If you have multiple classrooms then give each network the name/number of the classroom. This way you can ensure that the Airplay is done to the right Apple TV.

We have multiple sets of Apple TV/Airport Express that the faculty check out as needed. They have now grown comfortable with it and we have found that it is quite robust. The only problem that I have to remind the faculty is to set the sleep mode to at least 10 minutes on their iPads or the Airplay connection will be interrupted.