Where is Airplay Direct?

[Klae17]

Has this feature come out yet? I am trading in my MBA because my iPad mini does everything I need, except connect to a projector well. I could buy the $50 dollar connector or I can get an Apple TV for $100.

The problem is my work does not allow wifi therefore I can't airplay presentations. The cable means I can't move around the classroom. And the cable is ridiculous, half the price on an Apple TV. I know they were supposed to announce Airplay Direct (bluetooth) but haven't heard anything else since September.

 

[5gs]

Without looking at technical specs, I would think bluetooth cannot handle that kind of bandwidth.

I've been searching for a decent stereo bluetooth headset just for music, and every review I read has complaints of intermittent connections and poor quality.

I finally bought one that seemed better than average, and while it works OK when I have my iPhone 4S on me, it does occasionally have static or breaks up if I got for a run and I stretch my arm too far from the headset. The audio seems something less than CD quality too.

If Airplay goes WiFi free, I would imagine it will use the same WiFi technology that Airdrop uses, except without needing a middle-man router.

For the time being, maybe a cellular hotspot can do the trick (not the phone-simulated hotspot, but a separate physical device) - I'm not sure if they function as enough of a router, but since you can connect multiple devices to one, you might imagine these devices could communicate like they would on a standard router.

[edit] though I guess you'd need to find a way for the Apple TV to connect to the WiFi hotspot.

[edit 2] since you list as already having the Apple TV 3, why not just get a second set of cables for on-the-go so you can easily unplug it from your TV setup, and then get a cheap WiFi router and mini power strip for the two devices to plug into your projector? Seems like that would cost you $50 at most, and you have your own to-go WiFi+AppleTV - it's not like you need Internet access on the router to use your Airplay.

 

[techwarrior]

Many enterprise have a WiFi but the ATV and iOS devices may not be on the same subnet. Bonjour doesn't route as it is a Layer 2 protocol, so you may not see ATV if it was on LAN and iOS on WLAN or separate subnets.

It would be really nice if they implemented WiFi hotspot as an option on ATV so you could do local preso on your device(s) without having to join corp WLAN... they might actually sell a lot of ATV just for classroom and enterprise use if they did so. They could even make it a non-routable hotspot to comply with security concerns.

You could do the opposite. Enable iPhone WiFi hotspot and have ATV join that WiFi (yes, I have done this - ATV can join any WiFi network). But that is costly if your data plan requires added cost for hotspot.

 

[ThisIsNotMe]

http://www.geeksaresexy.net/2013/01...-pocket-router-routers-now-come-travel-sized/

Get one of these and a USB power adapter.

(Know that the USB is female on the AppleTV but wonder if it can supply power.......)