Mountain Lion And AirPlay Will Make The Apple TV A Great Business Tool

AirPlay Mirroring is one of the iOS features that Apple is bringing to the Mac in Mountain Lion. It’s a feature that offers a lot of potential for mobile professionals and educators in addition to being a great supplement to a family’s living room.

AirPlay Mirroring works the second generation Apple TV. The Apple TV itself as a small and easy to carry device that can plug into any HDTV or modern projector. That simple setup combined with a Mac running Mountain Lion makes for a perfect portable presentation solution.

AirPlay Mirroring has, of course, offered this ease of use when combined with an iPad 2 or iPhone 4S – and that has given business users some pretty good capabilities for presentations, particularly those that stick to a script and Keynote slide deck. Putting AirPlay Mirroring on a MacBook Air, however, opens up a much broader range of content and it is particularly advantageous for demonstrating software during a sales meeting or a training class.

AirPlay Mirroring on a MacBook also offers a key advantage over the iPad 2 and iPhone 4S in that the MacBook can create a wireless network to communicate with the Apple TV if none exists in the office, conference room, or classroom being where a presentation will take place. In fact, this entire setup can be easily prepared in advance for quick setup at a remote location.

Intentionally or not, Apple has created a winning business and education solution from one of its most consumer-oriented products (and one that’s supposedly a hobby). Given the $99 price tag of the Apple TV and the variety of low cost HDTV models on the market today, this could be a dream solution for smaller businesses and schools with limited technology budgets.

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