Apple is planning to launch an enhanced version of its AirPlay streaming technology in September, according to a new report from The Telegraph. Called “AirPlay Direct,” the new version of AirPlay would allow users to wirelessly stream music without the need of a WiFi network.
Instead, iOS devices would be able to create their own ad-hoc-style networks with AirPlay-enabled accessories and peripherals.
VMware has announced the latest version of its popular virtualization tool, VMware Fusion. Version 5 is optimized for the latest technologies found in OS X Mountain Lion, Windows 8 and the latest Macs — including the Retina MacBook Pro — and includes more than 70 new features “for a Windows on Mac experience never seen before.”
There are many premium content services that use DRM to limit where and how you can watch videos. iOS apps like HBOGO, DirecTV, and Amazon Instant Video will all let you watch content on your device, but you’re blocked from streaming via AirPlay or through an HDMI cable. We know, it’s silly. It’s all because of the contacts and licensing deals Hollywood makes with digital distributors.
What if there was a world in which no DRM could keep your content shackled to an iOS device? A new jailbreak tweak makes it possible to stream what you’re watching—no matter what the source—to your TV through the magic of AirPlay.
While it’s not high on visual appeal, new app Android HIFI allows Android users to stream to AirPlay-enabled devices, thus proving once and for all that Android can indeed play nice with Apple technology.
The app works by allowing any AirPlay audio source to play to your Android device, essentially making your device an AirPlay receiver.
An online petition has been created to try to convince Apple to make changes to its Bonjour network discovery service and related technologies including AirPlay and AirPrint. The petition is asking Apple to redesign Bonjour and other services to deliver a better fit with education and enterprise networks. It was started by Lee Badman, wireless network architect for Syracuse University, on behalf of the Higher Ed Wireless Networking Admin Group at Educause, a non-profit resource organization for IT staff working in higher education.
The other day, I was goofing around with one of the slick new features of OS X Mountain Lion, AirPlay streaming from my Macbook Air to my Apple TV. I played some videos to my LCD TV right from the laptop, and then sent Diablo III up there as well. All worked well.
Then I wanted to get back to some writing, so I figured I’d send some music from iTunes over to my Apple TV, using the same AirPlay menubar icon that I’d sent the video over with. While I could hear the music from my TV, the Apple TV also displayed my computer screen. I didn’t want that, so I stopped AirPlay screen streaming, and clicked the button in the lower right corner of iTunes, and chose my Apple TV as an external speaker, like I’ve been able to for a while.
Turns out, there’s an easier way to do this, and one that doesn’t rely on iTunes.
It’s hard to believe that it was just a little more than a year ago that Apple released OS X Lion. Only twelve months later, and we’re now staring right down the maw of Apple’s ninth major release of Mac OS X: Mountain Lion.
OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion signifies a new approach on Apple’s part towards OS X updates: instead of going years between major releases, Cupertino is trying to take the rapid release approach that has worked so well for them with iOS and apply it to the Mac.
Mountain Lion, then, feels in many ways less like OS X 10.8 than OS X 10.7.5: a smaller, more tightly focused update continuing what OS X Lion started, taking iOS’s best ideas and bringing them to Mac.
Thanks to major breakthrough features like iCloud syncing, Notification Center, Sharing, AirPlay Mirroring and more, there’s less of a distinction in Mountain Lion between the Mac and iOS than ever. But is that a good thing, and how will it change the way you use your Mac?
If you want to watch a movie on your Apple TV, but you want the sound to play through a stereo or home theater system, rather than through your TV, the only way to do that right now is to install a bunch of messy cables that connect one device to the other — and they need to be relatively close together.
In iOS 6 beta 3, however, you can send audio from the Apple TV to an AirPlay-enabled speaker system at the other end of the room wirelessly.
When we review speaker docks here at Cult of Mac, one of the most common things we’ll ding them for in our ratings is lack of Bluetooth streaming support. Especially for the more expensive speaker docks, it just seems like a no brainer: why not just slap in a Bluetooth chip for a couple bucks and infinitely expand the usefulness of your product?
We assume that we will continue to be disappointed by Bluetooth-less speaker docks for years to come, but maybe this brilliant KickStarter project can help mitigate that disappointment. Called the Pear (get it?), it’s a tiny little Bluetooth dongle that plugs into your speaker dock’s 30 Pin Dock Connector and gives A2DP streaming Bluetooth audio support to any device!
There’s not much more to it, which is why this is such a great idea: imagine being able to upgrade that dusty old speaker dock going unused on your nightstand or in your kitchen with just a $40 add-on. Unfortunately, it’s a Kickstarter project right now, but with more than $29,000 dollars towards its $40,000 goal already attained with almost two months left to go, this looks like one idea that’s going to soon become a reality.
Source: Kickstarter
Via: Engadget
With OS X Mountain Lion, AirPlay Mirroring is finally coming to the Mac, allowing some Macs to stream audio and video directly to their Apple TV.
‘Some’ is the operative word here. Much to the disappointment of the vast majority of Mac owners who will be installing Mountain Lion on their machines in a couple weeks time, AirPlay Mirroring will only work if you have an iMac, MacBook Air or Mac Mini from mid-2011, or a MacBook Pro from early 2011.
There’s been a lot of conspiracy theories floated about this requirement. Some have argued that it’s forced obsolescence on Apple’s part, trying to force older Mac owners to upgrade their machines. Others have suggested that the reason Apple requires a Mac from 2011 or later is because of special DRM technology in Intel’s chips that didn’t debut until last year.
The truth of the matter, however, is far less sensational. The reason you need a 2011 Mac to make use of AirPlay Mirroring in OS X Mountain Lion is because the graphics in older Macs just don’t cut the mustard.
This video of Brightcove CEO Jeremy Allaire demonstrating his company’s new dual-screen AirPlay technology is doing the rounds this morning, and it’s certainly an impressive demo, in which Allaire is able to use his iPad to do one thing while playing video in the background on his Apple TV at the same time. Is this what using a true Apple HDTV will be like?
One of Steve Jobs’s favorite quotes was by Wayne Gretzky, a famous hockey player: “I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been.” From the beginning, Apple has been all about looking ahead to the next greatest thing, not concerning itself with aligning with other companies.
It might be Google’s turn to take a lesson from Apple and do the same, or they may miss out on an opportunity of monumental proportion. What is the opportunity you ask? AirPlay.
Here at Cult of Mac, we’ve been playing around with our new Retina MacBook Pro — look for our review tomorrow — and we decided to install Mountain Lion on our shiny new ultra high-res notebook and take Apple’s latest operating system for a spin.
It runs a peach, of course, but one thing we noticed when we were playing around in the Displays preferences in Mountain Lion was that there is an option to set your display resolution as for “Best for AirPlay,” along with the other two regular options which appear in OS X Lion: Best for Retina display, and Scaled.
Earlier today we showed you the email Apple marketing VP Phil Schiller sent in response to Apple removing Rogue Amoeba’s Airfoil Speakers Touch app from the App Store. Yanking the app caused quite the stir, as Rogue Amoeba was accused of misusing Apple’s AirPlay API to receive audio to an iOS device.
Schiller said that Rogue Amoeba used AirPlay functionality without proper licensing, and the Airfoil Speakers Touch makers have responded to Schiller with more points of their own.
An Apple HDTV won’t be the first Internet-enabled television on the market. The market for so-called smart televisions has actually gotten pretty crowded over the past couple of years with products based around the Smart TV concepts of Samsung and LG as well as companies that offer televisions with GoogleTV.
Apple’s edge over the existing smart and connected television options is the company’s focus on creating a seamless and intuitive user experience. Based on a recent study, if Apple can deliver an interface half as good as expected, the company will make a killing in the HDTV market.
The entertainment industry may be bracing for further disruption by Apple when the company finally unveils its HDTV and related television plans, but at least one major player in the field is refusing to show any sign of fear.
In a move sure to be followed by other industry executives, DirecTV chairman Michael White downplayed the potential for an Apple television during a conference attended by other cable and satellite company leaders late last week. While other executives were fairly noncommittal about an Apple HDTV and what it could mean for the entertainment industry, White was emphatic in deriding the idea that Apple could deliver a better user experience to viewers.
Speaking at the Sanford Bernstein Strategic Decisions conference, White specifically called out two of the most anticipated features of an Apple television – a superior user interface and a better selection of content – and described them as unrealistic and unimportant to his company’s customers.
Pssst! You there, the one just about to buy that Airport Express for your AirPlay setup. Don’t waste your $99 on that plastic wall-wart. Come over here and I’ll sell you this nice white plastic AirPlay brick instead. How much? Well, seeing as it’s you, just $199, although it normally goes for $275.
Oh, by the way. It’s called the playGo AP1. You’re welcome.
Apple is bringing its iTunes Festival to London again this September, and it’s inviting more than 60 artists to perform for 30 consecutive nights of incredible music. The event, which will run from September 1 to September 30, will feature performances from Usher, Jack White, Norah Jones, Emeli Sandé, One Direction, and more.
If you’ve ever used AirPlay to connect speakers or your AppleTV to your iPhone, you’ll know that you’ve got to be diligent about disconnecting your device afterwards, lest you suddenly start piping sounds or video to somewhere else accidentally.
How bad can it be if you don’t remember to do that? Really, really bad. In fact, this is pretty much the worst case scenario we could think of: one Redditor who forgot to disconnect his iPhone from his Apple TV via AirPlay ended up showing his in-laws a homemade pornographic film featuring their daughter.
AirPlay and AirPlay Mirroring add a lot of value to the second and third generation Apple TVs. Paired with a recent iPad or the iPhone 4S, an Apple TV can instantly become a gaming solution and a theater for home movies – and will be amazing when combined with Mountain Lion when it ships this summer.
AirPlay also turns that Apple TV into powerful and extremely portable presentation system that’s a great fit for the classroom or the board room. The only challenge is that the Apple TV’s only output option is an HDMI port, which can be a big problem for connecting to older display technologies including many projectors and computer displays – a problem solved by cable and adapter maker Kanex.
httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqpXDFq1btw
The brand-new version of AirServer is being billed as “The Game Console For Mac.” Like previous versions of the software, AirServer runs on you Mac and turns it into an AirPlay receiver, allowing you to stream music, video, photos and even games to the Mac’s big screen, just as if it was an Apple TV. What’s new, though, is the ability to stream games from two players simultaneously for big-screen head-to-head action.
If you have been reading Ken Segall’s new book about Apple, Insanely Simple, then you’ll recognize the hallmarks of simplicity all over JawBone’s work. Even the e-mail containing the press release for its new speaker reads as little more than “Jawbone just released a BIG JAMBOX.”
That’s what it’s called. The BIG JAMBOX. And from its name, you know almost all there is to know about it.
What a world we live in. The things we can do with our iOS devices are world changing, and would make a person visiting from just a few decades ago squeal with delight or shiver with fear, depending on their philosophical bent.
Today’s tip is one of those “obvious if I’d thought about it” kind of tips that, well, is pretty obvious when you think about it. Here’s how to live stream the camera from your iPad 2, New iPad, or iPhone 4S to a big screen TV via AirPlay and an AppleTV.
iOSLiveTV is a web-based TV service that allows you to watch premium TV channels on your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch completely free of charge. It’s just like TV English Premium, the app we told you about last week, only it works… incredibly well. And it offers a lot more channels and AirPlay support.
Rogue Amoeba’s AirFoil started out as a way to stream any non-iTunes audio to your AirPort Express mini-router, back when AirPlay was still called AirTunes. Then it was expanded with a free iOS app which would let you stream music from AirFoil on the Mac to AirFoil on your iPod or iPhone, handy for hooking up to a stereo.
Now we have AirFoil Speakers Touch 3 for iOS, and it adds in proper AirPlay support, letting you send music from pretty much any iDevice you own.
