“It may not seem like much in the grand scheme of things, but HDMI radically simplified our home entertainment,” Sean Hollister reports for The Verge.
“But an HDMI cable is still a bulky, cumbersome thing to carry around if you’re simply trying to connect a smartphone or tablet to a television,” Hollister reports. “That’s why the wireless industry is working on a wireless alternative. It’s called Miracast. It might have already failed.”
“In 2010, Apple introduced AirPlay, a technology to stream content from any iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch to an Apple TV. At first, it could only send music, pictures, and videos; in 2011, Apple added the ability to mirror anything you see on a smartphone or tablet’s display. That’s precisely what Miracast does, only you don’t need multiple Apple products to make it work. Theoretically, any device with a recent Wi-Fi chip can support the standard, letting you pair any smartphone with any smart TV or connected set-top box,” Hollister reports. “Unfortunately, ‘theoretically’ is the operative word, because even though Miracast has support from many major players, you’d be hard-pressed to actually find it at your local electronics store.”
Read more in the full article here.
Related article:
Apple AirPlay leads screen sharing technology usage among small number who use it – April 15, 2013
So Miracast is actually AirPlay road kill?
I don’t think it ever made it to the “road”. Died of neglect, more like..
First I’ve ever heard of Miracast, and I follow a lot of tech stuff through Flipboard. AirPlay is the only system of that sort that gets mentioned in the UK media.
Adoption of standard is hard for most companies because they don’t see an obvious reason why it would make money in the short term. It’s all done to what they can earn this quarter.
Apple take the long term view and develop an ecosystem that supports multiple revenue streams. It’s hard for other electronic companies to do that since they are only selling one part.
…MIRACAST
Currently neglected, Intel’s MIRACAST is about to get a shot in the arm from Valve Corporation, the people behind Steam.
First, early this week Valve announced SteamOS, a replacement for Windows for PC gamers which is based on Linux and The Verge described as the first true post-PC OS; secondly Valve announced Steam Machines which is a hardware reference platform for the struggling PC OEM to build console-like PCs for the livingroom.
However, these new Steam Machines won’t be able to run the entire library of games of Steam on Windows and Mac, and Valve’s solution is to enable Steam Machines to stream games from Windows/Mac using Intel’s Miracast.
In addition, Microsoft’s Xbox One and Sony’s PlayStation 4 support Miracast too.
So it’s not quite road kill yet.
There are also rumors of Android KitKat getting better Miracast support (though no one really knows what exactly that means). If they update Chromecast to support Miracast, and you will see the adoption rise.
This is ‘mac’ site, so I should not be surprised, but your facts are wrong. Currently, Miracast is supported on MUCH more TVs and TV connected devices (like blu rays, dongles…) than AirPlay is. All new (and previous!) generation Samsung and LG devices (TVs and players) support miracast. And Samsung+LG alone sell 1000x more TVs/players than AppleTVs or similar AirPlay enabled TVs.
So if you have Miracast enabled device (btw, S4 is Miracast enabled, so there are more Miracast devices than AirPlay devices too), there is MUCH greater chance that you will be able to show something from your phone on random TV in your friends house. Good luck with that and AirPlay…
In order to use AirPlay, you need AirPlay compatible device, like AppleTV.
Yep. There are over 30 Miracast/WiDi adapters and only 1 Airplay/AppleTV. And they’re cheaper than AppleTV, and workwith many devices, not just IOS/OSX.
Miracast will work with devices from all the major laptop and phone manufacturers, and Airplay only with Apple.
Miracast/WiDi is set to capture the corporate conference room AV environment, which Apple has yet to do anything but be a failure.
The reality is, most real work is done on Windows PC’s and Apple commands a very tiny subset of the business device market.
Windows 8.1 has Miracast support natively, and I have it working flawlessly with the Netgear PTV3000 adapter ($69.95, yes, $30 cheaper than AppleTV) on several devices including HP laptops and my Surface Pro.
Air Parrot/Reflector sucks and is cost/security prohibitive in the corporate IT environment.
Apple’s exclusive little club is about to become even more excluded.
Thought this article is funny a year later.
Miracast is more prominent as all Windows devices with intel graphics chipsets, all android and WP devices use it. Add in current generation TV’s have it built in, and all the bug and problems with iOS8 and AppleTV, its pretty fun reading how people though this would be left by the wayside.