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Mountain Lion AirPlay Mirroring (iMac to AppleTV) Not Working

Mountain Lion successfully installed on my iMac.


AppleTV sucessfully networked with my iMac (at least where iTunes and iPhoto are concerned.)


But AirPlay icon is NOT appearing in my menu bar. Any clues as to why this is?


In System Preferences, I've checked "Show mirroring options in the menu bar when available" but still nothing.


Below is a screenshot of my menu bar. Thanks in advance!




User uploaded file

Posted on Jul 25, 2012 9:13 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jul 25, 2012 9:16 AM

Never mind. Just realized my iMac is too old. Late 2009.


AirPlay will only work for mid 2011. 😟

1,096 replies

Jul 26, 2012 7:37 AM in response to jcetheredge

They do mention in the 200 feature page about airplay (see below) However I do agree that even my 2008 macbook is capable of running airplay just fine using 3rd party software so they should have added this feature atleast from 2010.


Apple Mountain Lion 200 feauture page bottom -

AirPlay Mirroring requires a second-generation Apple TV or later, and is supported on the following Mac models: iMac (Mid 2011 or newer), Mac mini (Mid 2011 or newer), MacBook Air (Mid 2011 or newer) and MacBook Pro (Early 2011 or newer).


Jul 26, 2012 7:53 AM in response to stefano67

It's not a harware limitation, if a maxed out iMac from late 2010 with a quad core i7/8GB RAM/Dedicated 1GB ATI video card can't do it but an iPod touch/iPhone or my much less powerful 2011 macbook air with dual core i7/integrated graphics can do it.


It's a switch that Apple has turned off for us. I'm guessing some creative programmers out there will find the switch and figure out how to turn it on. It's gotta be a line in a plist file somewhere that tells the OS to turn Airplay on or off.


Meanwhile, Airparrot gets my $10, and I'll decide if the other features of ML are worth it- airplay mirroring from my iMac was a big carrot for me to upgrade. I can hook my MBA up via HDMI pretty easy.

Jul 26, 2012 7:55 AM in response to jcetheredge

Guys, pretty please read the description in the App Store. It is clearly stated which Mac supports Air Play Mirroring with OS X Mountain Lion 10.8. Gosh.


You need a lot of number crunching power to accomplish live mirroring. Even the older iOS devices can't do this, so AirPlay Mirroring is available with iPad 2 or later or the iPhone 4S only.


Take a look at the mediocre mirroring quality of Air Parrot. It is not up to Apples quality standards.


From appleinsider.com:

These systems are the oldest machines capable of supporting AirPlay Mirroring because they are the first to deliver dedicated hardware encoding for H.264. Without a CPU capable of crunching this task using specialized hardware, earlier Macs simply can't transmit video fast enough without a lot of heat and screaming fans.


Older Macs can already send video from iTunes to Apple TV via AirPlay, but they stop local playback while doing this. Mirroring requires the system to produce two video images, one driving the local display and one to be wirelessly delivered to the external screen.

Jul 26, 2012 8:07 AM in response to Put_mind_in_gear

@Put_mind_in_gear

Honestly... wow... it requires an iPad 2 to enable AirPlay Mirroring... Now please compare the compute power of an iPad 2 to for example an iMac with core i5/i7.... got it?

And I do not use AirParrot up to now (because I still hope and believe that Apple will show inside and enable AirPlay mirror for "older" Macs), but all that I heard is, that the quality of AirParrot is absolutely ok...


Again... I'v got an i7 iMac which is less than 2 years old, and it has SURELY enough power for AirPlay mirroring... Apple is just trying to sell more "new" Macs with this limitation without technical background...


The problem is, this will probably have just the opposite effect. A lot of people (like myself) are so upset about this ridicioulus limitation, that they are thinking about turning their back on Apple...


PS: It's such a shame that Windows 8 is such a ********, otherwise I'd really think about turning back to windows...

Jul 26, 2012 8:10 AM in response to jcetheredge

For months, I have been anticipating the release of Mountain Lion primarily because of the AirPlay Mirroring feature. I have an early 2008 aluminum MacBook, and after all of the "make sure your Mac can run Mountain Lion" advertising over the last few months, I was relieved that my four-year old Mac had not been rendered obsolete after recently investing in additional memory and a new hard-drive to add life to my machine for several more years to come. Like so many others, AirPlay Mirroring was the primary, if not the only, feature that I really wanted from Mountain Lion. Like so many others, I feel like I was duped by the hype and advertising only to have been swindled into spending $19.99 for a lot of nothing. The "Make sure your Mac can run Mountain Lion" info on the website was not clear about the limitations of installing this new OS X on machines older than 2011 models. I was led to believe that my machine was good to go, only to find out otherwise. Like many others I was forced to download AirParrot for an additional $9.99, so I too find that I am asking myself why the absense of AirPlay Mirroring on my 2008 Mac is a hardware related issue. I installed AirParrot and am able to do the very thing that I have waited months to be able to do. As the owner of three Macs, two iPhones, an iPad, Apple TV, an AirPort Express and Extreme, I felt a tremendous sense of loyalty to my Apple products, and now I'm wondering why. I planned to buy a new Mac for my wife next next year, and now I'm not going to bother. I've got enough of their gadgets, and this Mountain Lion update is a lesson in being satisfied with what I have and not falling prey to the mentality that I've got to have the latest and greatest. To quote some of the others who have posted here, Mountain Lion has failed to deliver on its promises and it is a shame.

Mountain Lion AirPlay Mirroring (iMac to AppleTV) Not Working

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