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Air Parrot performance with Ethernet cable ?

Hello Everyone,

I am very impressed by mirroring functionality provided by Airplay of apple tv. I have a 2010 Macbook pro purchased in mid 2010. Unfortunately, my mac doesn't have quicksynch tehncology hardware support for airplay to work in mountain lion. So, I never upgrader to ML. However, I have been playing around with Air Parrot. I have noticed a lot of choppiness while playing videos.


Both my macbook and apple tv are currently using Wi-Fi. I am guessing the lack of smoothness in video mirroring is because of wi-fi. Has any one tested by using ethernet cables. I mean connecting both MB and ATv to broadband modem using ethernet cables? Did it improve video quality ?



Thanks in advance.

Apple TV, Apple Tv 3

Posted on Aug 16, 2012 2:35 PM

Reply
17 replies

Aug 16, 2012 3:21 PM in response to techmonster

I use strickley WiFi for my airplay and have no problem that you describe. I do however have much later equipment. ATV3 and the new Ipad and Ipod touch. They both work flawlessly. So I would suggest that you try connecting them directly to the router to see if there is difference. To get good quality video you should be using a wireles N router. Let me know how you make out.

Aug 16, 2012 5:36 PM in response to techmonster

Please do post once you try it. I finally invested in a TV so I wouldn't have to sit 3 feet from my 20" early 2009 iMac, which I've been using with an HDHomerun to use the iMac as a DVR. The TV is grand, but AirParrot is unreliable at best; most of the time it lags, jumps, and eventually cuts out. It could be that a new router (with N) would do it, but frankly if a cabled setup will work to watch content on the TV, I could sell the new AppleTV and use the proceeds to replace the old router anyway.

Aug 20, 2012 12:05 PM in response to billtils

Okay, so I tested this week. Following is my observation:


1. When one one end of connection(MB to Router or Router is ATV) is wired (ethernet), it has improved performance however there was occasional loss of frames but not too many to affect viewing experience.


2. When I disabled audio mirroring, I see that it improved performance even better.

Aug 24, 2012 1:13 AM in response to techmonster

I got a Mid-2010 iMac (i3) and a ATV3. I faced some performance issues while streaming HD-video content from the web (3 Mbit DSL) and tranfering by WiFi (incl. a APExpress as repeater) to Mac and back to ATV via Airparrot (mirroring). So I have tried Dlan (Devolo 500) as an alternative to WiFi. Performance has improved significantly ! Now I am quite happy (but still anoyed that Apple does not support older machines with mirroring on ML).


But i guess my i3-iMac is now quite at the border of it's video coding/decoding performance.


---> give Ethernet (or Dlan) a try.


iMac 21" i3 (mid 2010)

iPad 2

ATV 3

iphone 4s

3x APExpress (for music airplay, 1 also as repeater)

AirportExtreme generating WiFi

Samsung on WXP

Dell on Win7

3Mbit DSL on Speedport700 Router

3x Devolo 500 (compact) for Dlan

Aug 24, 2012 5:13 AM in response to billtils

billtils wrote:


Interesting investigation - seems like my Dlan 500 mght be why it works for me (and you!) but not some others.

I've recommended the Devolo adapters for several years now - our microwave used to regularly interfere with wifi signals when it was on - seems less of an issue with current router, but I far prefer the Devolo 200/500 mix I have to wifi.


Not really tested Airparrot much but a quick try seemed ok.


AC

Oct 12, 2012 9:40 AM in response to sanchez22

Hi,


The iMac, the ATV and the Airport Extreme are connected by Powerline.

The Airport Extreme is connected to the Router by LAN (Ethernet).


However I still have some smaller stuttering issues. Especially when I stream sports (soccer, hocker) to the ATV it's not really perfect (but by far better than via WiFi).


I really do not know where this remaining stuttering comes from. The CPU is loaded by 30% only, memory is free (9 of 12 GB left over),.... network is for sure not overloaded. I also played around with the settings of my Samsung TV.

Air Parrot performance with Ethernet cable ?

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