file format support over airplay

Question

file format support over airplay

I'm looking at getting an Apple TV so that I can stream movies and TV shows to my TV wirelessly using my iPhone 5. The trouble is, I have a lot of movies in MKV or other formats that aren't 'officially supported' by Apple hardware, but the streaming app I've chosen to use (either Goodplayer or 8player) do support these formats. I just have a few questions about compatibility

1. Is streaming of these 'unsupported' file formats such as MKV possible over airplay, or will I have to transcode all my MKV files into a particular format/codec in order for them to work via Airplay?

2. Is the hardware decoding of the file done on the iPhone or on the Apple TV itself? If it's the iPhone, is an iPhone 5 fast enough to decode H.264 1080p content and stream it to the ATV without any hiccups, assuming I'm not using it for anything else at the time?

3. If I choose to use Display mirroring for my iPhone 5 to show a movie on screen, will the ATV output the native resolution of the iPhone, or will it scale up to 1080p? Also, using Display Mirroring, will the audio be sent over airplay as well? I would assume so, I just want to make sure it's all gonna wor

4. Using Airplay over wifi, will there be any compression of the file as it's sent over the network, or will the signal arriving at the ATV be the same as the original video file?

iPhone 5, iOS 7.0.4

Posted on Dec 11, 2013 5:42 PM

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Answer 1

Rudegar

Level 10

185,076 points

Dec 12, 2013 7:49 AM in response to InternetSandman

mirroring "should" be mirroring think taking an xerox copy of a picture

but some DRM protected material like blueray and dvd players have a way of blocking mirror (same issue with remote desktop and vnc and teamviewer and the likes)

mkv is not a format used by DRM as far as I know

the way airplay works is that it use the build in features of the videocard to in realtime take what it's displaying on the monitor compress it and send it over the network as a video stream much like what netflix and other such services do across the Internet

the fact that the user want this to be realtime mean only newer macs which video cards that support this support airplay mirror

same with ios only iphone4s and newer and ipad2 and newer support the feature because the video part of their system on a chip support the encoding in hardware

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Answer 2

Dec 12, 2013 10:12 AM in response to Rudegar

I'm really not sure I understood what you were trying to say and if mirroring sends the video at the resolution of the iPhone, then that answers only one of the questions that I listed

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Answer 3

Rudegar

Level 10

185,076 points

Dec 12, 2013 10:44 AM in response to InternetSandman

1. it stream a capture of the screen no files were involved or harmed during the stream

2. encoding is don by the sender decoding is don by the receiver

3. native of the iphone or it would not be mirror

4.yes I believe there will be a compression if it will be an image quality degrading compression I'm unsure of

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