Cannot turn Airplay ON.

Question

Level 2

176 points

Cannot turn Airplay ON.

I am using a Mid-2012 MacBook Pro 13, updated to High Sierra. I am attempting to connect to my AppleTV 2nd Gen. via Airplay, which has worked previously (but not since updating to High Sierra). When I go into display preferences I can see the menu towards the bottom left "AirPlay Display" with the menu selection "OFF." However, when I select that menu there is no other option, only "OFF."

I can select the "Show mirroring options" box and the Airplay icon appears in the menu bar. When I click it, I see grayed out "Airplay: Looking for Apple TV..." and after a moment it changes to "Airplay:Off."

There is no way to turn Airplay on from the Mac. I have restarted the Mac, restarted the AppleTV, confirmed that Airplay is turned on on the Apple TV, tried both a wired and wireless connection for the AppleTV, nothing so far has allowed me to have the option on the Mac of enabling Airplay.

As I have poked around the various forums (Apple communities as well as other internet forums) I see quite a number of people experiencing precisely the same problem with no solutions being offered other than linking to various articles discussing how to use Airplay to display content on an HDTV or AppleTV, which is not helpful at all.

As I stated earlier, this has worked previously but I have not tried it since upgrading to High Sierra. I do not know that it is related to the update, just that it now no longer gives me the option to turn Airplay "On."

Any help would be appreciated!

MacBook Pro (13-inch Mid 2012), macOS High Sierra (10.13.1), AppleTV 2ndGen

Posted on Dec 26, 2017 7:19 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Joseph_S.

Community Specialist

Dec 27, 2017 2:28 PM in response to Dr.Conn

Hi Dr.Conn,

Thanks for reaching out to the Apple Support Communities.

I see that when trying to AirPlay from your MacBook Pro to Apple TV you keep seeing a message that says 'Airplay: Looking for Apple TV...' and then it changes to 'AirPlay:Off'. I'll be happy to help provide some support for this issue.

Please try the steps in this support article: Use AirPlay to display video from your Mac on an HDTV , specifically:

If you don't see the AirPlay icon in your menu bar, make sure that your Apple TV is awake and meets the system requirements.

If you don't see your Apple TV in the AirPlay menu, make sure that your Mac and Apple TV meet the system requirements. Also check your firewall settings:

Choose Apple menu () > System Preferences, then click Security & Privacy.

Click the lock icon, then enter an administrator name and password.

From the Firewall tab, click Firewall Options.

Make sure that “Block all incoming connections” is not selected, and “Automatically allow signed software to receive incoming connections” is selected.

Let me know if you have any questions.

Kind Regards.

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Answer 2

Jan 29, 2018 8:33 AM in response to Dr.Conn

You are correct. Forums are flooded with hundreds of users with the same issue. After upgrading to Sierra and High Sierra, many are no longer able to push iTunes purchases to you Apple TV via airplay. I have tried everything which resolved the issue on previous MacOS versions. But those no longer work (turn ATV Quick Start to OFF, sync Region and Time Zone, firewall adjustments, etc).

We have to have faith that this issue will be resolve in the upcoming OS upgrades (late-2018 or late-2019).

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Answer 3

Dr.Conn Author

Level 2

176 points

Dec 27, 2017 2:36 PM in response to Joseph_S.

Thank you for your reply, but as you can see from my initial post the devices in question meet the requirements, and I have used them successfully before. I can also see the Airplay icon in the menubar. The firewall is currently off.

The problem is that there is no option to turn Airplay "On" from within the Display preferences. The only option is "Off."

I genuinely do appreciate your attempt at assistance, but in looking through the various forums and discussions (there are dozens) with others having this exact same issue, I continue to see the same 2-3 articles linked, none of which actually address the issue. The problem is not the inability to stream or connect, the problem is that there is no option to turn Airplay "On" on the Mac. That functionality seems to have been disabled upon the upgrade to High Sierra.

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Answer 4

poldo

Level 1

9 points

Jan 2, 2018 5:03 PM in response to Dr.Conn

same issues and i just found out that airplay audio actually works as i can select my chromecast dongle as audio playback but no video , i don't even have the pulldown menu in my display screen ..
i noticed that selecting "Show mirror option" and deselecting the menu bar flickers as it is trying to display the airplay icon but it never appears ...
Dear Apple, between these issues and the terminated support for logic xpress which I paid for and relied for several years and therefore have hundreds of files now rendered useless I am really fed up with you , and to think I used to be an Apple evangelist back in the days I don't recognize this company anymore

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