Quick and easy access to mirroring your iPhone or iPad screen to a Windows PC or Mac. It’s unclear how Apple will respond to Laird’s discovery. One possibility would be for the company to simply change the digital keys used by the AirPort Express, a feat that could be easily accomplished by issuing updates for the router’s firmware and iTunes. The ability to use the AirPlay protocol to beam videos and audio from iPhone directly to a Windows PC or Mac. And second, it would make it trivial for anyone to write an emulator that, instead of playing the music streamed, simply saved the information to disk. Granted, music on iTunes has now been DRM-free for a while, which may not make that issue a pressing concern. First, it could conceivably pave the way for a number of innovative products that take advantage of AirPlay in ways hitherto unimagined by either Apple or its manufacturing partners. However, Laird’s discovery technically makes it possible for anyone to write AirPlay-compatible software without requiring Apple’s consent or paying any licensing fees.
#Stream to airplay on pc install
In its current state, the app is far from user-friendly, and requires a considerable amount of technical know-how to install and run, making it well outside the reach of the average user. AirPlay is Apple’s feature that allows you to cast videos from your iPhone, iPad, or Mac to your TV, provided you have Apple TV or an AirPlay 2-compatible TV. Armed with the keys, Laird was able to write a simple app, which he called ShairPort, that essentially makes a computer appear to be an AirPort Express, tricking any copy of iTunes running on the local network into letting you stream audio to that computer.