Airplay, finally on Apple TV

One of the main things which has been missing with the new Apple TV is streaming media services.  Though, many of us have not given up on the Apple TV, with the hope that there would one day Airplay would arrive to save the day.  Well, our prayers have been answered, as Apple introduced  the iOS 4.2 update, they brought along news of an Apple TV update as well.  Well as we all anticipated while hearing this, the update made Airplay an available function on the Apple TV.

For those of you who do not know what Airplay is, well let me explain it to you.  Airplay is a function which allows you to stream media from another iOS device to your Apple TV.  Then you can take an iPod/iPhone/iPad and start playing any type of media.  Once it is playing you can then press a small button on the screen next to the volume slider where it then turns on streaming to the Apple TV.  Some things are required for this to work such as the devices you are using need to be on the same home network, and they both need the most recent iOS.

Things such as videos, music, or photos can be streamed to the Apple TV.  But videos which were recorded with the iPhone 4 cannot be streamed on the Apple TV, which is a little upsetting but we will deal with it.  Also, YouTube does work which does not necessarily matter because the Apple TV already has an app for it, but it is much easier to browse on the iPhone rather than your TV and then stream.

Although this does make the Apple TV incredibly better, there are other devices which may suit you better if you want a lot of streaming capabilities.  Devices such as the Roku XDS offer a very wide array of features which allow many different channels to be streamed.

Make sure to leave a comment with your opinion on the addition of Airplay to the Apple TV.