Will AppleTV allow me to stream games wirelessly from my desktop to my LG Smart TV

Hello Everyone,

First time user here so bare with me please.

I have searched over many forums, rang friends and I just can't seem to get anywhere so here I am to ask about this Apple TV.

All I want to do, is stream games ( World of Warcraft/Flight Simulator X ) from my desktop to my LG Smart TV and I have heard that this AppleTV might be the best way to go. I have wireless throughout my house and all I want to do is to be able to wirelessly stream/mirror my desktop onto my LG Smart TV, double click on my games icons to be able to play games.

Now, I only heard about this Apple TV for the first time today. I have a very High End Custom built Pryon gaming machine that has just about every bell and whistle you can imagine and cost roughly $4.5K to put together. I also have an IPOD and IPAD3 which I will be looking to incorporate to his AppleTV as well if I can.

Now, is the AppleTV they refer to this little black box thingy that you can then run a HDMI cable from into your TV, is that why it is called Apple TV ?

If anyone can give me any advice or at least let me know if I can play games wirelesly from my computer to my LG TV with this AppleTV, it would be appreciated.

Cheers,

Chris.....

 

AFAIK only Apple computers can stream to the AppleTv and I think it is not possible (yet) to stream games from an Apple computer, AFAIK you can stream games from iDevices.

 

have you looked at the Apple site? it will answer all your questions:

http://www.apple.com/appletv/

 

You could mirror the desktop from your mid-2011 or later Apple computer to an Apple TV using AirPlay Mirroring. That's a feature built into the Mac computers, so not an option with a Windows rig.

Even if you had a Mac, not sure how well it would work with gaming. I've used AirPlay mirroring for normal desktop work, and even video, and for that it's fine - but there's going to be a bit of latency introduced which I would think would make gaming not work so well.

 

I found the lag, about a half-second is all, to be unbearable while playing games with Airplay. However, both my ATV3 and iMac (Mid 2011) are wireless, so maybe the lag would be less if one or both were wired.

 

I've run some serious tests (see the iOS forums here) and found that the lag, when iOS devices are used as sources, is between 130 and 150 ms when the ATV 3 is wired and the networking environment is ideal. This lag already makes anything action / racing-based pretty much unplayable.

Dunno how Mac computers compare, that is, are they much slower. If there's indeed a half-second lag, that'd make even puzzle games pretty much frustrtaing.

In addition, the IQ also suffers a lot when using AirPlay (720p effective resolution, 30 fps max with MPEG compression artefacts when there's movement on the screen).

All in all, it's better to go with cabling and a HDMI KVM if you only have one HDMI input on your TV and no inputs for signals compatible with HDMI (say, DVI-D) and you don't want to pull / reconnect cables all the time. (See my HDMI-related articles here in other forums for more info on, say, HDMI -> DVI-D connections; HDMI -> VGA transcoding etc.; for example, section " 1.2.3.2 Driving the DVI(-D) input via HDMI (if present)" at http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1578989 )

 

Thank you for your post Menneisyys2, much appreciated with your insight.

I basically have a Custom Built PC Pryon gaming machine that has the best of everything and cost me about $4.5K to get together. I also have an IPOD and and IPAD3 as well..

What I really want to know is if I buy this AppleTV device and download Airparrot and put a top of the line Belkin HDMI cable from the little Apple TV box into one of the 4 HDMI slots on my LG Smart TV, will I then be able to wirelessly stream / mirror my PC desktop to my TV and play say World of Warcraft and Flight Simulator X on my LG Smart TV.

Thats all I really want to try and do just for now. I also have a Dual Band N Netgear Router and my entire house is wireless and runs the PS3, XBOX 360 and Nintnedo Wii as well as 2 laptops and 4 smart phones and it runs as smooth as silk with never any issues...

Your advice would be appreciated.

Cheers,

Chris.....

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Thanks also to everyone else that has responded, much appreciated guys.

Cheers,

Chris

 

There will almost certainly be too much lag for gaming.And"Top of the line"HDMI cables are a compete scam and waste of money.

 

hi chris, just for your info: HDMI is digital - you won't gain any speed/quality from a "top of the line" cable - they have only - hopefully - better built quality, so the won't break as easy as a cheap cable might after they get a lot of (mechanical) use.


( http://www.tested.com/tech/3329-the-difference-between-cheap-and-expensive-hdmi-cables/ )

 

You can't have zero lag on anything wireless using today's technology. Not with non-AirPlay-based solutions either, should you go for a set-top box allowing for other technologies like Miracast (too). (There are a lot of them supporting Miracast, UPnP, AirPlay etc. in one unit. Haven't tested them myself yet.)

For example, all the specifications of all Miracast receivers state they have 400-500 ms lag - that is, at least three times more than my AirPlay measurements. That is completely useless for gaming.

Go the wired way if you want playability on the big screen. Then, you CAN have zero lag, assuming you disable all DSP's, image quality enhancements all too common in today's TV's.

 

If you can hack OSX to run on that best, you might have a chance. And, as others have said, there will be lag. You will probably even experience lag when using ethernet.