[Canadaka]

I'm wondering if anyone knows of a software solution for screen mirroring from one PC/laptop to another running XBMC (both running Windows 7).

The new "Airplay Mirroring" feature in Apple TV 2 does this well, allowing any iOS and now OSX device to mirror their screen to an Apple TV. You can even do this from a PC using a program called "Airparrot".

There doesn't seem to be an equivalent in the PC/Windows world allowing a PC to be the receiver rather than an AppleTV. Sure there are screen sharing programs like RDP, VNC, Teamviewer and so on, but they struggle at 1080p video, 3D gaming and so on. Surely Apple is not the only one who can figure out how to stream this content over the network fast enough.

So I'm looking for any possible server-client software that might exist. Or Adding "Airplay Mirroring" support to XBMC would also work!

[sarcophage]

There's tons - something like this, for example:

http://www.maxivista.com/

[Canadaka]

There's tons - something like this, for example:

http://www.maxivista.com/

I will try this out, but I can see already in their FAQ "Hardware graphics acceleration such as DirectX or OpenGL or programs relying on WPF is not supported by MaxiVista".

It just seems like something Microsoft is lacking and falling behind in their eco-system with. The "Play to" Windows media thing never caught on, was for audio only and had quirks like you had to have WMP running. It just seems like Microsoft has all the pieces with receivers like the Xbox360 and Windows Media Center. It should be something they build into Windows, especially Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8.

It would be nice if XBMC count support the full new Airplay that includes screen mirroring and 3D gaming from iOS.

[bradvido88]

You could try using VLC to stream your desktop: http://betterlogic.com/roger/2010/07/how...playon-tv/

[Canadaka]

There's tons - something like this, for example:

http://www.maxivista.com/

So I tried MaxVista and its not really an option. The cheaper versions don't allow mirroring of your primary display so you have to buy Pro at $99. But even then its no good for video & 3D games. Even a simple video it couldn't handle and I'm on a local gigabit network. Plus the sound is also not transferred. It may have something todo with Windows 7, this software hasn't been updated in a long time and has some issues with W7.

I've tried VLC streaming before and I'll try again. But it uses a lot of CPU, my test right now it was using 80% CPU on a Quad core i7 920 and even then when trying to do something simply like a video its not smooth and there is a major delay. There are a lot of different methods and codec settings to try with VLC, its possible there is one that works better. But even then its a hassle because I need to manually open VLC and a stream URL on the TV computer each time. Something like Airplay or DLNA auto-starts.

So I guess this is more of a rant that Microsoft/Windows doesn't have a great solution to this.

[phyrexia]

Don't feel too bad. AirPlay Mirroring is not useable for gaming. even on a gigabit network with high end computers there is still too much latency.

I have a sandy bridge i7 macbook pro and a ivy bridge i7 hackintosh, a fast gigabit network (that is, i see ~950mbps transfer rates)...

Even with everything wired, Diablo III is unplayable from either machine...the whole thing is basically useless unless you want to stream video from the internet to your television. (I suppose it would work as a sort of HTPC, but I already have one of those.)

[johnclick]

My setup is different from yours (so I'm not absolutely sure), but have you tried RHUB? Their appliance gives you all kinds of options for online collaboration because everything is bundled into one device. Check it out. Works great for me.