Airplay Mirroring on Mountain Lion while using DVD Player

Posted:
in Genius Bar edited January 2014


Has anyone else had trouble viewing movies with DVD Player on Airplay mirroring? When trying to watch movies using DVD player, all I get is a gray checkerboard pattern on my computer monitor as well as my TV.

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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 25
    liam63liam63 Posts: 1member
    Having downloaded OS X Mountain Lion last night I was excited by the prospect of playing my dvd's on my MacBookPro then via mirroring watching the dvd back on my 50" LG HD TV. My aim was to plug my headphones in to my Mac, turn the sound down on my TV and then enjoy the large screen image of the dvd on the TV ( I have no audio out on my TV).
    Much to my dismay the Mac dvd player will not function with Air Play enabled.
    Instead of the dvd playing I am met with a grey and white chessboard effect image and the Mac dvd player will not play the dvd's video image or audio at all.
    However, once Air Play is turned off then there are no such problems playing it on my MacBooKPro. It would be good to watch it on a full 50" HD screen though.
    I have a newer MacBookPro and I'm hoping that Apple will update the dvd player so that it works with Air Play and will then show the DVD on my large TV screen with sound on either the TV or my MacBookPro.
    Has anybody out there encountered the same problem and what if any are the possible solutions?
  • Reply 2 of 25


    I tried this as well. Same result! It's a bit frustrating really. Any solutions around?

  • Reply 3 of 25
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member


    This is not a problem. This is a feature. It's called DRM. It's illegal to do a workaround.

  • Reply 4 of 25


    silmply use VLC! 


    http://vic.slftvvare.com

  • Reply 5 of 25


    Download vlc player and the problem will be solved and will play dvds on apple tv too.

  • Reply 6 of 25


    DRM? Even if I try to play my own iDVD created home movies (no region code, no unlicensed music, no protected content - just the MPEG2 technology).


    Apple doesn't live up to the promise of me showing videos to my friends on my AppleTv connected big screen!

  • Reply 7 of 25
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member


    Originally Posted by xenon8000 View Post

    DRM? Even if I try to play my own iDVD created home movies (no region code, no unlicensed music, no protected content - just the MPEG2 technology).


     


    Yep, DRM placed on the DVD Player application itself.


     





    Apple doesn't live up to the promise of me showing videos to my friends on my AppleTv connected big screen!




     


    You don't have them in iTunes or stored on your hard drive playback-able from QuickTime or anywhere else within the entire OS?

  • Reply 8 of 25

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Tallest Skil View Post


     


    Yep, DRM placed on the DVD Player application itself.


     


     


    You don't have them in iTunes or stored on your hard drive playback-able from QuickTime or anywhere else within the entire OS?



    Thanks for coming back!


     


    No, these were created on an older machine (also, iDVD is not part of iLife anymore) - I could go back to tapes and rebuild 300 hours of film or render every dvd back into a single movie and loose chapters etc. but don't want to as I'm not sure what Apple might drop in the future - e.g. Tiger's iMovie could produce MS Win compatible movies back then and now I only have a couple of devices to choose from (so, who knows what's going ten years of now and me re-re-repeating the same procedure as every OS X launch again?).


     


    All I say is, that I, and maybe some couple of hundred thousand of the 3 million downloads, still have dvd libraries - and for us our content won't be played on AppleTV. In 2006 I was able to use my MacMini connected TV but replaced it with last year's MBP. DVDs have just been put in the same BluRay bag of hurt. 

  • Reply 9 of 25
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member


    Since it's just your own DVD, why not use HandBrake to rip it? Get it into just a regular MP4 file and it should work fine.

  • Reply 10 of 25


    I guess Apple just doesn't see the point anymore. There is the cloud, and there are more compact ways of storing video and other data

  • Reply 11 of 25


    the problem will be fix if u download vlc player to play dvds on apple tv

  • Reply 12 of 25
    ernestuernestu Posts: 10member


    I downloaded the latest version of VLC and it does work, but I noticed the picture is a bit choppy as well as the sound. So, the quality is not as good as I'd like.

  • Reply 13 of 25


    After sitting on the line with Apple support and doing some troubleshooting, I finally figured out some additional things that might help out.  With the update to Mountain Lion, Apple seems to have enabled a feature that causes the grey and white checkerboard to appear in any of Apple's video playing software if there is any type of streaming or other connection active to the subject computer.  For example, prior to the Mountain Lion update, I had my Mac Mini connected to my television.  To make things easier on me, I would use the Back to My Mac feature to do screen sharing to navigate through the Mac Mini.  However, after the Mountain Lion update, I would get the gray and white checkerboard pattern in DVD player and in iTunes when trying to play videos (whether or not they were DRM protected).  But if I didn't use screen sharing but rather tried to play the videos on the Mac Mini using the typical bluetooth keyboard/mouse interface, then the videos would play perfectly.


     


    This same issue arises with Airplay Mirroring. When you try to mirror your desktop/laptop computer to the TV through the Apple TV, your desktop/laptop computer senses that you are doing a type of screen sharing.  As such, whenever you try to play anything through the Apple software (i.e. DVD player, iTunes, etc.), the result is that you get the grey and white checkerboard screen.


     


    At this time, there doesn't seem to be any type of workaround for this except to use third-party software when you mirror, as has been noted by other posters on this thread.  It doesn't matter whether you are trying to play DRM protected material or not, the computer you are trying to mirror will sense the connection to another device and will automatically checkerboard all video you attempt to play.  The exception to this is that if you want to mirror your iTunes video that is playing on your desktop/laptop computer, then you can do so but not through selecting Airplay Mirroring in the display preferences.  Rather, you have to go into iTunes on your mac and start to play the video.  Once it starts to play, there will be the Airplay Mirroring option inside of/within the iTunes window. If you use this selection, then you can properly stream to Apple TV without grey checkbox.  It only trips up if you try to do Airplay Mirroring for your entire computer screen rather than out of iTunes specifically. 


     


    Anyhow, this is what I've ended up figuring out.  Hope it helps.  

  • Reply 14 of 25
    zeusszeuss Posts: 1member


    Tried playing the dvd through iTunes..it wont show up. It's in my finder though. Do I need to rip the Dvd onto iTunes? Why Isnt this simple?..

  • Reply 15 of 25


    You cannot play a DVD through iTunes.  It doesn't work that way.  Moreover, the rights management protections are written into the software/application itself.  Effectively, when you try to airplay a DVD, you will not be able to do it unless you use a third party, non-Apple DVD playing software such as VLC.  The only other option you have is to convert your DVD to a mp4 or h.264 format and import it into iTunes library and then airplay the file through iTunes library.  However, the legality of doing such a thing is questionable.  Some say that if you own the DVD you should have the right to do such a conversion, while others disagree and find it to be a violation of copyright law, etc.  Do your own research before trying to do anything like the conversion.  It's probably better to just use a third party DVD playing software such as VLC to play the DVD through the airplay mirroring feature.  Hope that helps..

  • Reply 16 of 25
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member


    Originally Posted by zeuss View Post

    Tried playing the dvd through iTunes..it wont show up.


     


    That's because iTunes doesn't play them.






    Do I need to rip the Dvd onto iTunes?



     


    Yes. Use HandBrake for that. Note that it's illegal to be doing this. The legal way to get a digital copy of a DVD that you own is to buy the DVD, find a torrent for the movie, download the torrent, turn off all uploading in your client, and then wait a few years to download at dial-up speeds because you're not uploading.


     


    That makes it a perfectly legal way to do it. Ripping from the disc is illegal. … I know, right?


     




    Why Isnt this simple?



     


    The MPAA are idiots.

  • Reply 17 of 25


    I'm far from being an expert in this field so forgive my ignorance. But why do they advertise this advantage of playing videos with airplay mirroring when all you can play is what you could already access through apple tv anyway?  I thought, great, I can slip a dvd into my laptop and watch in on the big screen. As it turns out DVD player doesn't work. I can get Quicktime to mirror some shows I have on my hard drive but that is the extent of it. I just don't understand the point of this mirroring.

  • Reply 18 of 25
    ivinceivince Posts: 74member


    Oh ^^%^%^% I just made this thread.  Somebody can you please remove or close it.  Thanks.

  • Reply 19 of 25


    I had this problem. I saw a workaround. I just downloaded, Video Lan player (VLC). Its free and you can just type in VLC on Google and download it.


     


    Instead of playing your DVD movie with DVD player from mac, use VLC Player. It works great. I hope this helps.

  • Reply 20 of 25


    Worked a treat! :)  Thanks for the advice!

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