Mirror your iOS device to a Mac/PC with Reflection

I give a lot of demonstrations of various iOS tasks, playing games, different features etc. when I first got my Apple TV, I used to take it with me everywhere.   Most everyone has a HDTV today, so I found it a fairly easy solution to use the ATV and airplay mirroring from my iPhone, iPad, or Mac but there has always been a few minor caveats.

First, you have an apple TV, its power cable and the HDMI cable, I also carried a Toslink fiber optic audio cable with it just incase someone had a surround sound system that did not route its audio through the TV as well. This is kind of a pain because although small it’s still a bit of extra weight in the backpack or carrying bag. Secondly, if you have ever moved an apple TV around from say your house to a family members for a movie night or something, you must know how frustrating it can be to connect to a wi-fi network, it’s just no fun! (with ATV iOS 5.1.1 Build version 6.0 apple has brought the capability of using configuration profiles to join wireless networks for advanced users which helps ease this problem.)

Well, I found an application for you Mac called Reflection, which allows you to turn your Mac into an airplay receiver, in all reality, the device treats the connection just like one to an Apple TV. Now I can leave my house with just my Macbook Pro and my iPhone or iPad, create a wireless network with my Mac, join it from the iOS device, and then start airplay mirroring, that simple! Now anyone I’m trying to demo something too can see the screen on my Mac and I can walk them through whatever the client may need help with.

Another notable feature is that due to the fact that reflection treats its airplay connection as a connection to an apple TV, with a bit of fiddling you can get your device and output screen to work together, in the fashion of many games like Sky gamblers and Real Racing 2, which both allow you to use your device as a controller and you video display ends up on your apple TV. so for those who do not own an apple TV, reflection can help you play those nifty airplay enabled games, a little easier.

Reflection is available from www.reflectionapp.comas a time limited trial, and a $19.99 full version. The full version comes with unlimited connection duration, device frames too make the device seem like any given device on the output screen, video recording to catch videos of your demo, and password protection as well so you have control over what devices can connect to your airplay “network” so to speak.