I should be able to do 2 things very easily within the Microsoft ecosystem.
1. Send all audio via WiFi to a local device for playback.
2. Send all audio/video via WiFi to a local device for playback.
I just helped a friend setup a new A/V Receiver, that had both AirPlay and HTC Connect. I've been playing around with my Wife's old One M7. Both Airplay and HTC Connect seamlessly beamed music to the receiver. In my case, I was beaming streaming slacker to the receiver.
When I got home, I realized just how bad the situation is for non-apple devices. I've got several targets for the HTC, but none worked very well. When I connected to the Xbox One, only local content on the phone could be played, streaming media was a no-go. When I connected the HTC to my Xbox 360, I was able to stream streaming music to the 360, but it was just a bad experience it may have just as well not worked. On any song change, there was a 22s delay before audio would play. Pause would pause it immediately on the 360, but clicking play would incur another 22s delay before it'd play on the 360. You could see on the phone that the track was playing, it just took 22s for the audio to play through the 360. The last thing I tried with the HTC was miracast to my Fire TV Stick. This, at first, seemed to work the best, but even it had issues. I was able to connect to the Fire TV Stick (after what seemed like forever), and all content on the HTC was mirrored. Streaming slacker worked and was basically real-time. However, there were numerous audio dropouts, and it completely locked up at one point. One nice thing was that the HTC continued to stream audio even when the screen was off.
Moving on to my Lumia 830 with WP8.1. The only DLNA streaming I could get working was via the Lumia Play To, which only allowed playing phone local content to my Xbox One or Xbox 360. The miracast screen mirroring seemed to work a little better than on the HTC, but I still had audio issues every once in a while; and, with WP8.1, when the screen turns off, it kills the miracast connection. I was able to stream slacker via miracast, but that's clearly not a good solution for streaming audio.
I also tried miracast with my Lumia 630 with Win10Mo preview, with the same results as my L830 with WP8.1
I really should be able to do points 1 and 2 above with Windows Phone, and Microsoft hardware, like an Xbox One or 360. I assume the Microsoft Wireless Display Adapter would work similarly to miracast with the Fire TV stick. BB has the Microsoft adapter on sale for $30 this week, but after the poor results with the Fire TV stick, I'll likely not even bother.
The app gap MS can't directly control, but this is something they can. They need to have a solution to rival Airplay, either their own, or using industry standards. If using industry standards, they need to work better than they do now.
1. Send all audio via WiFi to a local device for playback.
2. Send all audio/video via WiFi to a local device for playback.
I just helped a friend setup a new A/V Receiver, that had both AirPlay and HTC Connect. I've been playing around with my Wife's old One M7. Both Airplay and HTC Connect seamlessly beamed music to the receiver. In my case, I was beaming streaming slacker to the receiver.
When I got home, I realized just how bad the situation is for non-apple devices. I've got several targets for the HTC, but none worked very well. When I connected to the Xbox One, only local content on the phone could be played, streaming media was a no-go. When I connected the HTC to my Xbox 360, I was able to stream streaming music to the 360, but it was just a bad experience it may have just as well not worked. On any song change, there was a 22s delay before audio would play. Pause would pause it immediately on the 360, but clicking play would incur another 22s delay before it'd play on the 360. You could see on the phone that the track was playing, it just took 22s for the audio to play through the 360. The last thing I tried with the HTC was miracast to my Fire TV Stick. This, at first, seemed to work the best, but even it had issues. I was able to connect to the Fire TV Stick (after what seemed like forever), and all content on the HTC was mirrored. Streaming slacker worked and was basically real-time. However, there were numerous audio dropouts, and it completely locked up at one point. One nice thing was that the HTC continued to stream audio even when the screen was off.
Moving on to my Lumia 830 with WP8.1. The only DLNA streaming I could get working was via the Lumia Play To, which only allowed playing phone local content to my Xbox One or Xbox 360. The miracast screen mirroring seemed to work a little better than on the HTC, but I still had audio issues every once in a while; and, with WP8.1, when the screen turns off, it kills the miracast connection. I was able to stream slacker via miracast, but that's clearly not a good solution for streaming audio.
I also tried miracast with my Lumia 630 with Win10Mo preview, with the same results as my L830 with WP8.1
I really should be able to do points 1 and 2 above with Windows Phone, and Microsoft hardware, like an Xbox One or 360. I assume the Microsoft Wireless Display Adapter would work similarly to miracast with the Fire TV stick. BB has the Microsoft adapter on sale for $30 this week, but after the poor results with the Fire TV stick, I'll likely not even bother.
The app gap MS can't directly control, but this is something they can. They need to have a solution to rival Airplay, either their own, or using industry standards. If using industry standards, they need to work better than they do now.