Interested in an Airtame 2 Alternative?

Airtame 2 is a wireless screen mirroring solution. It uses special software loaded onto the presenter’s notebook, and usually uses a local corporate Wi-Fi network to transmit to a small receiver device connected to a display.

In this article, we will look at the three popular models sold worldwide that compete with the Airtame system.

Setting up wireless screen mirroring correctly usually falls to the IT team to ensure that the system works and is secure. Both Airtame 2 and Mersive Solstice Pod Gen3 have detailed network deployment guides outlining the ports that need to be opened, specific features to turn on (such as multicasting), and other network requirements such as bandwidth availability. For example, the Solstice typically requires a network connection with a minimum bandwidth of 20Mbps, and recommends adjusting the QoS priority to ensure it works. The IT manager then needs to deploy the apps onto the user’s notebook to ensure quick login. Bottom line, these two are more complex than the BenQ and Barco systems.

Barco Clickshare C-10 consists of a receiver that is connected to the meeting room display or projector, and a button that connects to your notebook to share your screen. This system is easier to set up, but the receiver cannot be mounted on the ceiling with a projector, only on a wall or table. Also, ClickShare requires an app that needs to be deployed by IT staff onto the user’s notebook in order to connect with the receiver.

BenQ InstaShow is the easiest Airtame alternative to set up and operate. There are no apps or network configuration steps needed to get it working. You simply connect the receiver to the display and set the button on the table.

Do you want to have visitors use your wireless screen mirroring system when they are presenting in your collaboration space? Here are how the different solutions work.

With both Airtame 2 and Mersive Solstice Pod Gen3, employees or visitors are required to log onto the same network that is hosting the Airtame or Solstice receiver. Though Airtame 2 also supports employees and visitors on a separate network, there are some limitations and requirements. With Mersive Solstice, due to security risks to enterprise networks, IT administrators need to ensure that their network is protected from tunneling apps or other security risks associated with visitors on the network. The Airtame also recommends turning off network apps such as Dropbox to increase performance. Next, visitors typically need to download and run the Airtame or Mersive apps from their notebook. Outside of the extra time it takes, many organizations “lock down” their notebooks to third party software to protect from malware and require IT support and approval for any application to be installed.

With Barco Clickshare C-10 hosting visitors is easier and doesn’t require a network connection to use the system. Visitors still have to download the ClickShare app to do wireless screen mirroring. This app uses the notebook’s system resources to perform some of the functions needed to use the ClickShare system, and the same security concerns on “locked down” computers from the Airtame and Mersive apps may still apply to a visitor who wants to use the system.

BenQ InstaShow is the easiest for external guests or clients to use. You simply plug in the button to the USB-C or the HDMI port with USB power on your device and tap the button when you are ready to present. The process takes seconds and thanks to InstaShow offering a fully hardware solution, there are no apps to load or a need to connect to the network, ensuring the stability of your source device. The buttons are available in both standard HDMI with USB power or USB-C connectors that work with any modern notebook, including the latest MacBooks and Chromebooks.

While standard notebooks are not a problem for any of these systems, Airtame 2 and other alternatives have to transform the video signal from the device to enable wireless screen mirroring. This can limit the types of devices that can be used. For example, the ClickShare app enables Windows and Mac notebooks to share their screen, but not Chromebooks. Mersive Solstice allows you to use a web browser on Chromebooks to share your screen with their app, while Airtame 2 can work with specific Chromebooks or Linux devices. For these systems, you will need to carefully check to make sure your devices work.

The InstaShow approach is to wirelessly stream a native HDMI signal directly from a device. This enables thousands of different HDMI devices from over 1700 different manufacturers to mirror their screen on a shared display or projector. This helps not only notebooks and mobile devices to mirror the screen, but also digital microscopes, Blu-Ray players, and even X-ray and CT machines to wirelessly mirror their images to a shared display.

One drawback of the Airtame 2 system is that none of the content shared over the network is encrypted. This can open the door to presentation content being seen by bad actors and even recorded. So how do Airtame alternatives protect your content?

Mersive Solstice Pod Gen3 improves security by allowing the system to encrypt all transmissions from the notebook to protect content from unauthorized viewing or recording. The main drawback is that this has to be set up by an administrator and cannot be turned any time.

BenQ InstaShow and Barco ClickShare C-10 encrypt all content transmitted from their buttons. Both brands also have detailed security white papers (link to our white paper) that IT managers and security staff can review to make sure your corporate data is protected.

So how do you decide which one is best for you? While Airtame 2 is the least expensive of the three alternatives, you have to worry about overloading your network’s bandwidth, having sensitive content recorded, and allowing visitors onto your network to download apps and present to the display, not to mention lag times of up to one second when running videos.

To help you understand the tradeoffs between the various Airtame alternatives, we have put together a basic comparison table that may help you. Note that this does not have pricing or the optional annual subscription costs that may be required for security updates, such as with Mersive Solstice.