I’ve had Air Video for months now, but have been struggling to find anything more interesting to say than “it works, and if you want to stream videos beautifully over wi-fi, you should remove $2.99 from your local money container and throw it at Air Video”. However, I’ve also hesitated to give it a rave […]
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Quick Look: Air Video for iPhone

Aug 31st 2010 by

I’ve had Air Video for months now, but have been struggling to find anything more interesting to say than “it works, and if you want to stream videos beautifully over wi-fi, you should remove $2.99 from your local money container and throw it at Air Video”. However, I’ve also hesitated to give it a rave review because I simply couldn’t get over-the-air streaming to work over 3G ” well, until today, that is.

Local Wi-Fi Streaming
Streaming is ridiculously (or “redonkulously” — if you watch Dexter) easy to set up. You download the Mac or PC client and specify the folders you’d like it to watch. Then you download the $2.99 Air Video app, pair it with your desktop, and start watching stuff over wi-fi.
Live conversion of videos works almost seamlessly on my 2009 13 MacBook Pro, and it requires only a few seconds to get started. The quality is unbelievably good, and I can’t really tell the difference between Air Video quality and the synced videos I play within the iPod.app. It does take a bit more time to scrub through a video, but the app will save your position in the case of an interruption, just like the iPod does.

OTA Streaming
The other major feature of Air Video is its ability to stream over-the-air, which means it can stream video to any iPhone, iPod, or iPad with an internet connection, regardless of whether or not it’s on your local wi-fi network. Orb has been doing this for quite a while now, but I’ve found Orb’s quality lackluster when compared to Air Video’s. However, until recently, I simply haven’t been able to get Air Video to work over-the-air. None of the port forwarding instructions I’ve read seemed to work with my old Linksys router.
Luckily, the brand-spanking-new Bell router that was installed in my home last week seems to have Universal Plug n Play (UPnP) support. So instead of mucking around with icky port forwarding, I just ticked off the “UPnP” checkbox within Air Video on my Mac and started to reap the benefits of OTA streaming.

Long Story Short
I thought Air Video was good before, but this newest development has upgraded my verdict to “kickass”. Video quality and streaming speed is amazing over wi-fi (starts within 5s) and 3G (starts within 10 seconds – and quality is still *quite* good). Air Video may lack the full multimedia capabilities of the $10  Orb Live app (which streams pictures and songs, and even live TV), but it seems like the clear winner in the video streaming category, and it’s also a lot cheaper at just $2.99 (and it’s universal!).

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