What WiDi alternatives are you using?

[Cardinal98]

Hi all!,

 

We're currently in the midst of decommissioning most of our Microsoft WiDi adapters around the school and are looking for some alternatives that other schools may have experience using.

 

On the cheaper end, we've tried J5Create adapters, but found these to be just as inconsistent as the WiDi's have become. On the other end of the scale, we've also demoed Vivi and found it to be good (I thought it was excellent), while a little bit more expensive than our DFO is willing to shell out at the moment (especially for a school-wide deployment).

 

If you have any experience with any other adapters/wireless display systems, I'd love to hear about it! For the record as well, it'd be good to know if some schools have just ditched wireless display tech altogether (in the classroom) for the most part - this is an idea we've been floating around for a few months now too. Cheers!

 

Thanks in advances,

CB.

[MYK-IT]

We have a couple of these, available for school & drama hall etc to assist with connectivity, outside speakers (guests) etc

 

ViewSonic ViewShare WPD-900 Wireless Screen Casting Kit - ViewSonic Global

https://www.amazon.co.uk/ViewSonic-WPD-900-Wireless-Charging-Education/dp/B0F2G8Q7GY

Edited May 27 by MYK-IT

[DrCheese]

We have a few Airtames for this in our conference room & SMT. Good little devices, but admittedly quite pricy.

 

Classrooms are hard wired.

Edited May 27 by DrCheese

[Dipl0]

Following, same situation, I've suggested hard wiring but this was not wanted as staff like to "walk around the classroom" new head and new academic deputy starting in September which I'm sure will change this requirement. 

 

I've mentioned touch screens, we are still running projectors.

[nicholab]

My view is that in a secondary big screen with casting ability is the best fit to cast from the staff laptop rather than hanging £3k on the wall.  Poly Pano's are now dirt cheap on eBay, and work well. I bought myself one.

[Dipl0]

11 minutes ago, nicholab said:

My view is that in a secondary big screen with casting ability is the best fit to cast from the staff laptop rather than hanging £3k on the wall.  Poly Pano's are now dirt cheap on eBay, and work well. I bought myself one.

Just to say, we got recent quotes and a iiyama screen fitted was about £1300-£1500 a classroom. Interactive boards have gone down alot but obviously nothing is cheaper than a consumer grade tv and a casting tool.

 

Our projectors are rubbish though. 

[aydee]

4 hours ago, MYK-IT said:

We have a couple of these, available for school & drama hall etc to assist with connectivity, outside speakers (guests) etc

 

ViewSonic ViewShare WPD-900 Wireless Screen Casting Kit - ViewSonic Global

https://www.amazon.co.uk/ViewSonic-WPD-900-Wireless-Charging-Education/dp/B0F2G8Q7GY

Are you using these in classrooms or like a Hall/Gym etc?
They arnt crazy priced and I have a good few ideas if they seem reliable and are compatible with ChromeOS/Chromebooks as well as Windows?

[MYK-IT]

1 hour ago, aydee said:

Are you using these in classrooms or like a Hall/Gym etc?
They arnt crazy priced and I have a good few ideas if they seem reliable and are compatible with ChromeOS/Chromebooks as well as Windows?

 Hi @aydee

 

We're not using them in classrooms (as they have interactive screens, hardwired etc) but just for the School Hall and Drama Studio where we have 'hall-specification' projectors with big screen as an additional connection method (to HDMI) - normally for outside guest speakers who want to connect their device (which sometimes doesn't have a HDMI port / or they don't have an adapter etc). We don't have Chromebooks, but I've tried it connected to Android Mobile Phone and it works...

[synaesthesia]

20 hours ago, Dipl0 said:

Just to say, we got recent quotes and a iiyama screen fitted was about £1300-£1500 a classroom. Interactive boards have gone down alot but obviously nothing is cheaper than a consumer grade tv and a casting tool.

 

Our projectors are rubbish though. 

Consumer TV's are cheaper until someone pokes one too hard or a kid throws an empty water bottle at it. One replacement and suddenly the £1000 properly fitted, properly specced panel with all the necessaries built in is already better value for money - especially when cost savings are so blunt that people go for built-to-fail stuff like Hisense or Vestel based rebadges (wharfedale, some sharp and toshiba, blaupunkt etc). Not a great strategy. Quick stopgap fix by all means, but no solution there.

 

If there's nothing built into the panels you have already I always found the MS ones easiest by far, is there a particular reason you're moving away from them? I haven't looked for a long time but the MS ones we have are a great fallback and have been eyeballing some cheap 2nd hand to make up numbers where the panels are older or have faffy tech (promethean!)

[Dipl0]

27 minutes ago, synaesthesia said:

Consumer TV's are cheaper until someone pokes one too hard or a kid throws an empty water bottle at it. One replacement and suddenly the £1000 properly fitted, properly specced panel with all the necessaries built in is already better value for money - especially when cost savings are so blunt that people go for built-to-fail stuff like Hisense or Vestel based rebadges (wharfedale, some sharp and toshiba, blaupunkt etc). Not a great strategy. Quick stopgap fix by all means, but no solution there.

 

If there's nothing built into the panels you have already I always found the MS ones easiest by far, is there a particular reason you're moving away from them? I haven't looked for a long time but the MS ones we have are a great fallback and have been eyeballing some cheap 2nd hand to make up numbers where the panels are older or have faffy tech (promethean!)

I agree don't worry, when you go for the business panels you may as well go for touch screen with everything built in. 

 

The ms dongles are now out of support and are slowly losing their reliability for me. 

[synaesthesia]

13 minutes ago, Dipl0 said:

The ms dongles are now out of support and are slowly losing their reliability for me. 

Ah, cheers - not worried about the support for these, reliability concerns me though particularly as I was looking at 2nd hand units. Are they just stopping working or is it physical connection issues such as HDMI connectors failing please?

[localzuk]

We decided to go down the route of ensuring all new devices that go in have their own system - be it iiyama's iiShare, or the tech built into the cheap Acer projectors we've been buying. One less thing to deal with.

 

We've been replacing projectors with iiyama here mostly - their DMS is useful for managing the screens, and they are easy to install. Can do a room for less than £1000 with a 65" model.

[Dipl0]

2 hours ago, synaesthesia said:

Ah, cheers - not worried about the support for these, reliability concerns me though particularly as I was looking at 2nd hand units. Are they just stopping working or is it physical connection issues such as HDMI connectors failing please?

Bit of both but increasingly, it just doesn't work, you cast and they just fail to connect. Sometimes restarting them helps, sometimes it doesn't. It's my biggest callouts. The worst areas I changed for wired and never heard from them again. 

[Cardinal98]

22 hours ago, synaesthesia said:

Ah, cheers - not worried about the support for these, reliability concerns me though particularly as I was looking at 2nd hand units. Are they just stopping working or is it physical connection issues such as HDMI connectors failing please?

We're finding that particularly with the MS dongles that the connection is becoming more and more unreliable. As our network devices have increased (every student has a laptop/iPad in the classroom, as well as staff laptops) they've become more of a nuisance than a saviour.

 

I will say however that in areas of the school that are less traffic dense, the MS dongles still perform relatively well. I think it's more that our wireless traffic has increased so much since Covid that the interference in some areas of our school is causing issues with the WiDi adapters.

[Cardinal98]

22 hours ago, localzuk said:

We decided to go down the route of ensuring all new devices that go in have their own system - be it iiyama's iiShare, or the tech built into the cheap Acer projectors we've been buying. One less thing to deal with.

 

We've been replacing projectors with iiyama here mostly - their DMS is useful for managing the screens, and they are easy to install. Can do a room for less than £1000 with a 65" model.

Thanks for the reply! Out of interest, what models of Iiyama screens and Acer projectors are you using?

[BenQ_Chris]

Hi @Cardinal98 - just to add my two cents. What display technology are you currently using? Integrated casting in screens is fairly common place nowadays, all of the BenQ screens are integrated with InstaShare 2 (Miracast - P2P, Airplay, Google Cast). Additionally, even if a consumer grade TV and casting dongle is cheaper, it will likely not be warrantied for use in a school and the glass will not be reenforced, in the BenQ Interactive Panels for example, they are 3.2mm thick tempered glass rated 9H on the Mohs mineral hardness scale. All of our screens have a  powerful DMS system, SSO Account Management (AMS) if you want to take full advantage of the system. All with included wall bracket and upon registration a 5 year de/re-install warranty.

 

We have three main ranges RE04A/RE05A, RE04/RE05E and RP04/RP05.

 

If you'd like to know more or have any questions please feel free to drop me a DM.

[Dipl0]

On 28/05/2026 at 11:26, localzuk said:

We've been replacing projectors with iiyama here mostly - their DMS is useful for managing the screens, and they are easy to install. Can do a room for less than £1000 with a 65" model.

Are you buying and fitting yourself for this price? I got a few quotes and the screen alone was about £1000-£1200

[SYNACK]

Tried one of these and seemed to work alright during brief testing

 

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BRSRWKCF

[chazzy2501]

The Newline Lyra Pro and Epson EB420wi and 460wi laser projectors have Miracast (which incorporated the WiDi tech from intel) 

 

Miracast can be fussy, The realtek based wifi cards simply do not work well with it. (fight me) Intel Wi-Fi works great (so I upgraded all laptops). Also the OS firewall can block it, (damn ESET & remember profiles!)) 

 

The Microsoft Display adapters were the most trouble free hosts but are no longer available. (Our head has a 4k one in his office, no complaints) 

 

I prep teachers with, "if you want wireless you may get headaches" if they are not prepared then I can install USBC docks with AV, power and ethernet. (super good if the room allows for it)

 

With the Lyra TVs I leave a backup 2m USBC cable for fussy days. (always plugged in but they have a nice cabinet & well managed room) 

 

I'm not sure if it is sunspots or having a laptop that's not been rebooted for 43 days and has 140 PowerPoints open in "standby" but wireless projection is fussy.

[synaesthesia]

19 minutes ago, chazzy2501 said:

The Newline Lyra Pro and Epson EB420wi and 460wi laser projectors have Miracast (which incorporated the WiDi tech from intel) 

 

Miracast can be fussy, The realtek based wifi cards simply do not work well with it. (fight me) Intel Wi-Fi works great (so I upgraded all laptops). Also the OS firewall can block it, (damn ESET & remember profiles!)) 

 

The Microsoft Display adapters were the most trouble free hosts but are no longer available. (Our head has a 4k one in his office, no complaints) 

 

I prep teachers with, "if you want wireless you may get headaches" if they are not prepared then I can install USBC docks with AV, power and ethernet. (super good if the room allows for it)

 

With the Lyra TVs I leave a backup 2m USBC cable for fussy days. (always plugged in but they have a nice cabinet & well managed room) 

 

I'm not sure if it is sunspots or having a laptop that's not been rebooted for 43 days and has 140 PowerPoints open in "standby" but wireless projection is fussy.

 

This. I'm torn - we go through more HDMI cables than a hungry chinchilla hankering after it's owners high end AV system but the wireless on our prometheans is so flaky and finicky to use  The viewsonics are a bit better for this but still a bit finicky compared to "plug and play" - and the Microsoft adapters were as close to plug and play as it was possible to get for wireless!