Nearly an hour of pesky troubleshooting, but I prevailed (geek details after the jump)
Pretty much as soon as Apple TVs were installed in my new office, I'd realized they never would latch on to servers to set the time and date. But, we could still connect iOS devices to them to wirelessly AirPlay a signal, so no one (including myself) worried much about it.
But then, not long after I installed iOS 9 on my devices, I eventually realized I could no longer send video to the Apple TV—only sound. I didn't deal much with it for a few months because there was never a mission-critical need to make the wireless connection. The only times I needed to project from an iPad, I was able to use my Lightning to HDMI adapter.
Today, I decided enough was enough, and I began researching what the problem might be. The Apple TVs were obviously talking to the network because my iOS devices saw them and could send audio. After a bit of online digging, I confirmed my hunch that AirPlay protocols changed in iOS 9 and the Apple TVs needed a firmware update to restore compatibility. But the updates refused to run, telling me to check back later. I got even more suspicious when I tried running a network test, but the Apple TV was requiring me to sign into an iTunes account which it repeatedly wouldn't accept.
Then a light bulb went on. Perhaps my office network was blocking certain ports the Apple TV requires. And turns out that was, indeed, part of the problem. The rest of the problem was that I had to manually set the Apple TV's DNS addresses to Apple's servers. Once the ports were open and DNS was adjusted, the Apple TV was immediately able to auto-set the date and time and I successfully initiated the software update. Once it finally completed, video mirroring through AirPlay was restored.
In case anyone reading this is curious to know what ports and DNS addresses are needed, I'll share the info. If you're seeing messages such as Activation: Failed and Date/Time: Skipped, then it's a good chance you need to open these ports on your firewall and change the Apple TV's DNS settings.
TCP Port 123 (Time Server)
TCP Port 3689 (iTunes)
UDP Port 5353 (Bonjour Service)
TCP Port 80 (Web)
TCP Port 443 (SSL)
TCP Port 53 (DNS)
Primary DNS: 208.122.23.22
Secondary DNS: 208.122.23.23
(I don't see a way to add a secondary DNS in an Apple TV. The primary address should work fine as is, but you can try the secdary as a primary if needed.)
Nearly an hour of pesky troubleshooting, but I prevailed (geek details after the jump)
Pretty much as soon as Apple TVs were installed in my new office, I'd realized they never would latch on to servers to set the time and date. But, we could still connect iOS devices to them to wirelessly AirPlay a signal, so no one (including myself) worried much about it.
But then, not long after I installed iOS 9 on my devices, I eventually realized I could no longer send video to the Apple TV—only sound. I didn't deal much with it for a few months because there was never a mission-critical need to make the wireless connection. The only times I needed to project from an iPad, I was able to use my Lightning to HDMI adapter.
Today, I decided enough was enough, and I began researching what the problem might be. The Apple TVs were obviously talking to the network because my iOS devices saw them and could send audio. After a bit of online digging, I confirmed my hunch that AirPlay protocols changed in iOS 9 and the Apple TVs needed a firmware update to restore compatibility. But the updates refused to run, telling me to check back later. I got even more suspicious when I tried running a network test, but the Apple TV was requiring me to sign into an iTunes account which it repeatedly wouldn't accept.
Then a light bulb went on. Perhaps my office network was blocking certain ports the Apple TV requires. And turns out that was, indeed, part of the problem. The rest of the problem was that I had to manually set the Apple TV's DNS addresses to Apple's servers. Once the ports were open and DNS was adjusted, the Apple TV was immediately able to auto-set the date and time and I successfully initiated the software update. Once it finally completed, video mirroring through AirPlay was restored.
In case anyone reading this is curious to know what ports and DNS addresses are needed, I'll share the info. If you're seeing messages such as Activation: Failed and Date/Time: Skipped, then it's a good chance you need to open these ports on your firewall and change the Apple TV's DNS settings.
TCP Port 123 (Time Server)
TCP Port 3689 (iTunes)
UDP Port 5353 (Bonjour Service)
TCP Port 80 (Web)
TCP Port 443 (SSL)
TCP Port 53 (DNS)
Primary DNS: 208.122.23.22
Secondary DNS: 208.122.23.23
(I don't see a way to add a secondary DNS in an Apple TV. The primary address should work fine as is, but you can try the secdary as a primary if needed.)