Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Anyone Used Chromecast?
I had a friend recommend to me Chromecast the other day.
It looks pretty simple, but has anyone used it and have any thoughts?
Most of what I would want to 'cast' is on a network drive. Any thoughts as to whether this is a relatively straight forward way to use Chromecast? The instructions for installation look pretty simple, but there is no guidance as to how you 'find' the film or video etc you might want to cast- I expect this to be the most difficult component...
What do you think?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by adamvietnam on
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Had one for quite a while now...
Its very good for...
Netflix, Youtube, iPlayer and various other casting stuff from phone / tablet to TV
It also supports various media servers but will only cast formats that the ChromeCast understands - I've had problems with .avi / .mkv etc though haven't gone too deep into it as have other solutions.
Regardless I'd still recommend it as it knocks sports off the Tivo based Netflix / YouTube / iPlayer apps and of course its only 30 quid
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Permalink Reply by AndrewAW1 on
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I have a chromecast, nice for what it does (streaming, mainly online sources) for the price.
Depending on what network drive you have, or whether you have a PC that's turned on, you could install Plex. That serves videos, etc up to the Chromecast once it's installed onto the PC/NAS.
Personally, for playing media from a network drive I'd probably use a Raspberry Pi with OpenElec installed (or Raspbmc).
If you have a reasonably new tv with a network connection you might not need to buy anything, my TV can see and play the videos I have on my network drive via Plex.
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Permalink Reply by Justin Guest on
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Sadly I have a bit of an old school TV, with no network connection. What I often do is rip a DVD I have bought to and ISO back up (my kids have trashed so many by not looking after them). It looks like you are saying Chromecast might not be able to handle this, and only hand media that the hard wear recognises?
Will check out the other recommendations though. Plex sounds interesting. Will check that out.
Thanks.
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Chromecast can handle anything in a way, it's just a way of transferring pictures, videos, music, etc from an app on your phone/tablet to your tv.
The issue is whether there is an app an app that plays the files. I'm pretty sure that Plex isn't compatible with DVD .ISO files (although if you then rip the videos from the ISO files you could use those, although it's extra hassle).
Openelec on a raspberry pi will cope easily with ISO files and isn't much different in price to a chromecast.
I've used both these systems in the past.
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Permalink Reply by Chris Setz on
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You can't use Chromecast if you don't have an HMDI socket. You could buy an HDMI-to-RCA adapter (under £20) and connect any HDMI device via that, probably through your SCART socket if you really want to use modern HDMI stuff, or wait until it's time to change your telly.
BlueRay DVD players can also do things like Netflix if you can get one second hand and often have SCART. It's a good way of networking your TV if you're a bit of a techie.
The best value for money are the Android 'TV boxes' - for under £40 you get a settop box that will do everything, with an HDMI and a built-in RCA connection.
Here's a cheap one from China for less than £25 (I'd spend more). They are complete fanless PCs and some come with built-in cameras (for Skype I guess...).
They almost all run Android 4 so are quite modern, but none are upgradeable so it seems. The latest crop are based on 'KitKat' (Android 4.4) so are a bit more future proof but the price is at it likely peak of around £80 so I'd wait a bit if I were you. A KitKat box could probably last a good 5 years though, a lifetime in internet aging.
I did 'sideload' plex on a £10 Sky 'NOW TV' box you can get with no subscription - the hardware is a stripped-down version of one of the market leaders - ROKU, who sell a good range of settop boxes you can get at big discounts if you shop around. Plex will transcode movies in unusual formats in the background so think 'library' rather than immediate for some things.
Just bought this bigger ROKU box for a friend for £46 inc free deliv. Amazon say is 54% off! She probably wouldn't mind if you came round and had a play with it if that helps when it arrives next week.
Her neighbour has a 4-user Netflix licence and doesn't use one of the licences. I called Netflix and they say it's perfectly legal for her neighbour to give my friend the username and password (all you need) so she can add Netflix to her ROKU channels. I can't see the logic here - what's to stop, say, four neighbours (or people even in different cities) from splitting the cost four ways, getting Netflix for 25% the price?
I loaned the NOW TV BOX it to someone but can get it back and lend it to you if that helps Justin. Plex runs on your home PC which acts as a streamer, broadcasting through the ether to the settop box. Generally that means that the quality of the signal is compromised though. The compression algorithms on lower-bandwidth routes mean you'll get 'TV' quality - watchable unless you don't get niggled by being able to spot artefacts from time to time.
I've also used the XBOX to stream from a PC and that works fine so I still use it, although I get some limitations (like probs with subtitles and mkv formats meaning I usually transcode, which is a pain, frankly. I also considered running something on my router but it was too much pfaff...
Another option is to connect your VGA on a long lead - long VGA leads are cheap - I put an old PC in a cupboard (where it's fan couldn't be heard yet it was adequately ventilated) and just fed the VGA + RCA audio to the lounge through a small hole I cut in the stud wall and used a wireless 2.4gb keyboard to operate BBC iPlayer, VLC etc. I even got a cheap XBOX controller adapter for Windows that peeked into the room so my son could play PC games with his XBOX controller...
p.s. Look out for the best match of resolution and sound. You can work out in advance what you'll get, so there'll be no surprises. The cheap £10 box will not deliver 4K surround sound - it's more like 'Youtube quality'. Best option for me was the PC in the cupboard, but even then it needs to be reltively modern
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We love chromecast. Excellent bit of kit for £30.
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