Google Chromecast media streamer

Google’s new Chromecast device wants to make it dead-simple to play Internet video on your TV, regulating a outrageous operation of phones, tablets, and laptops as your controller.

The knowledge is like regulating AirPlay to lamp calm from an iOS device to an Apple TV. Tap a Chromecast symbol on your phone or tablet, and poof–the video starts personification on your TV. But distinct AirPlay, Chromecast isn’t streaming a calm from your device itself, though rather true from a Internet, during a top fortitude available. That means we can still use your device to multitask though interrupting a video. In fact, it works like a Plair, usually some-more reliably and for reduction money.

These are early days for a Chromecast, and not all of a facilities worked utterly as facilely in a bureau as they did for Google in a company’s Wednesday demo. But deliberation a impulse-buy cost of $35, Chromecast is still a estimable purchase–especially given it includes 3 months of Netflix streaming, a $24 value.

Simple setup

The Chromecast is a tiny HDMI dongle that plugs into any accessible HDMI pier on your HDTV. But since HDMI doesn’t yield any power, a Chromecast needs consistent energy from a USB pier as well. That can be a USB pier on your TV if it has one. If no pier is available, you’ll need to bond a enclosed USB wire to a bundled energy adapter and find a place to block it in.

After you’ve extrinsic and powered a dongle, Chromecast leads we to revisit a URL on an authorized device to finish setup. But when we dismissed adult a Chrome browser on an iPhone 5 to do usually that, we was greeted by an blunder summary directing me to use an Android phone, or a Chrome browser on a Mac or Windows laptop. So, while we can use iOS inclination to control your Chromecast, your initial setup requires other hardware.

I attempted again from a Nexus 4 using Android 4.2, and a URL destined me to squeeze a Chromecast app on a Play Store. That app automatically rescued a Chromecast device and let me name it and supplement it to my Wi-Fi network. So far, so good. Now a Chromecast was ocular by my iPhone and Mac as good as my Android phone and tablet.

Uh-oh, it’s (not) magic

Google’s demo started with a TV off, and when product manager Rishi Chandra sent a video to Chromecast by drumming a accessible Chromecast symbol in a YouTube app for Android, a TV obediently flicked to life. “Chromecast is branch on my TV, switching it to a right input, and now personification YouTube in HD on a TV,” he boasted, though that pretence didn’t work during a TechHive office.

I suspicion maybe this was since we had plugged Chromecast into a TV‘s USB port, and it wasn’t removing energy with a TV off. Not so, apparently. When we plugged Chromecast’s energy adapter into a wall instead, a TV-on pretence still didn’t work. The YouTube app for Android saw a Chromecast and let me expel to it, though we had to spin a TV on myself (like a caveman!) and name a correct submit to see a already personification video.

While a video is playing, we control it with your device a same approach we would if it was personification on that device–meaning, we could crush a volume buttons on my Android phone and see a volume indicator on my TV. If we max out that volume slider, we see a summary revelation we that if we still need it louder, you’ll have to spin adult your TV itself. So while we can control playback from your phone or tablet, devise on gripping your TV remote accessible too.

What works

But aside from those niggles–and some few crashing behind to a “ready to cast” screen, that competence be a outcome of an packed Wi-Fi network here during a office, a other facilities in Google’s demo worked as advertised.

Playing videos from a YouTube apps on Android and iOS was a cinch–just daub a Chromecast button, and name a Chromecast device. YouTube even lets we supplement additional videos to a TV queue–an apparent “Add to TV queue” pops adult on a Android app when we crop to another video, and a same choice appears on iOS, though it’s somewhat dark underneath a Share menu.

The Chromecast symbol appears in Netflix for iOS and Android too, and works like a charm. Once a video is playing, we can put your phone or inscription to nap to save battery life, and still postponement a playback from a close screen, or collect adult a controls from another device on a same Wi-Fi network.

The Play Music and Play Movies TV apps on Android are also upheld and let we expel calm you’ve bought or rented from a Play Store. we was incompetent to play a Yeezus manuscript that I’d sideloaded in to Play Music, and volume control lagged a small and worked usually when we was in those apps. we could put a phone in nap mode and get forward/back and play/pause controls on a close screen, though a volume controls didn’t work there either.

Brain freeze

Chromecast can also arrangement calm from a add-on in Google Chrome on a Mac, Windows machine, or Chromebook Pixel, nonetheless that sold underline is still in beta. Once we downloaded a Google Cast app for Chrome, a Chromecast symbol seemed in my browser’s upper-right corner, subsequent to a URL bar. Casting a add-on worked, nonetheless a playback lagged behind what was shown in a browser, and we was incompetent to adjust a volume with my Mac’s volume buttons.

Still, we successfully played videos from Vimeo, Hulu Plus, and BravoTV.com. Chromecast strips out a perspective of your desktop and a browser’s menu bar to concentration on a calm itself, that is a good touch. we still had to go full-screen on my Mac to get a full-screen perspective on a TV, that meant we couldn’t do other things on my Mac, unless we pulpy Command-H to censor a Chrome app, or parked some other Mac apps in another Desktop space. Closing a add-on on a Mac halts a playback on a TV.

As approaching with anything noted beta, a tab-casting underline crashed a few times. Playback would freeze, try to buffer, and eventually lapse to a Chromecast’s “ready to cast” start screen–once with a humble blunder summary that pronounced usually “Brain freeze.”

Still, with an SDK to let some-more developers supplement in-app support, a low price, and cross-platform compatibility, a Chromecast has a lot going for it.

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