Database Develop

Problems syncing across devices

Hey everyone. I've had my chromecast for about a week now and I have some nagging issues which hopefully are just bugs which google will fix. Nonetheless, I thought I would see if anyone else faced the same issues. Ok first, most of the time when I cast something syncing works fine. I cast lets say YouTube and every other device finds the chromecast and I am able to interact with it as expected. Occasionally, I will start a video and then move to a different device and that new device does not automatically connect to the chromecast and display the queue as I would expect. Instead, I have to hit the connect button in the app and manually have it connect. Sometimes when I do this it picks up the queue fine and other-times it preempts the video queue and stops playback. I never know going into it how it's going to react and it has annoyingly killed a queue several videos long.
Much more annoying is Play music. On the device which initiates the cast I can interact as expected. However, on any other device I pick up the queue never syncs at all. Further, if I try and connect with another device it boots off the first device and goes back to the screen with the headphones. Where youtube does this occasionally, play music does it every-time without fail. What's even more annoying is that the remotecast app which was released several days ago works while casting play music. It has never once killed a queue. It connects perfectly and allows me to play and pause as expected across devices so I suspect that it might be an issue with google's code. Anybody else have these problems?

I have the same issue with play music. Owning a Nexus Q this is frustrating. The Q synced seamlessly between devices.
Google is pushing updates to both chromecast and the play music app right now so it could be fixed.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 4 Beta

haberda said:
Hey everyone. I've had my chromecast for about a week now and I have some nagging issues which hopefully are just bugs which google will fix. Nonetheless, I thought I would see if anyone else faced the same issues. Ok first, most of the time when I cast something syncing works fine. I cast lets say YouTube and every other device finds the chromecast and I am able to interact with it as expected. Occasionally, I will start a video and then move to a different device and that new device does not automatically connect to the chromecast and display the queue as I would expect. Instead, I have to hit the connect button in the app and manually have it connect. Sometimes when I do this it picks up the queue fine and other-times it preempts the video queue and stops playback. I never know going into it how it's going to react and it has annoyingly killed a queue several videos long.
Much more annoying is Play music. On the device which initiates the cast I can interact as expected. However, on any other device I pick up the queue never syncs at all. Further, if I try and connect with another device it boots off the first device and goes back to the screen with the headphones. Where youtube does this occasionally, play music does it every-time without fail. What's even more annoying is that the remotecast app which was released several days ago works while casting play music. It has never once killed a queue. It connects perfectly and allows me to play and pause as expected across devices so I suspect that it might be an issue with google's code. Anybody else have these problems?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hey Haberda ! I'm the RemoteCast developer and I just wanted to let you know that the way RemoteCast has been developed shouldn't interfere with your playback in any negative way. The app is following the standards Google made available for developers, which was made for multiple connections to the device. I think the issue is on the Chromecast itself. It's still a young platform, give it a few months to catch up with expectations.

kouray said:
Hey Haberda ! I'm the RemoteCast developer and I just wanted to let you know that the way RemoteCast has been developed shouldn't interfere with your playback in any negative way. The app is following the standards Google made available for developers, which was made for multiple connections to the device. I think the issue is on the Chromecast itself. It's still a young platform, give it a few months to catch up with expectations.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Remotecast works great! It's the only reliable way for me to connect across devices without fear of killing my current stream. Thanks for the good work!

Anyone have issues with absent cast icon in music apps?

Has anyone else run into this? Last night I tried to cast some music from the music app, and the cast button would not appear. Now I've had some issues with this in the past that I could generally fix by rebooting the chromecast a few times, but last night nothing would work.
To be clear - the CC is on the network, and is specific to only some of my phone's apps:
I spent about an hour attempting to fix the problem and found that the cast button was missing for both google music and Pandora, but present for both Netflix and YouTube. I verified I could actually connect/cast in Netflix/YouTube just fine. I tried rebooting the Chromecast a half dozen times via both the Chromecast app on my phone, as well as manually by turning my AVR on and off. I rebooted my router. I used the Chromecast app to "restore to factory default" in the menu. I thought maybe it was the music app, so I rebooted my phone, cleared the cach on the music app, cleared data on the music app... Nothing. I finally gave up and watched 2 episodes of Breaking Bad, casting via Netflix.
Afterward, right before calling it a night, I checked one last time and sure as **** the icon had come back for music and Pandora.
I'm just wondering if anyone has seen this or knows how to force it to fix itself in the future. I've had this happen in the past where I just had to give up and wait and the next day I wouldn't have the problem... Google's online help offers nothing for this scenario, dealing only with the case where the CC can not connect to the network....
It's quite frustrating!

I had the same problem. Quick solution is to make sure the music app (play music/pandora/whatever) is completely closed, then launch the chromecast app. Send it to the background, and then launch the music app. Cast button will be there everytime.

SalTNutz said:
I had the same problem. Quick solution is to make sure the music app (play music/pandora/whatever) is completely closed, then launch the chromecast app. Send it to the background, and then launch the music app. Cast button will be there everytime.
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Click to collapse
Thanks, I'll give that a try if it happens again. Though to be honest I have to think I tried that. I was force-closing music and Pandora repeatedly as well as repeatedly opening the CC app.

Just a bump that I"m still seeing this strange issue.
It occurred again last night - no cast icon for the audio apps - Google music and pandora (I forgot to try Songza). The apps w/ video (YouTube/VEVO/Netflix) all had the cast button. I have two Chromecasts on the network and tried with two devices (phone and tablet). Both devices had the same behavior and both chromecasts were present on the apps that had the cast button, so the chromecasts are correctly connected to the network, and it's not specific to the phone. I tried rebooting the router, both chromecasts, and my phone and couldn't resolve it.
Once again the fix was only to wait and an hour or so later the cast button returned to google music and Pandora.
So strange and completely frustrating. What's more frustrating is that I can't find an official support forum for help directly from Google. Tough to fix something when you can't ask the question to begin with. Though I did find a support phone number so I guess I could try that...

Interesting to see that this is such a long standing issue. Just had the exact same problem with the brand new lollipop version of play music, but it looks like the issue wasn't related to the recent update.
Incidentally, removing updates fixed the problem for me.
What brand of routers are you guys using? I have a buffalo, wonder if it's related.
Edit :
Appears to actually be related to the new play services update.
https://code.google.com/p/google-cast-sdk/issues/detail?id=314

[Q] Did someone try the PLEX app with chromecast ?

All is said in title
Sent from my HTC Desire X using xda app-developers app

Yes. It works on my non-rooted chromecast. You need to have purchased a Plex pass subscription in order for it to work.
Movies & TV shows work well if they are burned to your computer & follow the correct naming scheme. Some Plex channels work & some don't. The only thing I haven't been able to stream to chromecast is pictures & slideshows. Otherwise, it has worked great.

What Plex channels worked for you? None of the ones I tried at random worked for me.
Overall it works fine for casting local content. The only issue is that the Plex app on my Android tablet disconnects from the Chromecast after a few minutes, and I have to reconnect it to get control back. I can reconnect without interrupting the video if I do it the right way. The Plex app doesn't disconnect from my Roku player, so it looks like the issue is on the Chromecast side.

DJames1 said:
What Plex channels worked for you? None of the ones I tried at random worked for me.
Overall it works fine for casting local content. The only issue is that the Plex app on my Android tablet disconnects from the Chromecast after a few minutes, and I have to reconnect it to get control back. I can reconnect without interrupting the video if I do it the right way. The Plex app doesn't disconnect from my Roku player, so it looks like the issue is on the Chromecast side.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There is a bug in the Plex Control protocol but it seems to be limited to the device that starts the stream as others seem to be able to jump onto the control and not have restart issues.
Try this and see if I'm correct there....
Next time you lose control, Force Kill the Plex App on your device, Then reload and select the CCast that is streaming.
You should resume control without seeing the Restart from scratch bug.
The loss of control may be CCast related but it may also be WiFi related. Any loss of connection on the device side (even switching bands) seems to disrupt the ability to control.
Plex Devs are aware there is an issue but right now all their CCast attention seems to be focused on the Transcoder and the Surround Sound Transcoding issue.

MediaBrowser will be adding Chromecast support soon.
www.mediabrowser3.com
MediaBrower Server can also act as a backend server for Plex

Asphyx said:
Next time you lose control, Force Kill the Plex App on your device, Then reload and select the CCast that is streaming.
You should resume control without seeing the Restart from scratch bug.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't have to do anything that drastic. I can simply reconnect to the Chromecast and resume control of the current Plex stream without interrupting it as long as I don't change the selection. That's why it's not a big deal.

DJames1 said:
I don't have to do anything that drastic. I can simply reconnect to the Chromecast and resume control of the current Plex stream without interrupting it as long as I don't change the selection. That's why it's not a big deal.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So your not seeing the Loss of Control, Reconnect and Restart from beginning bug?
I wonder if they fixed that in a recent update...Could be...

DJames1 said:
What Plex channels worked for you? None of the ones I tried at random worked for me.
Overall it works fine for casting local content. The only issue is that the Plex app on my Android tablet disconnects from the Chromecast after a few minutes, and I have to reconnect it to get control back. I can reconnect without interrupting the video if I do it the right way. The Plex app doesn't disconnect from my Roku player, so it looks like the issue is on the Chromecast side.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am able to get Nickjr, That Daily Show, and The Colbert Report channels working. However, many others don't work.

Sucks that if your internet goes down that you can't stream local plex content to a chromecast. I was sad when I observed that. Maybe that'll be fixed in the future.
Sent from my Nexus 5 using xda app-developers app

Huh, you're right about that, just tried it. With no internet connection the Chromecast won't connect to Plex over the LAN and instead gives the cheery error message "Oops, shouldn't be here." Along with that other delightful message "Brain freeze!" that you get when Pandora doesn't work, it really helps give the impression of a mature, well-designed, user-friendly product. I'm expecting to see "Shucks, we done screwed up." any time now.

The real player cloud app works well. No $$ needed. And you don't have to upload anything. It'll play smoothly regardless. I'm sorry I spent money on plex to find out that I still needed a subscription
Sent from my SCH-I605 using xda app-developers app

You don't need Plex pass, just the Plex for android app is enough. It's released about 10 days ago. It works like a charm for me.

betizad said:
You don't need Plex pass, just the Plex for android app is enough. It's released about 10 days ago. It works like a charm for me.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's not true. You do need the $3.99/month Plex Pass. The paid Plex for Android app alone is not enough. Perhaps you are referring to the special developer version that was temporarily linked here in this forum before being removed. That was not an officially sanctioned release.

As said above, you need to be PlexPass member. PlexPass members have access to the development Android app which is no extra cost. On a side note, I thought they brought back the life subscription.
More on topic, I have used the Chromecast with Plex. It works fine for me. I don't recall if I tried on my LAN that has the PMS. I have used it work and worked well; I bring a TV, use my smartphone for internet access and router, and a tablet to control plex (phone doesn't get an local IP).
Towards channels that work, I've tried Revision3 and worked fine.
The only issue I have encountered is that the resume feature for movies/tv shows doesn't work. I get the load screen. The load screen disappears, but no movie plays. The tablet doesn't show the movie playing either. Basically, you have to restart the movie, and then jump to where you left off. I've seen this issue before with the Android app, which was eventually fixed.
I haven't tried music or pictures.

This is how I get around the problem of Plex for Android disconnecting from the Chromecast while playing a video:
1. The problem:
I start the stream on the Chromecast from Plex on my Android tablet. Initially I can control it from the tablet. A few minutes later I check the tablet screen again, and I see that Plex has disconnected from the Chromecast and the playback controls have disappeared. If I reconnect to the Chromecast, the controls do not come back. If I back up to the previous screen and hit Play again, the video restarts from the beginning.
2. The solution:
When I reconnected to the Chromecast, I should have noticed a small Plex notification icon appear in the notification area at the bottom of the screen. If I click on that, it shows me that the Chromecast is currently playing a video, and I can tap the entry to reconnect to that video stream. The controls come back without interrupting the Chromecast.
It only stays connected for a few minutes before it disconnects again, but at least I can regain control at any time with a few clicks. It's a bit of a strange quirk, because this doesn't happen when I play a video remotely on my Roku using Plex on the tablet to control it (and BTW there's no extra cost or requirement for Plex Pass to play from the Android app to the Roku).
This always works reliably when I am playing a single video. I have seen problems though when I have played multiple videos in a row. In that case when I reconnect to the Chromecast it may suddenly flip back to a previous video and restart at the beginning of that stream before it gives me the chance to select the current stream from the notification icon.

Slightly OT but newsworthy....
Plex has released a PlexPass preview of PMS (0.9.9.0) that is said to fix the Surround Sound Transcoding issues.
Back to the topic at hand...
I'm sure there is a bug in the Plex Control Protocol...
Just about everyone has seen the problem you describe. And I think it is in the Player App that gets loaded to the CCast which they probably haven't looked at recently. Too busy on the Transcoding and PlexWeb stuff.
Why it loses the connection in the first place may not be Plex related just something that is related to Normal WiFi connections that Plex needs to compensate for in their app.
I don't have any info to back up this notion but I am betting that whatever dev team they have working on the Player App for the CCast side is busy working on Music and Picture support (and it's playlist requirements) and what we are using now is just a down and dirty Video Player since that is the Primary Media people stream from Plex and there are so many other options for playing Music available already (Like Google Music app)
Music will on it's own require an expansion and fleshing out of the Control protocol to enable things like Repeat, Shuffle, FF and REW as well as solving the problem of the CCast sending a signal to play next file in the Playlist. That should also solve the issue some are having with multipart videos not playing properly as well.

Works for me. You have to purchase a full subscription in order for it to work. Also make sure when you open the browser you refresh it after you turn or or wake your computer. Chromecast doesn't need to be rooted.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using xda premium

I pointed the Plex PC application to the folder on my hard drive where my local media content is stored and was subsequently able to use the plex android app to play these items on my chromecast but my question is how do I make sure that the chromecast is playing these media files via the local LAN and not using the internet to do it? i.e. I want to make sure its not using my internet cap space to stream when Ive already downloaded the files and have them on my PC.

kingofkings11 said:
I pointed the Plex PC application to the folder on my hard drive where my local media content is stored and was subsequently able to use the plex android app to play these items on my chromecast but my question is how do I make sure that the chromecast is playing these media files via the local LAN and not using the internet to do it? i.e. I want to make sure its not using my internet cap space to stream when Ive already downloaded the files and have them on my PC.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try disconnecting your Internet connection while the video is playing then wait a while (at least a minute or two). If continues to play without Internet connection you can rest assured, it's not proxying the media through an external server.
If you disconnect before Plex launches on the Chromecast it may not launch because Chromecast won't be able to look at the Google whitelist.

bhiga said:
Try disconnecting your Internet connection while the video is playing then wait a while (at least a minute or two). If continues to play without Internet connection you can rest assured, it's not proxying the media through an external server.
If you disconnect before Plex launches on the Chromecast it may not launch because Chromecast won't be able to look at the Google whitelist.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm a newbie in all of this and curious to learn... Why is this necessary? When I'm home, my smartphone is connected to my home network via wifi. Couldn't he just make sure his smartphone is connected to his home network via wifi? If he disconnects, he will no longer be able to browse his collection on the PC and will have to reconnect to select a different movie, correct?

Local Media not playing well with Chromecast

I have looked around but haven't seen anyone talking about this issue so apologize if I missed something.
I am trying to play movies that I have on my phone. They are in the .MP4 format. I currently have tried Avia, LocalCast and AllCast (though I have not purchased the full version yet). I can start watching a video and it will play great and look great. Inevitably though it will start acting like it is buffering and then it will quite working at all. On top of this, the controls on my phone (HTC One rooted) will disappear. For instance, Avia controls will be in my status bar when I first start the movie but will soon disappear giving me no control over what is playing.
At first I thought it might be Greenify doing something but I don't have them greenified. I have tried a few different things to fix this issue but it just won't go away. Could this be a problem with the Chromecast or my phone or is there just something I am not doing correctly. I don't want to use plex or anything I have to upload and then stream from.
Appreciate the help.

srb7215 said:
I have looked around but haven't seen anyone talking about this issue so apologize if I missed something.
I am trying to play movies that I have on my phone. They are in the .MP4 format. I currently have tried Avia, LocalCast and AllCast (though I have not purchased the full version yet). I can start watching a video and it will play great and look great. Inevitably though it will start acting like it is buffering and then it will quite working at all. On top of this, the controls on my phone (HTC One rooted) will disappear. For instance, Avia controls will be in my status bar when I first start the movie but will soon disappear giving me no control over what is playing.
At first I thought it might be Greenify doing something but I don't have them greenified. I have tried a few different things to fix this issue but it just won't go away. Could this be a problem with the Chromecast or my phone or is there just something I am not doing correctly. I don't want to use plex or anything I have to upload and then stream from.
Appreciate the help.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Almost sounds like your network is encountering a loop, traffic storm, or increasing packet retries.
If your router has an STP (Spanning Tree Protocol) option, try toggling that.
Also try disabling WiFi Sleep in your phone (keeps WiFi connected even when phone goes to sleep).

It could also be his device is running out of steam (overheating and therefore the OS throttles the Clock down especially true when heavy radio use like constant WiFi causes excessive heat in the unit), Starts doing some Background tasks that take priority or is generally going into a lower power state after awhile of no activity.
People need to understand while it may seem convenient to stream files off your phone or tablet they are not built for such activities.
They are meant as media consumers and not much more than that.
Too much going on inside them and Manufacturers put an extreme emphasis on saving power in all of their drivers that makes the devices just not suited to doing a long duration activity without user interaction.
Between the screen going off, WiFi going to sleep, Unit going into deep sleep mode and constant monopolizing of the Network and radios when the Device has a Pull task scheduled like getting Email....It is really not the ideal device to stream media from.
Since most media servers available today support remote (Home Cloud) streaming to a variety of devices and can transcode on the fly there is no longer any reason to store media on your device unless you have no network access at all. And in those cases the CCast won't work anyway because it needs to be able to load the player apps from the internet. Many of those same media servers also support some sort of local sync so you can store and play media locally on that mobile device when network is not available.
We need to start changing the way we think about storing and using media for Mobile...

Thanks for the advice and I will keep exploring. I have WiFi sleep disabled already.
It very well might be the device. I tried using my Touchpad and it didn't seem to run into any problems although I haven't used it enough to be sure it wasn't going to run into the same issues.
What is happening just seems like odd behavior. Like I don't understand why Avia would lose the player controls in my status bar after such a short time.
Maybe I need to think about a media server instead. Though one of the things that made me interested in the Chromecast was the portability of playing movies on large screens.
Again thanks for the response and if anyone else has any idea, I would love to hear it.

you could try y2cast from google play store, it is easy to use.

I'm getting a similar issue when try to cast Pandora. It runs fine on the tablet but won't run on the chromecast, seems like it tries but doesn't make it.

Chromecast Cast Screen Live

http://www.androidpolice.com/2014/0...elect-devices-running-kitkat-4-4-1-or-higher/
Looks like it's finally live. Not sure if this should go in General or App section.

Does anyone have the Chromecast APK 1.7? can't find it posted anywhere. It's required per the announcement. http://chrome.blogspot.com/2014/07/mirror-your-android-screen-to-tv-with.html

Not needed for our devices. 1.7 i believe is needed for non nexus devices.
I'm on 1.5.5 and it works

That's good. I'm at work, so I assumed every device would need it.

It's very laggy for me ?? Hmm anyone else?

Yup the screen cast is working without app. Once the chromecast is detected on the network the cast screen shows up in the quick settings.
There is little bit lag but even the videos play quite well.
Not sure what I will use it for though.

I'm excited to try it when I get home. I actually tried to check yesterday and it wasn't working. I wanted to cast pictures and allcast was being very slow using Drive. I'm also curious to see how games turn out.

Kept failing to connect for me, gave the phone a restart and couldn't get the button to show up in the quick settings again... Going to bed for now, hopefully I'll have better luck in the morning haha

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0Bzuu2Konsi6VMnBxZWI5ajhNaHc/edit?usp=docslist_api
Here's 1.7
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

We need Google cast receiver apk can someone please chare it?

rahuln said:
Yup the screen cast is working without app. Once the chromecast is detected on the network the cast screen shows up in the quick settings.
There is little bit lag but even the videos play quite well.
Not sure what I will use it for though.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Honestly, casting photos is what I'm most excited about. AllCast has never worked reliably for me and the Photos app doesn't let you zoom.

Hey can someone try casting sling box or xfinity TV go this is very important to me because I stream all my cable for free on computers and thinking about canceling my ISP and just using T-Mobile.

Here's the link to the new Chromecast APK if native support isn't working. http://www.androidpolice.com/2014/0...v1-7-screen-casting-integration-apk-download/

It works flawless with xfinity tv go app. Jus fyi
Sent from my SM-N900A using XDA Premium HD app

rahuln said:
Yup the screen cast is working without app. Once the chromecast is detected on the network the cast screen shows up in the quick settings.
There is little bit lag but even the videos play quite well.
Not sure what I will use it for though.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll be using it mainly for Xfinity app & emulators on my TV in my bedroom!
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

The first thing I tested it with was MXPlayer and a video format not supported by Chromecast. It worked flawlessly.

I tried flappy bird (I know) and it worked surprisingly well. Probably not 100% playable as there is an expected delay. However, I think other games that don't require constant input might work well. Video actually does work well for me. Also, I thought it was cool that if you lock the phone when casting it gives the CRT animation on the TV.

My sound doesn't work. Plays sound choppy distorted and very low. When I use normal YouTube with Chromecast not Cast Screen, it plays sound normal. Strange. Anyone else?

I have the same issue when casting screen however I'm running Android l and looking at the chrome cast forums here it looks like it's a bug with Android l or the beta chrome cast app
Sent from my Nexus 7 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app

PsychDrummer said:
I tried flappy bird (I know) and it worked surprisingly well. Probably not 100% playable as there is an expected delay. However, I think other games that don't require constant input might work well. Video actually does work well for me. Also, I thought it was cool that if you lock the phone when casting it gives the CRT animation on the TV.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was thinking the Walking Dead games would be cool to play with this.