I started having this problem in the last week, and I haven't found any solutions here or elsewhere on the internet.
I have multiple chromecasts. One of the old USB stick looking ones and a few of the newer round ones. I've used them for years with a mediatomb server to stream local content to them, and it has typically worked pretty well. Now they've started working really flaky. They'll either drop connection entirely or skip to the next video on the mediatomb server after about 30 minutes of playback. The server is a desktop with wired gigabit ethernet to my router. The chromecasts are all using wifi. I haven't changed the configuration of anything in ages.
The first time I noticed it a movie stopped that my wife had cast using some app (I forget what it is called) from her iphone. I power cycled my router and the chromecast, then cast it from my android using Localcast with similar results. Playback kept stopping after 20 - 30 minutes. I factory reset that chromecast and set it up again, same results. I tried a different chromecast, same results. I set up mediatomb on my laptop to try a different server, same results. I tried ushare and rygel for some other dlna servers on the laptop, same results. Netflix, HBO Go and services like that still seem fine, but these chromecasts just refuse to work right with local dlna servers anymore.
I don't know much about troubleshooting these little buggers aside from all the resetting and swapping stuff I've tried. Previously they always just worked. Is there anyway to get any logs off these things in an unmodified state? Anyone else seen anything like this recently? I'm very suspicious that a chromecast firmware update might have started this behavior, since it came out of nowhere and I've changed nothing on the equipment I control.
Related
It's been almost 3 weeks since I purchased 4 Chromecasts. I have some Pros and Cons about my experience. I encourage you to add your own Pro/Con list.
Pros:
- Cheap. At $35 it's an impulse buy. I expect to see it at the checkout aisle of the supermarket next to the gift cards.
- Cheap will make it ubiquitous. Every app developer will rush to make their app Chromecastable.
- Extremely easy to set up. Some have had troubles as we've seen on this forum but my daughter set hers up without a single phone call to me. And she has absolutely no tech skills.
- I absolutely, positively love the ability to queue YouTube videos. I wish Netflix had that and I hope other app developers pick up on that. I wish there was one central queue where I could queue up Netflix, YouTube, Google Music, et all in one big queue. I could plan a whole night's viewing and then just sit back and watch.
- Shared control. It's nice that I can start a video and leave the room and my wife can take over control of it on her device. Very clever.
- Doesn't tie up my device. I can do other things while watching a video. Multitasking as it were.
- I can start a video on my phone then cast it to my family room TV, then pause it and start playing it on my bedroom PC, then pause it and finish it on my tablet. Very versitile.
- Video quality is superb. 1080p is very nice from the Chromecast. As good as cable TV.
- Audio is also superb. 5.1 is a nice surprise.
- If you have multiple wifi routers with multiple SSIDs you can control a Chromecast across SSIDs. And you see all the Chromecasts no matter which SSID you're currently using.
CONS
- Using the phone/tablet as a remote is not as convenient as a real remote. We have an unwritten rule in our house that when someone starts a conversation we pause the TV. With a real remote I can do this in a split second without looking at the remote. Using Chromecast I can't. Not only do I have to look at the phone, thus ignoring the person that is talking to me, I have to find the app that cast the video and start it up again to be able to pause it. This has made for an awkward situation more than once.
- It's not a perfect device, lots of app tweaking needs to be done.
- Sometimes I get spinning circle on my phone and it never casts.
- Sometimes I get spinning circle on my phone but the cast actually starts. This is not good at all as I have no way of pausing or stopping it from my phone. Same thing happens to my tablet so it's not a device specific issue.
- There's no ability to reduce picture quality. If I'm in a hotel using my phone's hot spot capability I could easily eat up 5gb of data watching a 1080p movie when 480p, or even less, would have been satisfactory.
- It has connectivity issues with some routers, especially Verizon FIOS' Actiontec router. There's not much in the way of documentation to help with this. The help information refers to turning off a feature that the router doesn't have.
BOTTOM LINE
The Chromecast is not a perfect device, like all devices, but the low cost and ease use make up for a lot of its misgivings. Almost all of the Cons I have listed can be corrected by software updates. I only see this product as getting better and better. The only fear is that it becomes another Google castoff like Google TV or Google Reader or Google Q or Buzz. But at $35 there's not much risk.
This product is a sign of the future and the future is bright. With many devices battling for this space, Apple TV, Roku, etc. we will all be the winners. Just as many people have multiple game consoles so will many people have multiple streaming devices. This is going to be a fun ride.
TabGuy said:
There's no ability to reduce picture quality. If I'm in a hotel using my phone's hot spot capability I could easily eat up 5gb of data watching a 1080p movie when 480p, or even less, would have been satisfactory.
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Click to collapse
Wait, what? Have you been able to get it to work using a hotspot? Everything I've read says it's not currently possible.
We need more app's....
TabGuy said:
- Extremely easy to set up. Some have had troubles as we've seen on this forum but my daughter set hers up without a single phone call to me. And she has absolutely no tech skills.
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Click to collapse
As I was setting it up, I had no idea I needed a WiFi device for first time set up. I was using my desktop connected to my router with the WiFi turned off. So quickly I assumed it was because of that. (I have a WAP broadcasting another SSID so i turned off my router) After I turned on my router, I was still getting the same problem stating my WiFi was off. Then I feared that my desktop needed to be a WiFi device to work with the Chromecast. After some quick searches I found that the WiFi device was just for setup which I did on my phone and got it up and running smoothly.
TabGuy said:
- If you have multiple wifi routers with multiple SSIDs you can control a Chromecast across SSIDs. And you see all the Chromecasts no matter which SSID you're currently using.
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Click to collapse
So my setup was kind of like this, and i feared that it would not work. After the setup, I just installed the extension on Chrome for all my computers in the family and it showed up on all of them. Relieved and happy that it was simpler than I was dreading.
andrewhchiu said:
As I was setting it up, I had no idea I needed a WiFi device for first time set up. I was using my desktop connected to my router with the WiFi turned off. So quickly I assumed it was because of that. (I have a WAP broadcasting another SSID so i turned off my router) After I turned on my router, I was still getting the same problem stating my WiFi was off. Then I feared that my desktop needed to be a WiFi device to work with the Chromecast. After some quick searches I found that the WiFi device was just for setup which I did on my phone and got it up and running smoothly.
So my setup was kind of like this, and i feared that it would not work. After the setup, I just installed the extension on Chrome for all my computers in the family and it showed up on all of them. Relieved and happy that it was simpler than I was dreading.
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Click to collapse
Common sense should tell you that you can't connect to the Chromecast through your wireless network before it get connected to your wireless network. Assuming it's protected with a password how do you suppose Chromecast would connect to it? And for open networks I think it's illegal to just auto connect to open networks. I would think that most people buying a Chromecast would have a smartphone or tablet.
rkirmeier said:
Common sense should tell you that you can't connect to the Chromecast through your wireless network before it get connected to your wireless network. Assuming it's protected with a password how do you suppose Chromecast would connect to it? And for open networks I think it's illegal to just auto connect to open networks. I would think that most people buying a Chromecast would have a smartphone or tablet.
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Click to collapse
I figured it was going to be something like connecting a bluetooth device where it would broadcast its own signal and then you can connect to it. but i guess i wasn't thinking.
Echo the majority of the above comments, still too early to be overly concerned that Google hasn't yet released their chrome cast API.
I'm in UK so had to wait slightly longer than others for my US bought one (first day purchase) to arrive here in the UK, but its here I love Google play , Google movies and YouTube integration
Waiting for CM casting to go live and hopefully be implemented into aokp.
Not tried casting chrome tabs from my laptop yet or my hard wired pc workstation, is it true that sounds cabled PC's can have issues connecting to chromecast
Am I meant to be able to cast from chrome browser tabs on my N4 ?
Yesterday I received my Chromecast and after set up I used it with many tabs and YouTube videos from my laptop, tablet, and phone.
Last night, the Chromecast updated. Now, I can't seem to cast a tab from my browser. Also, I can cast YouTube from my tablet and phone, but not from my chrome browser.
I have changed the power source from the USB brick to the USB port on my TV, nothing changed. Unplugged and plugged back the Chromecast itself, nothing changed. Even did a factory reset through the options, connected it back to my network, and still nothing changed.
I have a Cisco router connected to my university's Ethernet port in my dorm, but I don't think this is affecting the connection considering It was working fine yesterday.
TL;DR
Tab casting worked yesterday, doesn't work now.
YouTube casting works on phone & tablet apps, not on Chrome browser.
Restarted router, re installed chrome browser, factory reset Chromecast. Nothing worked.
I was wondering if I shouldn't worry about this because it's still in Beta, but the fact that it worked perfectly fine yesterday is confusing me.
I posted this on the Chromecast subreddit (which I can't link to yet), just in case if someone has a similar problem and it's resolved, but not here.
I cannot cast anything without it buffering on my chromecast anymore.
Youtube/Netflix can play but resolution is of lowest quality (probably because its built in), but casting tab from web browser will not work at all. At first I thought my internet speed was slow, but I do a speed test most days (on mac) and get an average of 30mpbs-35mbps. Mobile speed I get is 5mbps. Funnily enough I play Netflix through phone and it plays but like I said, quality is compromised. My other tv which is a smart tv (no Chromecast) plays Netflix/Youtube of the full 1080p and no lagging. So which leads me to believe that there is a problem with the Chromecast itself?
My only other option is to see if it works on the smart tv, but then it defeats the purpose of having a smart tv. And I will be without smart tv/chromecast in the bedroom.
Any advice please?
yep, I'm finding this too. I ended up hooking my laptop up via hdmi because casting was so poor. Really low resolution and it would lose connection (black tv screen, laptop still playing) for 3-4 seconds, every 15 minutes or so.
I'm very quickly losing patience with the CC.
After 3 chromecast (of which 1 returned) and trying 2 new routers specifically for making cc work I couldn't find any permanent solution. Where any phone or tablet works fine for streaming netflix, plex, etc, cc would struggle, I gave up, it's useless. Btw, the routers I tried for the past year are netgear r6200, Linksys ea6500 and currently netgear r7000.
Sent from my HTC One
Do you try speed4cast? You can see if the problem is from internet or from CC. Reboot router, enable upnp on the router and look for new update by rebooting CC.
If nothing works, make a factory reset and try to cast. If not, return the device.
Hey guys, I've got some problem with my original Chromecast. When I bought it a year ago, it worked well, casted full HD movies through BubbleUPNP and Videostream without any problems, now it just lags whenever I try to, even with SD movies. No matter if I convert it to mp4, or transcode it via Videostream, it runs well for a second, then everything becomes laggy and the CC tries to buffer everytime (although mp4 runs a little better).
Some details:
-The router is close to the TV/Chromecast, and it has strong signal. However, my net service provider gave me some noname (Technicolor) modem with built in wifi recently, so I'm using that instead of the previous Cisco modem+D-Link router combo. I'm suspecting that this can be a reason, but my other devices are connecting to it without a problem from the same distance. And as I remember, it had similar problems not long before the new router. Also, Youtube app works well.
-I've checked my computer resources when transcoding, it only uses around 20% of the CPU, so I don't think that it causes the problem. The computer is connected to the network via cable.
-Also tried resetting the Chromecast, and setting it up again. It detects the wifi well, but it had some problems connecting to the internet (but I guess the local network is what matters when casting from a computer drive).
I hope someone can provide me some kind of help to solve this, I've read many people to suffer from similar problems, but couldn't get any noticable solutions from them. Thank you, and have a nice day!
Can anyone cast screen using Chromecast? Used to be able to do that with several other devices. But on this device, I get msg that screen not optimized for Chromecast. I can cast videos from different apps, but can't cast the phone screen anymore.
Please check and let me know what you're experiencing.
Tried right now and it works. Buggy, but it works. And with buggy I mean 1 out of 3 or 4 times I cast, it ends after a few seconds with a "casting has ended" for no reason. But when it does work, it goes for hours with no problems...
Odd. Screen casting using an Xperia X Compact (with its slower processor and less RAM) is fine, but on the XZ1C it disconnects or freezes nearly every time. I have found a workaround, however. The app "Web Video Caster" works reliably, and can access the full storage, including an SD card, using a built-in file explorer. Offers subtitle search and can play everything I have thrown at it so far.
flintfirewalker said:
Can anyone cast screen using Chromecast? Used to be able to do that with several other devices. But on this device, I get msg that screen not optimized for Chromecast. I can cast videos from different apps, but can't cast the phone screen anymore.
Please check and let me know what you're experiencing.
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Chromecast works perfect for me.
But I have read that the Chromecast dongle needs excellent wifi to work properly, ideally within ten foot of a fast router.
@Didgesteve
It's curious how I've done everything short of completely resetting the phone, including updating firmware on both phone and Chromecast, and the screen cast connection is almost never maintained for more than a few seconds, if it connects at all to begin with. However, through a 3rd party application, as I indicated above, the connection is reliable, as is also the case for all connections (including the built-in screen casting) on the Xperia X compact..
pseudonym58 said:
@Didgesteve
It's curious how I've done everything short of completely resetting the phone, including updating firmware on both phone and Chromecast, and the screen cast connection is almost never maintained for more than a few seconds, if it connects at all to begin with. However, through a 3rd party application, as I indicated above, the connection is reliable, as is also the case for all connections (including the built-in screen casting) on the Xperia X compact..
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Click to collapse
Have you tried the Chromecast in another enviroment, different wifi setup?
Are there any power cables or transformers near the back of the TV? The ariel for the TV may be built into the frame, whilst the Chromecast might suffer being lumped next to all the power connectors at the back.
Try sending it back for a replacement, you might have a duff unit.