Chromecast

Note: this is about the first ever chromecast dongle (media renderer). Not Android TV version.

What is Chromecast?

Your Chromecast dongle is not a complete Android device. Chromecast is a wifi media renderer based on Android. It accepts media streams on a network port and renders them, audio and video, to the HDMI port. It lacks any local control, except for a little button which can be used to reset the dongle.

But it does support USB OTG. With the proper powered USB OTG micro usb cable it can read files from an USB stick. This can be used to flash custom firmware on it.

The Chromecast dongle will auto update it's own firmware after it has a working Wifi internet connection on your local Wifi network.

My opinion on the Chromecast dongle: I get too much an Apple feeling from it. Too limited, too closed.

Setup the device on your WLAN

After unpacking your Chromecast dongle and powering it up by the usb cable it will act as an Wifi access point. Use your phone or tablet to connect to that Wifi network. Then install the Google Chromecast app from the playstore on your phone or tablet to do the setup of the Chromecast dongle. Connect it to your existing local Wifi network. Then reconnect your phone or tablet also back to you own local Wifi network again. That is about it.

Limitations

It is nice that you can play Youtube, Netflix and whatever internet based movie services, but the big thing is streaming local or NAS stored content to the Chromecast dongle. Google does not provide this functionality, which is a shame. Maybe in the future they will wake up.

Of course the development scene jumped into that gap and apps are now available to offer that functionality.

The current limitations of the Chromecast media renderer:

    • limited codec support, only mp4/mkv/flv (supported formats)

    • no builtin subtitle support

If you want to be a media renderer you need way more codec/container support. Please reconsider Google Chromecast team!

Note: wide range of hardware decoding is supported by the Marvell Armada 1500 SOC and MV88DE3010 GPU

Casting apps

Local Cast - http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2649075

There are dozens like Bubble UPnP Chromecast, Allcast, Plex...