All things holy, Google just made something cool. Well, that is pretty much standard hat for them anyway, but the company’s latest little gadget is the Chromecast. The little dongle plugs into the back of your HDTV via HDMI and allows you to sync what you are watching on your phone, tablet, or computer to your big screen! Seems pretty dang neat right? Of course it is. What is more exciting is the fact that this little gem will only set you back $35 and is available now on the Google Play Store.
So how does it work really? Watching your favorite movie via Netflix on your iPad and want to share it with everyone? Simply hit the “cast” button that is now available and Chromecast automatically turns your TV on, sets the input and picks up what you were watching. What is even better is that it accesses the files from the internet directly without you having to stream to from your device. Which saves you valuable battery life to play Candy Crush or update your Facebook status.
Did he just say iPad up there? That is right I did. The Chromecast is compatible with all devices! So there is no annoying app to download to get it to work, as it is built into the apps themselves. Current support for Netflix, Youtube, and Google Play apps make it easy to toss your files to the glory of your big screen. Currently in Beta testing is the ability to cast from your Chrome browser.
About the only thing that I can say that I don’t like about this is the fact that you have to power it separately via a USB power cable that plugs into the side of the Chromecast. Clearly, if successful future generations might be able to be powered via HDMI, assuming that technology comes to fruition.
I’m not sure how much of a game changer this will be, with Roku having similar devices and a wide array of channels to choose from. But I find this device super neat for entertaining purposes. For the average tech knowledge person, this seems like a pretty easy option to share those photos of vacation on the big screen without having to hook up the computer to the TV.
