Australians will be able to stream music, movies and videos to their televisions with the launch of Google’s Chromecast for less than $50.
Plug the Google Chromecast into one of your television’s HDMI port, add a little power and the thumb-sized device will replay content streamed from a smartphone, tablet or PC.
An app walks you through the set up, and streaming content is a matter of pressing the ‘cast’ icon from your media player.
Minimising a video on a smartphone or tablet won’t interrupt its playback. The Chromecast is similar to the Miracast standard in its ability to let you multitask on your source device while preserving a stream.
The Chromecast is compatible with Google’s media library, including YouTube and Google Play’s music, TVs and movies. It’ll “automatically update to work with a growing number of apps,” Google said in a statement.
One of these applications will be Foxtel-owned Presto, a movie streaming service available on Apple, and from July, select Android tablets. Compatibility with Chromecast will make it possible to stream Presto’s movies from tablets to televisions.
The Google Chromecast supports Apple iPhones and iPads; Android smartphones and tablets; Mac and PCs running Chrome; and Chromebooks. It works by creating its own wireless network which devices can communicate multimedia data over.
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JB Hi-Fi and Dick Smith are selling the Google Chromecast from today for $49.
