OIT-ITS recently purchased a Google Chromecast to test with, which unfortunately, we can’t use on Duke’s network. It turns out that the Google Chromecast requires multicast to be enabled on the network it is connected to. This is NOT something that is enabled on Duke’s network (and they have no plans to do so) so we were unable to test/use it in the Duke environment.
However, I did do some testing at home and found it to be a pretty cool device for $35. It was extremely easy to set up and I had it up running within a few minutes. Currently, there are only a handful of applications on iOS and Android devices that can send content to it, but I’m sure many more will be capable soon. The device does not support mirroring like the Apple TV does, but if you are using Google’s Chrome web browser on newer Macs, Windows PCs, and Chrome OS devices, you can mirror that content after installing the Cast extension. So if you wanted to browse the web and see that on the screen this can be done using the Chrome web browser.
The Chromecast worked well at home and has a lot potential (in the consumer enviroment). It will be even better when the device supports more apps. It would also be great if Google provided an app that would allow desktop mirroring so you are not limited to doing this only with the Chrome web browser. There is no password protection to lock down the device so anyone that is on the same network can access it, which is a deal breaker in the educational and business environments.
