Just a short note to say: it just works. See here.
I bought the Hudl last September but sold it later. I don’t think I’ve seen one in my local Tesco since.
Further Chromecast setup guidance still available here.
Have £40 or so in your pocket and camp outside one of many stores (Dixons/Currys/PCworld are one set of outlets, Argos probably another) for 9am Wednesday, and you should be able to walk out minutes later with a Google Chromecast.
Having used my US-sourced one for 8 months now, i’ll provide a short list of things to do below, to ensure you have your Chromecast working straight away – and without the speed bumps that new users typically experience.
I’ve been running mine since they first got released in the USA, and fortunately managed to get one of my relatives in Arizona to redirect the two I ordered on Amazon to here. My youngest son in North London has the other one.
Once set up, you can fire up YouTube, Netflix, Google Music or a Chrome Browser Tab on your iPhone, Android phone, Apple iPad, Android Tablet or on a Windows PC – then literally throw the display over to your large flat screen TV. After doing so, the source device becomes the remote.
It is fantastically impressive. I managed to throw a YouTube video of Marc Bolan and T-Rex (my wifes teenage crush way back then) playing on YouTube to our Toshiba 37″ TV, then piled a set of his other tracks in the queue behind it – which then played one after the other. Ditto for streaming Google Play Music, having built a playlist of Christmas Music tracks to play in the background at a Family Christmas get-together.
For me – living as we do 3 miles from the local BT exchange and having broadband speeds of 1-1.3Mb/s, the most impressive thing to me was having Netflix stream a 2-3 hour film to our 1080p 37″ TV with no loss of quality, no noise and a perfect viewing experience.
Last week, the BBC released a maintenance release of iPlayer – but which appears to have Chromecast support hidden inside and ready to go. If SkyGo does likewise, then I believe all our media needs will have been met.
Getting it working, avoiding the common frustrations
As a free gift based on my 8 months personal experience – if you want to get ready for your installation this week, a few things to do to make your experience as close to “always works first time” as I can get you:
That’s all there is to it. Hope you enjoy this device as much as we do – and please tell our your friends! And if you’ve any issues with yours i’ve not listed, reply below and i’ll endeavour to assist.
Footnote:
The part number Google assigned to the Chromecast I have is “H2G2-42”, which is a tip of the hat to “HitchHikers Guide to the Galaxy” and 42 – the meaning of Life, the Universe and Everything” from the novel by Douglas Adams.
The associated power supply (at least in the USA) is MST3K-US. That in turn is a tip of the hat to “Mystery Science Theatre 3000“, a cult American Comedy TV series.
Another Fantastic Resource on Google+ is from James Mosvick: Chromecast Tips & Tricks Guide.