I was a little hesitant to ask this on a watersports forum but I done a quick google search and come up empty.

I'm having a little trouble getting my google chromecast to work. I have a land line cable in my room which plugs into it and I can get it to work sporadically. After chatting to a co-worker they explained that I probably need a wifi router??.

So is there a way of using your phone as a hotspot to avoid having to buy a router? Am I missing something? as I said, it does work sometimes but its a long way right.

Any help greatly appreciated.

Cheers,
Gaz.

Results seem to vary. I bought one, set it up a metre from my router, and I couldn't get anything without lag & stutter. I have a 2ghz & 5ghz wifi network downstairs, same upstairs, wouldn't work regardless. Took it back 3 hours later.

Other people have had good experiences, so I dunno either..

Is a Chromecast Ultra different to the original chromecast?

I set one up ages ago and as long as the PC and the chromecast is on the same wifi network, they find each other.

Do you have a normal wifi network? Are both devices on 2.4g or 5g (the same as each other)?

My understanding is that the content gets sent directly to the chromecast from the internet if its something that you cast from your PC to the Chromecast. Other things I think go to the PC first and then to the Chromecast. If they were on different networks, whether one is ethernet and the other is WIFI, or on different bands, this may not work.

I just googled it and it sounds like you have the Ultra plugged into an ethernet cable. Is your PC on the same network, i.e. a LAN cable plugged into it?

Often with a WIFI router (which you probably don't have), the devices on the wifi network may not necessarily talk to devices on the LAN network. There is some sort of setting on the router/modem that can change this.

If both are on the LAN, in theory it should work fine...

So i'm trying to cast from my phone. So I have it plugged the LAN cable from the chromecast to the wall and as I said it very intermittent Im having alot of trouble locating it.

Sometimes I can get it to cast if I start with youtube and then move to netflix but that only works 50% of the time. As I said my mate said that if I had wifi it should work smoothly and therefore i'm trying to work out if I can use my hotspot on my phone to overcome these issue but to date no luck.

I starting to get the feeling that Chromecast is similar to other google devised= ****!

Owned the google pixel a couple of months now and had heaps of issues,. speakers are ****, no volume control and a heap of other glitches. Oh and dont get me started on the daydream!

How is your phone connected to the internet? Through the normal 4G connection? or through WIFI?

If its through 4G, I am not sure how that works. I have only done it where the laptop is on WIFI and the Chromecast is on the same WIFI, and it works fine.

Are you saying you have already used your phone as a hotspot for the Chromecast? You would think that would work. They are on the same network so they should have no problem seeing each other.

edit: I was just reading up on this, and an article says that you need to connect your phone (or laptop) to the Chromecast through a wifi hotspot initially, but once they know each other, they should be able to talk to each other. This means you can take it to someone else's house, connect your chromecast and your phone to the same wifi signal, and they will find each other.

Afterwards, it sounds like you can then just connect the chromecast to your LAN and the phone to whatever (4G or WIFI), and they will find each other and work. I haven't tried this, but this is what is suggested.

In my experience using WIFI with mine I have had no problems at all. I haven't tried it the way you are talking about.

The only experiences I've had with Chromecasts are the two my mum has on two different TVs. She casts to them from her Android tablet. All the devices are on the same wifi network. She does not have any trouble with them.

Id recommend setting up the Chromecast on the wifi network. From my understanding the cast from the controlling device gets the stream going and the Chromecast takes over.

Thanks Guy's for the replys.

I has hoping not to have to buy another device to get it to work but that's cool.

Thanks again.