Will chromecast be good for streaming HD movies from my laptop to the TV

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geek0killer

geek0killer

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I have a 2 years old Samsung LCD TV Model: LA40D550RLXL. I had never used the HDMI ports on the TV. But, when I decided to watch HD movies on the TV from my laptop via the HDMI cables I have, it detects the signal then says "No signal". After googling I found that it's a common problem with Samsung TVs. *S**t moment* Tried every remedy posted on the forums but all in vain. Then I called Samsung for checking the fault. The guy from local Service centre said he can only change the motherboard which will cost me Rs.6000. *OH F**K! moment* Then I chatted to some tech guy from Samsung online chat. He said that the TV doesn't support laptop/pc connection via HDMI but only through DVI (back to era 2000 moment). When I checked at the back of the TV there was no DVI port only VGA port for PC/laptop connection (again Oh Sh*t moment).

So, finally what I want to ask you guys is, will chromecast be good for streaming HD movies from my laptop to the TV or is there any other method like those android dongles which can be found cheap online?
I did a search and found this too for good price. Will it do what I need?
http://www.snapdeal.com/product/tee...th_feed&utm_campaign=7_628&utm_medium=8797696

P.S. the TV doesn't have in-built WIFI either. It says I have to buy a particular model of WIFI dongle from Samsung. :-/
 
Yep you can stream content from your pc to your tv via Plex, Chromecast now officially supports Plex

Its a nifty piece of software, once you install and import you media into it, it recognizes the filenames(ahem) and gives you a full synopsis it will even sort the episodes and seaosns of your tv shows!

 
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geek0killer said:
So, finally what I want to ask you guys is, will chromecast be good for streaming HD movies from my laptop to the TV
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It depends on the bitrate the hd movie is recorded with. There are two values you need to know about avg rate and peak rate. use this tool to check out those rates of your movies.

chromecast is a N150 client which means it can handle a max of 20-30Mbs transfer speed. Your laptop might be N300 (dual stream) but the chromecast will reduce it to single stream N150.

Now if avg rate of your hd movie is below the 30Mbs which it should be then it will work. The problem is when there is action and the peak rate comes in, this is where the bitrate will spike, if it crosses 25Mbs then you will get stuttering. However if the peak rate does not exceed that rate for the particular hd movie you are watching then it will work fine.

So you can see that some movies will work and others might not. or none works if you have high encode rates or everthing works if you have low encode rates.

geek0killer said:
or is there any other method like those android dongles which can be found cheap online?
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Comes to the same, those dongles unless for more recent tv models are usually N150. chromecast is a little more convenient as it does not require a wifi router, its wifi direct from either your laptop/mobile straight to the tv.

geek0killer said:
I did a search and found this too for good price. Will it do what I need?
http://www.snapdeal.com/product/tee...th_feed&utm_campaign=7_628&utm_medium=8797696

P.S. the TV doesn't have in-built WIFI either. It says I have to buy a particular model of WIFI dongle from Samsung. :-/
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If your tv has an ethernet port you could use a bridge but that will be more expensive for a N300 capable bridge. Now your peak rates jumps from 25Mbs to around 40+Mbs.

The dongles offered by smasung are particular to your tv in the sense the drivers in the tv's firmware will only support certain dongles.

no clue about this teevee thing but going by its price its most likely a N150 client with android. A little more powerful than chromecast i suppose.
 
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@blr_p This is what I needed. Thank you. But as you say, the bandwidth is a main concern here. I checked with the tool you provided. 1080p rips frequently crossed 40Mbps mark so wireless solutions are not an option. :(

So, if I get a Android dongle with a HDMI-IN port that should do the trick?
 
oh by HD you meant 1080p then no. 1080p is full HD.

HD i took to mean 720p, this can work up to a point.

this dongle does it connect to some HDD via usb, i'm not familiar with it at all.

Another problem is with audio codecs used in your movies. i don't know how well surround sound works with android. You might want to test out samples of your movies in some tab or mobile to see if the codecs are there or not before considering this android device. Some of these codecs are pay only.
 
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I feel buying an external hdd->copy movies from laptop to hdd->connect hdd to tv to watch the movies is a better option.
 
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@booo That's what am I doing right now. But, won't using USB would be throttling quality? I mean there is a point of using HDMI cables and port, right?
 
geek0killer said:
@booo That's what am I doing right now. But, won't using USB would be throttling quality? I mean there is a point of using HDMI cables and port, right?
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there is a difference...

if you are using usb drive to watch movies, the movie and audio will be decoded by the tv itself... so the TV will read encoded(read compressed) movie file and then play it directly.
if you are using laptop/xbmc/other streaming device then the movie will be decoded first and the uncompressed data is transmitted over hdmi/network to the TV. now it totally depends on how the laptop/streaming device is decoding the movie. if its just a movie with 2 ch audio it will simply use less bandwith on the hdmi/network and play lagfree. but again, you will have problems with scrolling and fast forwarding movie.

I have a series 6 samsung lcd tv back in India. I bought a n300 router, original samsung wifi dongle hoping that I would stream movies over network. but it wasnt simply user friendly. finally I moved to the usb 3.0 WD 1tb hdd. it works amazingly well and since I used to connect 5.1 system over optical cable, everything used to work in perfect harmony. :)[DOUBLEPOST=1409894700][/DOUBLEPOST]
vyral_143 said:
No. Theoretical bandwidth by USB 2.0 standard is 480Mbps. Even if counted at 50% efficiency in practicality, it is 240Mbps.
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on a typical usb 2.0 port and usb 2.0 external hdd, you will get somewhere close to 12mBps. and with usb 3.0hdds, you will get close to 25mBps which is more than enough for movies with DTS audio to play.
 
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booo said:
on a typical usb 2.0 port and usb 2.0 external hdd, you will get somewhere close to 12mBps. and with usb 3.0hdds, you will get close to 25mBps which is more than enough for movies with DTS audio to play.
Click to expand...
series 6 has usb 3 ports.

Did not realise usb 3 was required for dts audio. Isn't close to 100Mbs on usb 2 enough ?

connecting a usb HDD is the cheapest and easiest option but its down to the codecs the tv can understand. if you media was encoded with those codecs then all is good otherwise you will have to reencode. media players tend to have a little more flexibility and can always be updated
 
Hmmm... my doubt still remains unsorted, why the need of HDMI then?

Both my WD and Transcend external HDDs have usb3.0 but the TV has USB2.0 ports only so that won't do any good. Besides I am not satisfied with the TV's capabilities. A blu-ray rip 3GB movie is useless with this setup. I see linings and flickering in display.

I think my best option would be a dongle with HDMI-IN port i.e., if the ports on the TV are functional. When today I again contacted Samsung's online support service to verify, this time they say my TV does support PC connection via HDMI. Now, I need to check whether the ports are really defective or not. *smh*
 
@Crazy_Eddy No. It's was native problem on lots of Samsung TVs back in 2012. I didn't get to use the ports when it was in warranty so now facing the problem.

I researched a bit more and found out the even VGA can carry 1080p signals. That led me to this listing.
http://www.ebay.in/itm/1080P-HDMI-M..._DefaultDomain_203&hash=item2a4326bd3d&_uhb=1
The seller claims 1080p@60hz output. So, connecting my HDMI out on the laptop to VGA on the TV should do the trick (if the HDMI ports on the TV are bad). Again, this is experimental, but the 'real' concern would be does the TV's Vga port supports 1080p signal? How to find out? After two contradictory statements from the tech guys from Samsung, I don't trust them.
 
Will find out tomorrow if can lay my hands on a VGA cable. Then will have to buy a HDMI to VGA adaptor too if that doesn't work.
 
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