TWO MONTHS with the Chromecast with Google TV: The BEST Streaming Stick?

the original chromecast was dirt cheap and it was pretty cool it provided the super simple but super cool feature of taking whatever's on your phone's display and pushing it to your tv screen and this is the next evolution of that the chromecast with google tv takes that awesome feature and combines it with all the features that normally comes in a tv that has the android tv os is this thing worth fifty dollars let's find out with a little review when you open the box you'll find the chromecast itself the remote two aaa batteries for the remote a usbc to usb a power cable and a usb power brick the chromecast comes in three different colors snow sky and sunrise in human terms that would be white light blue and orangish red the remote has a tiny home button and the tv input button on the bottom and also has a youtube button that can be reconfigured to youtube youtube tv or youtube music by holding it down on the home screen it also has a netflix button that cannot be reconfigured to anything else a home mute back and google assistant button the top has the four directional buttons you normally find on tv remotes as well as a center select button and on the right side of the remote there are volume up and down buttons the chromecast with google tv has 4.5 gigabytes of usable storage available to you wi-fi bluetooth and support for resolutions of up to 4k 60 frames per second with support for some hdr formats for tvs that support it the chromecast with google tv plugs directly into your tv's hdmi port on one end and has to be connected on the other end via usbc to the wall if you try to plug the usb end into a usb port on the tv the chromecast gets mad at you and constantly screams at you until you move it into a stronger power source setup is pretty quick and easy and you can manually set it up through the chromecast or through your phone with the google home app there's a few more steps after this but i doubt you came here to watch me set it up so let's move on to some of its software features the chromecast with google tv has all the features of chromecast in the past like i mentioned in the intro of this video this includes casting from your phone tablet or computer to your tv in supported apps but now you get that exact same feature as well as the android tv operating system built into this tiny little dongle which means you can download many of the same apps you normally find on android on your tv instead on the big screen this includes games like crossy road huh people don't play this anymore right okay so now that we know what this device comes with and its features what was it like using it i've had my chromecast with google tv for two months now and here was my experience with it when booting the chromecast with google tv up it does take a while but to be honest with you there would only be a few times where you would have to boot it up or reboot it like installing software updates or rebooting it if it gets all wonky on you but bugs like these were rare for me with my time using it one of the standout features of the chromecast with google tv you can set it up to control your tv via ir or hdmi cec and your audio setup's volume can also be controlled through ir cec or even the bluetooth connection that being said you can also mix and match both on this single remote i know a lot of people probably use their game console as a streaming box but i find that the controllers of your game consoles make your nightstand completely unusable since you probably normally have your wallet keys and cell phones already there and other necessities it's a cluttered mess you don't need this big bulky controller to be there at all this leaves game controllers prone to accidental button presses i just don't want to press a button and start hearing the same thing repeated twice twice but with this remote it barely takes up any space on nightstands or side tables or coffee tables honestly i'm super satisfied with it and it makes the chromecast with google tv remote a really simple but great compatibility universal remote but a small problem i have with it is while you can select the resolution that your tv is you can't select the space that it occupies and scale it down which means if your tv is older or has a strange aspect ratio you can't fix corners that are snipped off for the most part the ui is snappy enough but i found that sometimes it does get a bit stuttery if you go around it too fast or when the chromecast has to load too many things off the internet at once apps do take a second or two to load up as well but i never felt it was too slow i personally feel this is snappier than many smart tvs uis especially aging ones from the chromecast with google tv performance in each app varies netflix and youtube is overall snappy to scroll around but prime video always seems kind of clunky and slow the google assistant behaves how it does on other devices and you can even get it to play certain shows or even youtube channels but you have to make sure that those apps support being opened by the google assistant for example youtube youtube tv spotify and netflix are supported but if i try to tell the assistant to play a show that's on crunchyroll it just won't open them if you download a web browser like puffin browser you can even surf the internet on your tv and the web is surprisingly responsive even then personally i wouldn't surf the internet on this thing it's just not ideal now let's move on to the home page this is the screen you'd see if you booted up your chromecast with google tv or you finished the setup there's different sections of this home screen depending on the tabs up top if you have a youtube tv subscription the channel listing appears under the live tab of this screen and you can quickly view what's on tv that way the for you tab is basically a summary of all your streaming applications from there you can resume your live tv sessions shows and movies if they're from supported apps sorry crunchyroll see your recommended shows and even open specific shows from their respective apps the other tabs are kind of self-explanatory movies have the currently popular movies and from here you can open one from a streaming app you have or purchase it the same applies for shows apps is where each of your individual apps lives as well as a place to view new apps you might want to download now or later the library tab is where your purchased collection of entertainment would go see i'm a cheapskate i don't really buy content that much so mine is empty okay so that's it right are we done it's just a roku or amazon fire stick with some google flavors slapped on top right well technically you wouldn't be wrong to say that but because this is running android tv and has a usb type c port this opens doors to tinkerers and some tech savvy users too with the usb type c dongle and a higher wattage power brick you can plug in webcams microphones external storage devices mice keyboards game controllers and the ability to side load apps this thing can also emulate some old school games like from the nintendo ds nintendo 64 ps1 and psp with not too many issues i won't go into that too much further as there's better channels that can go into that emulation stuff trust me there they'd be much better at explaining it we all know at the end of the day its primary function is as a streaming stick how does it compare to the roku's fire sticks apple tvs and other android tv devices in the world well the standout feature that separates the chromecast with google tv from the other streaming devices are three different things it's massive app library versatile software and value for your money the google play store is massive and many of the apps that were created for android phone or tablet has been created for google tv as well because of this it far out classes any of its competition on this front except for maybe the apple tv okay sure it's not the entire list of android apps but it's a decent chunk of it but that by itself makes the app store significantly larger than the other devices second the ability to easily cast your content from your phone computer or tablet to your tv screen adds a layer of convenience that again only the apple tv could match with airplay but at a much larger price tag and only for apple devices at that when you look at android tv devices the most popular ones are the xiaomi mi box s and nvidia shield and the chromecast with google tv undercuts both of those devices while touting better hardware and features than the xiaomi mi box s while the nvidia shield costs three times as much for a better gaming experience so as far as android tv devices are concerned the chromecast with google tv is definitely the best bang for your buck so all that being said for my own experiences with it what's my conclusion of the chromecast with google tv well it's a fantastic little streaming dongle with plenty of features i can't find too much to complain about this thing because it does so much for 50 this thing would be a fantastic option to make your dumb tv smart easily take all your entertainment with you on trips and replace your aging smart tvs operating system with a fresh and snappy one through just taking up an hdmi port or it could also be great for replacing your current tvs os with android tv if you don't like your tvs os regardless of what you're trying to accomplish this is a great value smart streaming dongle that covers the majority of people's needs so if i were looking for a streaming stick this is the first thing i'd look at anyway guys what do you think would you buy the google chromecast with google tv or are you looking at other streaming sticks or actually do you not care about streaming sticks at all do you prefer to use your game consoles or just your tv's os leave all that down in the comment section below i'd love to hear what you think because i'm sure we all have different preferences right anyways if you enjoyed this video give it a thumbs up and well don't forget to subscribe i'll see you guys next time you

Channel: Jimmy Tries World

Views: 579,802

Keywords: google chromecast with google tv, google tv, chromecast with google tv review, chromecast with google tv, chromecast review, google tv vs android tv, chromecast vs firestick, chromecast, google chromecast, Chromecast features, google chromecast with google tv features, chromecast vs amazon fire stick, Jimmy Tries World, google chromecast features, google, android tv, best android tv box, best android tv box 2021, android tv box, chroemcast with google tv vs nvidia shield

Id: bz0FgALacJ4

Length: 9min 38sec (578 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 15 2021