The Google Chromecast and its predecessors are among the oldest and most successful products in the Google portfolio and will probably have a successor again this year. In the last few days, the first information about the new dongle has become known, which unfortunately does not give the product that many users might be hoping for. Here you can find all the details known so far.
With the Chromecast, Google entered the hardware business for the first time almost nine years ago and has now sold more than 100 million sticks and dongles, which do their job invisibly behind just as many televisions. With the Chromecast with Google TV, there was a big restart at the end of 2020, which brought together the two previously separate platforms Android TV and Chromecast. A step that was previously thought to be overdue.
However, the “Chromecast with Google TV” is a bit weak and offers little performance and storage space. No wonder many users have been waiting for a more powerful dongle or box to compensate for the technical weaknesses since the restart. From today’s perspective, however, this will not happen anytime soon, because Google is planning in a completely different direction. Instead of a strong and slightly more expensive product, you tackle the other side of the price chain.
There have been several leaks about the new Chromecast these days, which, interestingly enough, were classified by all observers as solid and not very speculative. There seems to be a very high degree of certainty that the information is correct, so I am stating it as fact for this article as well. But keep in mind that the information is not yet from an official source.
The new product will be called Chromecast HD with Google TV. It sounds good at first and appears to be of high quality next to the product name of the 2020 product – but that is deceptive. The current Chromecast with Google TV supports 4K, while the new one is said to only support HD. The current product should be advertised correctly as “Chromecast 4K with Google TV”. Maybe that will be done soon in the course of a small renaming.
But not only the maximum resolution is slimmed down, but also with the remaining specifications one tries not to impress, but to reduce to the minimum that is necessary for the use of Google TV and the main task as a streaming receiver:
The expected specifications
Under the hood, an AMlogic S805X2 should be used and of course, support the AV1 codec and HDR10+ playback. The new Chromecast should continue to keep the dongle form and bring a maximum of 2 gigabytes of RAM. It is difficult to say whether a remote control is included in the scope of delivery. Google will not have upgraded the smartphone remote control for nothing… Because with such a product, the price counts and saving the remote control should still make a difference.
Selling price
Such a product will only sell on the price and will only be of interest to Google as a mass product. Of course, the Chromecast with Google TV is also a mass product, but at 70 euros it is more expensive than most of its competitors in this country. A price of ” well under $40 ” is expected for the new Chromecast. That can probably be 20, 25 or 29 euros. We don’t know exactly, but it would be the price range in which the Amazon Fire TV Stick is also the biggest global competitor.
It would also undercut the price of the current classic Chromecast. This is available in Germany for 39.99 euros and has long been a discontinued model, even if it is not yet designated as such. The new product should succeed the classic Chromecast and probably offer about the same performance. The two biggest differences would probably be the support of Google TV and the AV1 codec. And that brings us to the next topic.
Problem AV1
The AV1 codec is not just any codec, it is the key of choice on Google’s platform. Already last year, shortly after the release of the Chromecast with Google TV, the AV1 codec was made mandatory for all new devices with Android TV. That means the Chromecast with Google TV is outdated from a codec perspective. The new dongle, on the other hand, would not be, because it would bring support with it. This means that the significantly cheaper product offers more than its big expensive brother.
This in turn suggests that the Chromecast will also be revised with Google TV and could come onto the market in a silent second batch under the same or very similar name. We remember the potential “Chromecast 4K with Google TV”. Would be enough to solve the AV1 problem and at the same time clarify the market position compared to the new Chromecast. The second variant would be another new Chromecast, which I would classify as unlikely after two years.
One would think that the new Chromecast will not be launched until autumn, but the quite advanced speculation means that spring 2022 would also be possible. It would be conceivable for me that the new Chromecast will come in spring and another one in autumn.