this post was submitted on 12 Sep 2023
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Title says it all, I'm looking for something as user-friendly as a chromecast but not made by a company like google. I'm familiar with linux and if some open source software exists that can do this I would love it.

Ideally it would be able to stream things like Netflix and Disney+ using a smartphone. Would be great if it can also play local files from an external hard drive, but I have a raspberry pi with Kodi for that so that's not a hard requirement by any means.

Price range: preferably under €/$/£100 but for something truly excellent it can be a bit more than that.

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[–] ijeff@lemdro.id 8 points 1 year ago
[–] flashgnash@lemm.ee 8 points 1 year ago

I've tried setting up a pi for a Chromecast replacement but I soon realized it was never going to "just work" like my Chromecast did

What would be cool personally is some way to root a Chromecast and strip out all the telemetry

[–] eco_game@discuss.tchncs.de 6 points 1 year ago

Miracast is pretty good, but I don't think it supports DRM-content. Also it seems to be getting phased out in favor of chromecast.

[–] AdminWorker@lemmy.ca 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

I bought the rii remote/controller/keyboard/mouse, a raspberry pi 4 8gb, a 4k micro HDMI, a rpi4 power cord, a 64gb micro SD card, rpi4 case with fan. I then attached it to my TV with some zip ties and a L brace

  • I installed rasbian 64bit.
  • I installed steam link (have to go to tty command line to have it work though because bullseye doesn't have previous buster driver support yet
  • I installed kodi > Plex addon
  • I installed kodi > YouTube addon
  • I installed kodi > jellyfin add-on with repository
  • I didn't trust the sketchy "add my repository to download and install". Disney plus on kodi, so I made a shortcut to the browser with that site
  • I made a shortcut to Netflix browser.

It isn't the same as " any phone controls sound and playback" like a chromcast, but it is private and it is better than Chromecast (higher resolution and framerate, and streams/remotelycontrols local beefy gaming computers) in some ways.

Do you know of a RPI app with a fdroid counterpart that allows clicks from a LAN smartphone?

[–] johan@feddit.nl 2 points 1 year ago

Sounds like a nice setup. I have an old laptop I could potentially use for this.

[–] furrowsofar@beehaw.org 4 points 1 year ago

Wouldn't we all. If you mean stream based on app on android by hitting the built-in cast button I think your out of luck.

What you can do is just connect a Linux box to your TV and use the web browser. Works great for most things. You can control from phone using VNC which seems to just work or KDE Connect if you can get it to work. You can also just get a wireless keyboard/mouse too. Xmouse on Fdroid also works great.

Actual screen casting, there are a number of methods but none work well for movies. Miracast is nice but Google phones do not support though my LG does. ScreenStream app is kind of cool just for the screen, allows steaming to any browser.

[–] smeg@feddit.uk 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I asked a similar question at !privacyguides@lemmy.one, some of the suggestions there might be appropriate for your use case

[–] johan@feddit.nl 2 points 1 year ago

Thanks, will check it out!

[–] Apicnic@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'm also interested in this for using stremio from phones and PCs. Chromecast in particular also kinda sucks due to limited codec support.

You can use Stremio on most devices. I have it on my Android TV.