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The Chromecast is probably one of the best things to happen to the living room since the TV remote. Makes sense that Google would want to put it up for sale in as many places as possible. Besides already being able to pick one up from Amazon, Best Buy and, of course, the Google Play Store, consumers everywhere now have the option of snagging a Chromecast directly from Motorola.
Of course, the Chromecast keeps the same affordable $35 price tag (+$4 standard shipping, or $11 for 2-day from Motorola), making it the perfect stocking stuffer this holiday season. While it doesn’t seem like there’s a clear benefit in buying the device from Motorola versus other retailers, it could come in handy should you land yourself a Motorola coupon code.
Only in North America it seems.
I thought they were for sale in the UK. And I don’t mind through ripoff third party resellers. Friend of mine in Finland wants one, I might order another and send it to him.
Only available in Europe for around twice the normal price from grey importers and rip off merchants. Best to wait for official availability!
Google owns Play store. Sells Chromecast there. Google owns Motorola. Sells Chromecast at Motorola.com. So… don’t see the big deal…
Its also sold through Best Buy stores, but usually sell out and not worth driving all over the place.
I bought mine from Best Buy and paid only $12 after spending reward zone coupon!
I own three currently. Living Room TV, Bedroom TV and Rec Room TV.
Same here. Inside every room that has a television.
Yup. If I get another TV, which I am actually thinking of mounting one in the kitchen… I will get another Chromecast.
I managed to buy 3 with the free Netflix deal. I gave 1 to my parents and kept 2 for myself. I have one in the living room and one in the garage hooked up to a stereo.
Nice.
Greatest invention since the remote? Tell me what am I doing wrong then? I picked one of these up on launch day and have found at best a couple of uses for it… Shopping on Amazon so everyone in the room could see what I was looking at and random ass you tube videos… Does this thing have some hidden features that I do not know about?
I have 2.
As cheap as they were, I do have a little buyer’s remorse. So far the support for this has been dismal. And if you ask me, the hardware leaves much to be desired.
Its wireless adapter/antenna is pathetic. Why is it I can easily stream YouTube videos in HD on my 4 year old Gateway laptop (WiFi) in my girlfriend’s bedroom but I can’t even get close to doing that on my Chromecast? The signal reception on it is awful and both devices are within feet of each other.
My second one is still sitting in a box because it wouldn’t install on my apartment’s WiFi. It sees the network but when logging in it never connects.
So far my recommendation to other is to save your money.
Jurk,
I bought one for my Samsung which was already a smart tv, I have no remorse, and fully understood it isn’t the best product on the market, and that maybe my reason. Found it easy to set up and does what I want. Simple and works for my simple needs. I did order another for my daughters LG which isn’t a smart tv. Worked perfect. Took a bit more time doing it being the second Chromecast on my wifi. She loves it, basically all we do is use it for Netflix, some Hulu and Youtube. I did try some irc apps which work through the chrome browser, really didn’t work out as well as I wanted, but thats OK. Luckly both tv’s have a good usb port to power the device. Another nice thing, is its tucked behind the tv’s and you don’t see it at all.
For simple needs, its great, And in that I do agree with you. I also ordered them through Play and should have ordered it through Amazon and saved the shipping charges since I have Amazon Prime. For me the price was right. I hope in the future you feel different and Google adds more features. Do I think its perfect, no, nor is it the end all for such devices. Now I wish that Google sends me my N5.
It’s been like this for 3 days now, guess nobody noticed since then?
Black Friday Ad for Best Buy is $29.99
And Google treats Motorola as separate companies? HA.
It’s quite obvious that’s just an image front to the other OEMs to keep them out of the background collaborations between Moto and the Big G.
I can’t believe I’m the first to post about the typo:
“While it doesn’t seem like there’s a clear benefit in buying the phone from Motorola versus other retailers…”
We got phones on the brain ’round here.
I would say the PVR is the greatest invention for the TV since the remote but I do love my Chromecast. I Constantly use it to watch youtube content as it is by far the easiest way to get their content onto the big screen. I’ve played with some of the other features but don’t really use them right now. Personally I think the youtube features alone I think it’s worth the $35.
I’m suprised we haven’t seen any experimental Chromecast games, along the lines of the Skiball demo they did with chrome. I keep telling myself I’m going to play around with Cast API, but I never get to it.
I have a chinese dual core Android stick that I get from U$40 shipped to my home. I think its better because its a full Android device with Play Store, can play games and emulators like a charm, support BT controllers like joysticks, mouse (Air Mouse) or keyboards. Cheapcast app makes it a Chromecast clone also, so nothing is missing.
I meant coming up with creative multi-screen experiences. Think games where everybody has their own portion of a game on their tablet and everybody is sharing a board on the TV. Pokemon royal rumble death matches where everybody in the room is has their local controls and whatnot while everything unfolds on the TV. Or something along the lines of “Artemis”.
Sure, the form factor of an android stick is nice. But emulating games on a TV isn’t anything I haven’t been able to do with a PC for about 15 years now.
moto is looking much more interesting
Where has all the hype gone for this thing? I am still waiting for third party apps to support it. AhemSPOTIFYAhem