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Google Chromecast and Google Home Causes Wi-Fi Drops

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Re: Google Chromecast and Google Home Causes Wi-Fi Drops

#81

Post by toast0 »

xrd wrote: post #51

Has anyone found a good way to troubleshoot and confirm these suspicions? This aligns with our experiences as well since adding more Chromecast devices and Google Home devices.

This tcpdump should show mDNS packets -- if you're getting hundreds per second (in some seconds), like I was, that's probably a good indication that something is misbehaving (or that you have a _really_ big network). If googlecast shows up in the name, it's probably Google Cast misbehaving.

    tcpdump -n host 224.0.0.251 and port 5353

Re: Google Chromecast and Google Home Causes Wi-Fi Drops

#82

Post by david90 »

chubot wrote: post #28

ChromeCast is such a frustrating product. It does exactly what I want in theory. In practice I have to wait 10 to 60 seconds to get it to connect, or reboot my phone. I've started giving up and just using the computer attached to my TV. I don't think I've been having the particular Wi-Fi issue described in the article, but ChromeCast has been just slow and flaky in my experience. I've had both v1 and v2. It seems to…

My Chromecast works quite well, at least the connection is quite stable casting from my mobile. 10s wait is kinda acceptable for me. It'd be nice that resolution could improve.

Re: Google Chromecast and Google Home Causes Wi-Fi Drops

#84

Post by SyneRyder »

Pxtl wrote: post #45
habosa wrote: post #39

I've got a pretty good ($100) TPLink router and a 100Mbps Comcast connection in my 1BR apartment. I can almost never find the 5Ghz channel and get constant drops on my laptop, particularly the Linux one. I've got a 1st Gen Chromecast, a Google Home Mini, and a Pixel XL. Sounds like this is my culprit. Finally.

I have the same router I bet (Archer c7) and I'm convinced it just hates Android devices in general. Every time my phone has a connection hiccup it takes several minutes to renegotiate DHCP... But if I turn off WiFi and count to 15 and turn it on, it reconnects in 3 seconds flat. I'm tempted to throw out my wifi gear but I'm having trouble who in the industry isn't total garbage, because I have an Asus AP that sure i…

Hmm. I got my parents an Archer C7 based on it being the Wirecutter's pick for Best Wireless Router. It has been having a lot of problems with WiFi dropping out, like you describe. But I now see the Wirecutter have updated their comments [1] on the Archer C7:

"This is the single biggest reason we’re no longer recommending our former pick, the Archer C7. Though the C7 has great range and good single-device performance, it doesn’t have band steering, which means that it stumbles when several devices are connected and there’s a lot going on. The problem is compounded by the router’s relatively weak single-core CPU."

...our former pick, the Archer C7, leap all the way off the top of the chart into “oh, this is horrible” territory shortly past the 75th percentile — which means that roughly one out of every four page loads will leave you wondering if you should hit reload.

[1] https://thewirecutter.com/reviews/best-wi-fi-router/

Re: Google Chromecast and Google Home Causes Wi-Fi Drops

#85

Post by cortesoft »

habosa wrote: post #39

I've got a pretty good ($100) TPLink router and a 100Mbps Comcast connection in my 1BR apartment. I can almost never find the 5Ghz channel and get constant drops on my laptop, particularly the Linux one. I've got a 1st Gen Chromecast, a Google Home Mini, and a Pixel XL. Sounds like this is my culprit. Finally.

It sounds like it is only on wakeup of the chromecast? how often is that happening? It wouldn't cause 'constant drops'

Re: Google Chromecast and Google Home Causes Wi-Fi Drops

#86

Post by pjmlp »

chubot wrote: post #28

ChromeCast is such a frustrating product. It does exactly what I want in theory. In practice I have to wait 10 to 60 seconds to get it to connect, or reboot my phone. I've started giving up and just using the computer attached to my TV. I don't think I've been having the particular Wi-Fi issue described in the article, but ChromeCast has been just slow and flaky in my experience. I've had both v1 and v2. It seems to…

> I guess this is why Apple insists on owning the whole stack. The compatibility matrix becomes tractable.

This is how everyone used to build computers, PCs just became the outliers due to way things went with IBM/Microsoft.

Now with the all-in-one models, it seems even PCs are getting back to those days.

Re: Google Chromecast and Google Home Causes Wi-Fi Drops

#87

Post by mosselman »

"...If your router vendor has not released an update for the issue..."

Ah good, I feared Google needed to update their devices to stop DDOS-ing my home network, luckily for them they don't get blamed and we think that the router vendors should add more robust DDOS-protection.

Re: Google Chromecast and Google Home Causes Wi-Fi Drops

#88

Post by sgt »

27182818284 wrote: post #57

Lots of anecdotal experience in this thread about how bad Chromecast is so I'd like to offer my opposite: Chromecast has been one of the nicest additions per dollar for my home. It has been working well for me for a year or so. I even used it today (for the first time in a week or more) while cooking and it worked like a charm first try. The only real problems I've had with it, I switched hardware, but used the same…

I enjoy my Chromecast but it does crash about once a week. Then I have to physically unplug it. I haven't experienced any other types of issues as of yet. Ideally I would like to replace this with an Apple TV 4 at some point.

Re: Google Chromecast and Google Home Causes Wi-Fi Drops

#89

Post by dragonwriter »

cortesoft wrote: post #85
habosa wrote: post #39

I've got a pretty good ($100) TPLink router and a 100Mbps Comcast connection in my 1BR apartment. I can almost never find the 5Ghz channel and get constant drops on my laptop, particularly the Linux one. I've got a 1st Gen Chromecast, a Google Home Mini, and a Pixel XL. Sounds like this is my culprit. Finally.

It sounds like it is only on wakeup of the chromecast? how often is that happening? It wouldn't cause 'constant drops'

From the description, I got that it was app wakeup on the Android, Cast-enabled apps, not wakeup on the Chromecast.

Re: Google Chromecast and Google Home Causes Wi-Fi Drops

#90

Post by izacus »

chubot wrote: post #28

ChromeCast is such a frustrating product. It does exactly what I want in theory. In practice I have to wait 10 to 60 seconds to get it to connect, or reboot my phone. I've started giving up and just using the computer attached to my TV. I don't think I've been having the particular Wi-Fi issue described in the article, but ChromeCast has been just slow and flaky in my experience. I've had both v1 and v2. It seems to…

Those bad experiences are usually due to poor wifi equpment though - many routers mess up mDNS which means that devices that relying broadcasts work poorly. In your case Chromecasts, Avahi and similar (AirPlay falls also into this category).

So I'd check your router if you keep having issues.

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