How to Chromecast?

David G

Hi Walter av, my TV uses 1080p resolution, so I've no experience with 1080i / 24p etc. on TVHeadEnd (in UK using DVB-T PAL). What I do find though is that setting the Video Codec to "Copy codec type" just leaves me with the blue cast icon as you describe. I therefore must specify which Video Codec to use, ie I use "libx264: libx264 H.264 / AVC / MPEG-4 AVC / MPEG-4 part 10".

BTW, in terms of the Persistent Auth Token, temporarily upgrade to TVHeadEnd 4.3, setup your user and then note the Persistent Auth Token. Downgrade back to 4.2.8, you can now enter this token into the TVH_EPG settings and everything will work without hacking. Easier when Paul M continues to develop TVH_EPG :-).Worked for me anyway,the pain though is that you need to purge uninstall 4.3 and start fresh with 4.2.8.

Hopefully soon they will release a version of TVH 4.3 with transcoding working as it does in 4.2.8.

Paul M

I'm sorry I have no special knowledge of transcoding with de-interlacing and how the chromecast handles these things.

BTW, another thing I do is to turn my downloaded recordings into a "podcast" so that I can grab programs on a phone or tablet to watch later, I adapted someone else's tool for this

https://github.com/speculatrix/genRSS

Walter av

Thanks David_G for the Tvheadend 4.3/4.2.8 downgrade trick.

As far as content concerned, only transcoding 'audio' to 'aac' has been done, video is 'Copy codec type' for performance and quality reasons. Googling around about the chromecast capabilities seems that it does de-interlace when it is fed interlaced material in 'h264' and right container and possibly other important flags... mpeg2 is not supported and the ultra does h265.

These settings were succesful for 720p50 streams.

Container:Matroska (mkv) builtin / (MP4 also some suc6)
Resolution (height):1080
Channels:Copy layout
Language:Use original
Source video codec: h264
Video codec: Copy codec type
Video codec preset:ultrafast
Video bitrate (kb/s) (0=auto): 0
Audio codec: libfdk_aac
Audio bitrate (kb/s) (0=auto): 0
Subtitle codec: do not use

David G

Thanks for sharing your settings Walter av, really helpful. I'm learning so much on this journey to get the best from my PI4 / Buster / Pi TV HAT (DVB-T2) setup.

I've now seen the TVHeadEnd log at the bottom of its web GUI and can see my TV card outputs MPEG2VIDEO / AUDIO. I've therefore refined my settings further to try and get the best picture quality without the PI4 stuttering;

Container:Matroska (mkv)/built-in
Resolution (height):0 .....(keep resolution as transmitted) Channels:Copy layout
Language:Use original
Source video codec: MPEG2VIDEO
Video codec: libx264: libx264 H.264 / AVC / MPEG-4 AVC / MPEG-4 part 10 .....(MPEG2 Video will need converting) Video codec preset:veryfast: h264 / h265 / qsv(h264) .....(tuned with bitrate for optimum quality / no stutter) Video bitrate (kb/s) (0=auto): 3500 .....(tuned with video codec preset for optimum quality / no stutter) Audio codec: libvorbis: libvorbis .....(seems to be less load on the CPU????) Audio bitrate (kb/s) (0=auto): 0

Subtitle codec: do not use

I believe for my PI4 setup, the best performance would be to use the Video Codec "h264_omx: OpenMAX IL H.264 video encoder" to use the hardware encoding capabilities rather than software as above. Unfortunately the output from this is not quite right, ie, the picture is squashed @ 4:3 ratio on Chromecast. Anyone know if there is a fix for this?

Walter av

David G, since you use SD PAL which is non-square pixel combinations of 352/704/720x576 you may need to find a way to set the aspect ratio for encoding or force horizontal resolution to stretch 720 to match 1024x576. I'm afraid you have to edit the sourcecode of tvheadend for that or fill in a bug report with missing aspect ratio option or horizontal resolution.

Since the Chromecast doesn't conform to -25fps/50fps or even- interlaced no matter what effort you throw at it for re-encoding it will allways lack quality wise. You maybe better of installing VLC/Kodi on a client device, even a raspberry zero with usb ethernet and mpeg2 license can play kodi fine via HDMI-cec remote of your television...

chromecast 50hz option

https://support.google.com/chromecast/answer/6308937?hl=en

David G

Thanks Walter_av, yes, when looking at some channels from the TVHeadEnd log I can see;


2020-02-15 08:14:56.763 transcode: 001F: 1:MPEG2VIDEO 544x576 ==> H264 544x576 (h264_omx) ----- (4MUSIC)
2020-02-15 08:18:32.380 transcode: 0020: 1:MPEG2VIDEO 704x576 ==> H264 704x576 (h264_omx) ----- (BBC ONE)
2020-02-15 08:20:00.663 transcode: 0021: 1:MPEG2VIDEO 720x576 ==> H264 720x576 (h264_omx) ----- (Channel 4)
2020-02-15 08:21:11.520 transcode: 0022: 1:MPEG2VIDEO 720x576 ==> H264 720x576 (h264_omx) ----- (Channel 4+1)
2020-02-15 08:27:19.572 transcode: 0023: 1:MPEG2VIDEO 544x576 ==> H264 544x576 (h264_omx) ----- (Sky News)
2020-02-15 08:29:24.930 transcode: 0024: 1:MPEG2VIDEO 720x576 ==> H264 720x576 (h264_omx) ----- (ITV)

Quite a mix of ratios! I was surprised BBC1 is lower than ITV, buts that's another issue :-)

I'll raise an issues report but for now will stay with Video Codec "libx264: libx264 H.264 / AVC / MPEG-4 AVC / MPEG-4 part 10" which works correctly but drives the PI4 really hard.

Walter av

Update about Chromecast 50hz/50fps, still have to test:

https://support.google.com/chromecast/answer/6308937?hl=en

It seems possible to force it via Chromecast settings, this is recomended for any broadcast originated content with a webstreaming platform like BBC or tvheadend in PAL region countries. However I guess Youtube with alot of 23,97/24/29,97/30/59,98/60 will look less optimal on this 50hz mode.

David G

I remember switching this 50Hz HDMI Mode on when I first setup my Chromecast(2) a couple of years ago. I must be honest, I cannot tell much difference and have cast from many apps now.

David G

Hi Paul_M, I believe I have found a bug with the m3u files generated from a Recording link (non-Chromecast), ie line 868 should be;

p_uuid,

instead of

p_uri,

Without this change, my m3u files contained Python error text (name 'p_uri' is not defined) for recordings.

brimur brimur

I wonder if the newly released Cast Connect can be integrated.

Tutorial video including code samples
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fc5IUJtVpjs

David G

A quick update.

Thanks to all the work put in by Paul M, I've continued to benefit from TVH EPG and the ability to Chromecast over the last year :-)

Last week I needed to build another SD card for my RPI/TVH EPG setup and everything worked again until I got to Chromecast, which would not find any device and produced an error as attached. Luckily I had a backup of my old card so I copied over the original pychromecast directory and it started to work again, ie, find my Chromecast device without any errors. By swapping between the two pychromecast directories I now have, I've determined that the latest version available from repo https://github.com/home-assistant-libs/pychromecast produces this error.

I've checked the dependencies and directory permissions for these two pychromecast directories and they look correct. So if anyone else runs into this problem, I would suggest trying to get an older copy of pychromecast ;-)

Flole

If you haven't already done so you should report that issue to the developer so it can get fixed ;)

David G

David G wrote:
> Last week I needed to build another SD card for my RPI/TVH EPG setup and everything worked again until I got to Chromecast, which would not find any device and produced an error as attached. Luckily I had a backup of my old card so I copied over the original pychromecast directory and it started to work again, ie, find my Chromecast device without any errors. By swapping between the two pychromecast directories I now have, I've determined that the latest version available from repo https://github.com/home-assistant-libs/pychromecast produces this error.

>......

Thanks to support from emontnemery (pychromecast github) the problem & fix below has been determined;

Updating to the latest version of pychromecast +7.x.x, prevents thv_epg from finding Chromecast devices. To fix this the code change below is needed in tvh_epg;

FROM- chromecasts = pychromecast.get_chromecasts()
TO- <pre><code class="python">
chromecasts = pychromecast.get_chromecasts()
if isinstance(chromecasts , tuple):
chromecasts, browser = chromecasts

La Marqe

As the solution discussed above works using a home assistant support library and I run both (tvheadend and home assistant) on a RPI4, I thought to simply try out the native chromecast support of home assistant to access tvheadend and stream TV to my Google Nest Hub. I can say: It works very well.

For all who stumble upon this thread and have the same idea, I want to share some config details.

1) Tvheadend
Chromecasts needs a slightly tuned stream.
You need to set up a new streaming profile using container format "MP4/av-lib".
Same as described here: https://github.com/speculatrix/tvh_epg/blob/master/CHROMECAST.md

At least for HD channels, it was not required for me to set up any transcoding (the bottom half of the config). My profile works without that, leading to a very low CPU usage while casting. SD channels will have to be transcoded as Nest Hub does not support mpeg2 video codec.

2) Home assistant

You can use home assistants built-in media player. The following sample config works well when configured as an action as part of a script or an automation:

action: - service: media_player.play_media data: media_content_type: video media_content_id: http://192.168.0.100:9981/stream/channelid/1030292195?profile=chromecast target: entity_id: media_player.nesthub

192.168.0.100 is the IP of my tvheadend server. Replace it with the IP of your server. Make sure to use the IP. Don't even try to mess with intranet hostnames which cannot be resolved with internet DNS infrastructure.

Red bull

Plug in Chromecast and visit chromecast.com/setup. ...
Connect Chromecast to your Wi‑Fi network.

Tap the Cast button in a cast-enabled app.

Red bull

Gabs Man wrote:
> I have a Chromecast 2. I also have a Media server running OpenMediaVault and TVHeadEnd with a dual tuner. I think it's great, works really well I have been using TVHClient on my phone, Kodi, Plex and the web interface.
>
> I can watch Live TV or Recordings via Kodi no problem, and the Guide looks really good in Kodi too; but alas, there's no way to cast it to my TV from Kodi.
>
> I have also set up channels in Plex for TVHeadEnd. I can view the Live TV adn also Recordings, although the Recordings won't play in the browser with Plex. I have worked out with a Movie library I can play the Recordings though. Unfortunately, although they play in the browser, Chromecast just wont play it properly, not sure if it's transcoding settings or what, it either say s Cannot play video or shows half the picture blurry. Similary using the Plex app on my phone.
>
> With teh TVHClient it uses an external player. But when I go to the external player, it won't allow Chromecst; not sure if that's being limited by the app or TVH?
>
> So has anyone got this working? If so, how do you do it? It's really frustrated as I just want to be able to watch TV recording on my TV, not just on my phone and tablet :(
>
> cheers,

> gabs

Plug in Chromecast and visit chromecast.com/setup. ...
Connect Chromecast to your Wi‑Fi network.
Tap the Cast button in a cast-enabled app.

creasty somp

I have tried upgrading TVHeadEnd to the latest unstable (for Buster) (4.3-1857~g221c29b40) and that does allow Persistent Authentication settings, BUT, does not allow transcoding profiles and tvh_epg does not seem to be able to login and keeps coming up with authorisation errors.

https://teatv.ltd/ https://hellodear.in

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