Media Server + chromecast question

[v-600]

Sorry for the length of this but I wanted to get as much info in as possible.

Old Setup:
Until last month I had an laptop in everyday use. It had a range of media players and about 500GB of media (music,pictures,videos) and a DVD drive. I have a TV with a chromecast attached. I used a range of software (videocast directly from the laptop, and Windows Media Player, BubblesoftuPnP server and the android bubblesoft app on android) to stream local files on the laptop to the chromecast. The main downside of these was that you had to leave the phone/laptop on and connected.

Currently:
I just bought a new laptop and plan to re-purpose the old one into a NAS (ideally windows based rather than something like FreeNAS).

What would be perfect would be something that would let me initialise streaming from the old laptop to the chromecast without needing to leave the starting device on much like youtube/netflix/iplayer currently do i.e. you can start something playing, then turn of your laptop/phone and the chromecast continues playing.

From what I've been reading the chromecast uses something called the DIAL protocol which allows the your phone/laptop and chromecast to discover each other, and then to launch an app on the chromecast. At this point the starting device can disconnect.

Is there a way to launch a video stream from a local source rather than the internet (youtube/iplayer/netflix)?

 

[v-600]

After a couple of days of investigation I found plex. Trying to go down the dlna server and a matching android app seems to be a dead end.

 

[sdifox]

Why are you doing dlna if you are running plex?

Grab the android client for plex and you'll be able to cast to your chromecast, albeit cc is only 720p.

 

[v-600]

I wasn't running plex until I discovered it in my search for a better dlna solution. After a week I've discovered plex is great.

 

[sdifox]

I wasn't running plex until I discovered it in my search for a better dlna solution. After a week I've discovered plex is great.

:thumbsup:

I am running plex on a 2U Dell R710 with 2 Xeon L5640, 24GB of memory and 25TB of drive space :awe:

 

[JeffMD]

I was going to suggest plex as it is exactly what I was doing to repurpose a secondary laptop AND get movies onto the living room tv with as little fuss as possible. Aside from needing to log into the laptop first, it is otherwise autonomous and provides a wonderful movies experience with chromecast on the tv end.

 

[Homerboy]

I use plex in my house. ChromeCasts on all the TVs. Everyone has the Plex app on their phones and/or tablets. Just pull up the Plex app on the device, and cast to TV. Works flawlessly. As an added bonus, we can all stream from Plex to our mobile devices while away from home.

 

[sdifox]

I was going to suggest plex as it is exactly what I was doing to repurpose a secondary laptop AND get movies onto the living room tv with as little fuss as possible. Aside from needing to log into the laptop first, it is otherwise autonomous and provides a wonderful movies experience with chromecast on the tv end.

Plex app for your phone is a better solution no?