Your castin' will get far easier
Google’s Chromecast has become an affordable way to turn your TV into a smart TV. However, the second-generation Chromecast came out way back in 2015. And the Chromecast Ultra, which enables 4K viewing, arrived back in 2016.
It’s time for something new, and filings with the FCC have revealed that a fresh Chromecast is certainly on the way. Back in May, Google submitted a document to the FCC detailing an update to the second-gen dongle with both Bluetooth and Bluetooth low energy.
Read this: Your essential guide to Google Chromecast
Since then, Google has made more changes to the upcoming Chromecast, upgrading the hardware for the Chromecast’s 5Ghz antenna to increase its antenna gain, which should give it a stronger Wi-Fi signal.
The new Chromecast will likely look exactly the same, retaining that familiar puck shape. In fact, the new Chromecast may be a lot like the old Chromecast. The new model number is NCC-1701-B. Take out the B and you have the same model number as the second-gen, NCC-1701.
While updating the regular Chromecast with 4K support would be nice, it doesn’t seem like this new Chromecast will ship with 4K support. That would require some more powerful internals other than Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. With all that Google has to announce in the coming months – like, possibly, its very own Smart Display – it doesn’t seem likely that the search giant will make much noise about this new Chromecast.