How to "cast" MKV files to your Chromecast

[thegillion]

Okay so like everyone out there I have been trying to get my local media to stream to my chromecast but a lot of my files are MKV. So I have been playing with the desktop streaming but when you run dual monitors its really buggy. Show I was looking for a way to play my files and then I saw chrome plays MP4 great but nothing else. So thats when I tried the VLC plugin for my MKV files only for that to show a black screen on my chromecast. So I got to missing with the file extensions and saw that if I change the file type of the MKV to MP4 it plays and streams great to my chromecast using the "cast this tab" So here is how it is done.

This if only for windows 7

Showing the file extension in windows
goto Control Panel
then click on "Folder Options"

Click on the view tab and uncheck "Hide extensions for known file types"

Then click "OK"

Changing the file type
Find the file you wish to change the file type
Right click and rename
add .mp4 to the end of the file
Click "OK" on the warning

Casting your video
Open chrome or a new tab
Drop your file into chrome
Then click the "cast" button in chrome and click on the chromecast you want to watch you movie on.


Hope this helps someone else out there

 

[Hamp]

Re: How to "cast" MKV files to your chromecast

Didn't work. Still got the blank screen as before.

 

[chickweedblur]

Re: How to "cast" MKV files to your chromecast

Neat tip but most of my MKV's are from b-ray disks and are huge (20g+). I can't imagine them streaming particularly well over wifi. Gigabit connection from my Synology to ATV2 even has an occasional hiccup. I haven't had any problems casting videos via the browser but they never seem to look great and often don't size correctly without a bunch of fiddling. When someone writes a simple app to cast your local content this will be an absolutely amazing $35 product.

 

[barthawk]

Re: How to "cast" MKV files to your chromecast

I have had issue with MKV files not playing the audio on Chromecast. I can drop the MKV files onto a chrome window and the video will show, but no sound. This still happens after I change the extension to MP4 After a little googling I think the issue is that the audio is encoded in AC3 format which is not supported by Chromecast. Some MKV files are encoded with AAC and will play fine. The only solution I have found is using avidemux to re-encode the audio.

 

[jpr]

Re: How to "cast" MKV files to your chromecast

I put my mkv and other media in a Plex server and then use the Plex Web app in a chrome tab. I haven't had any problems playing anything that Plex accepts.

 

[m4f1050]

Re: How to "cast" MKV files to your chromecast

I do the same until the trial ends... I've been playing with AllCast but no-go on sound...Plays the video GREAT with no hickups but no sound.

 

[someguy01234]

Re: How to "cast" MKV files to your chromecast

Best solution is just to setup Plex server so it can do transcoding on the fly.

If you use this address to log into Plex server, it let you cast the video to Chromecast or other devices that are running the Plex app while logged into your Plex account: https://my.plexapp.com/users/sign_in
The regular localhost address doesn't seem to have the casting ability right now.

Or like mentioned, use Avidemux to transcode the audio to AAC format, leaving the video as "Copy" so it doesn't need to transcode, and set the container output as "MP4".

 

[m4f1050]

Re: How to "cast" MKV files to your chromecast

This worked. I got the CAST square on the player they provide.

 

[paulmike3]

Re: How to "cast" MKV files to your chromecast

Download ffmpeg, put the code below in a .bat file, along with the ffmpeg exe in the folder with all the MKV files you want to convert, and kick it off. End result is mp4 versions of everything in the folder with AAC audio. It takes about 1 min per 30 mins of video.

for %%a in ("*.mkv") do ffmpeg -i "%%a" -vcodec copy -acodec aac -ab 384000 -sn -strict -2 "%%~na.mp4" 
pause

 

[m4f1050]

Re: How to "cast" MKV files to your chromecast

Interesting! Only if we could do this streaming.....and if stopped streaming to delete the end-product...

 

[Joseph Schafer1]

PaulMike3 you make me proud to be a Buckeye. Thanks!

 

[Patrick van Deursen]

for the script with ffmpeg:

for %%a in ("*.mkv") do ffmpeg -i "%%a" -vcodec copy -acodec aac -ab 384000 -sn -strict -2 "%%~na.mp4"
pause

sorry to open this aftr a long time. Just tried the convert option with ffmpeg and it is working as we speak. question is how do I adapt the bat file to also go through the nested folders. is that possible? all my movies are in seperate folders and doing this for all of them is just a bit too much work.

thanks in advance!
Patrick

 

[blaidth]

Re: How to "cast" MKV files to your chromecast

Hey here is something I tried and it seems to work: Videostream for Google Chromecast
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/...gle-ch/cnciopoikihiagdjbjpnocolokfelagl?hl=en

Haven't tried it much but it seems to work well... plus i think they have a remote that you can use with your phone.
Again I haven't tried all options but it worked on first go round.

 

[harrynode]

Re: How to "cast" MKV files to your chromecast

paulmike3, you beauty

 

[sillybilly80]

Sorry to revive thread. Bit confused about paul mike's instructions. So I have the "ffmpeg.exe" file, "ff-prompt" bat file with only the code above in it and my mkv file in a folder. Then do I click onto the exe to start the conversion process? If so it's not working... I just get a black pop up window and then nothing. Can someone help? Thanks

 

[cyberdman]

No, you would double-click on the .bat file.