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Google Chromecast and Google Home Causes Wi-Fi Drops
- sofaofthedamned 9y agoIt's blamed on MDNS packets being spaffed out at high speed. I've got 3 Chromecasts of various flavours in the house and have never seen this behaviour. Has anybody else had the problem?
- bfuller 9y agoI have noticed an issue since grtting a chromecast this Christmas but i cant say for sure its causing the issue
- slindz 9y agoMy iPad recently quit being able to connect to the 5GHz channel. My Samsung S6 networking is also glitchy and often on cell service while at home. Timing aligns with me getting a Chromecast.
- sprt 9y agoI've actually had a weird issue where my wireless mouse freezes for a second (not the OS) and my Chromecast simultaneously disconnects from my Wi-Fi. It's only happened a few times in several months, but the two are definitely linked. I can't rely explain it beyond "interference", not well-versed in wireless tech.
- londons_explore 9y agoIt'll happen when a neighbour uses a dodgy microwave.
- shegs 9y agoAfter adding a second chromecast video / audio chats are impossible and countless drops at any given time. It's good to know the source of the issue.
- bshep 9y agoI have been having wifi issues for the last 3 months and I have 2 Chromecast's Ive had them for much longer but after reading this I'm going to segregate them to a different wifi network and see if the wifi gets better but my understanding of the issue makes me think it won't get better without a Chromecast update
- londons_explore 9y agoThis specifically needs an android update. Androids the fault here not the Chromecast
- dragonwriter 9y agoSpecifically, it sounds like Play Services Cast support has fairly pathological behavior in common circumstances.
- senectus1 9y agosame here. This article was a dawn of light for me.. time to start logging the wifi behavior
- kpil 9y agoI also have three Chromecasts and occasionally 7-8 mobile devices that are connected to them in multi-AP network. I have mostly Sony devices and I think they have a rather aggressive powersave profile. The last 3-6 month or so, the mobile devices have been losing connections to Chromecast while playing, and the network have become markedly more flaky also for other devices. I actually got a Chromecast Ultra with an ethernet connection in case the wifi was bad, but it didn't really make a difference. At some point a D-Link AP that is also the main router started to hang at least once per day, occasionally every 5 minutes. I installed Lede on it in order to rule out hardware problems - and then it stopped crashing at which point I stopped bothering, but I suppose the hardware can still be cooked. I've noticed that the network occasionally is really slow for a short while - I managed to measure the speed to an external provider to be around 4-5 mbit/s instead of 100, but I haven't considered the possibility that it's my own network that goes bananas. The WAF is declining, but it's so much junk that can go wrong so it will take a considerate amount of time to debug. Edit: I must say though, that I expect my routers and APs to survive 100.000 packages...
- StudentStuff 9y agoThe unnecessary flood of multicast packets these Google devices send is causing your AP to drop to its lowest speed and broadcast those packets. Its the equivalent of having an 802.11B client that only syncs at 1Mbps and is constantly downloading. There is no airtime left for anyone else! Things you can try: Block 802.11G and lower clients (increases your minimum WiFi transmission speed), convert multicast packets to unicast (LEDE is apt to support that), or throw the chromecast in the dustbin!
- voltagex_ 9y agoHang on, if you're converting multicast packets does that mean only one device is receiving them?
- kuschku 9y agoThe WiFi AP handles unicast packets differently than multicast packets. So on a network with N devices, you just convert one mulicast packet into N unicast pakcets. Because multicast packets are sent with the slowest possible rate, this actually speeds up performance as long as N < 20.
- tomrod 9y agoI'm fairly certain a similar issue is being caused by the Wii U.
- rogy 9y agoInteresting, my wifis been terrible since christmas, ive had casts and a google home for a while but my partner got a pixel 2, the first android device in the house. Could be it!
- 77ko 9y agoGot a pixel 2, Chromecast and a Google home and now have lots of wifi woes. The timing being exactly after the pixel 2 (turned in cast and home before, didn't have problems). Edit: turning of guest mode on all cast devices makes things better (less wifi dropouts) but still bad. Turning of wifi on both the android phones in my house has cleared up the wifi problem (which was really annoying as even spotify kept failing to stream with phones on wifi). I wonder if Google employees need to test their consumer devices outside the googleplex where the internet is super fast and the industrial grade networking gear deals with such issues automagically.
- londons_explore 9y agoIn the Googleplex they have networks designed to be slow and crappy to test exactly this. All people working on consumer facing apps and sites are encouraged to use these crappy networks on a day to day basis.
- nmstoker 9y agoI wish there was more evidence that they used them. Far too often their software seems to assume a superb connection. Personal "favourite" is their Newsstand - it will ditch cached stories whilst out and about because it briefly got a connection on the Underground, only for the content to not download (precisely because you're on flakey Tube WiFi) and boom the best use case for that software is ruined!
- stefco_ 9y agoI was in Costa Rica last week with a slow wifi connection and had a similar experience with a 5MB offline PDF file in Google Drive. For some reason, drive decided to redownload it, but after only a minute it timed out and gave up. I just ended up going for two more days without the file, but I found it pretty ridiculous that Drive failed so miserably on such a simple use case. I had a nearly seamless (albeit slightly slower) experience browsing Instagram on that slow connection despite the fact that all of the content was photo/video media, so I know the connection was not completely useless. It seems that Google engineers can't even fathom the possibility that someone would have a slow enough connection that a 5MB file might need more than a minute to download. This is frustrating.
- pvtmert 9y agoimho, routers either handle this somehow or drop packeta. because mdns is higher level protocol than wifi and mac, router should not deal with those. also, with same hardware what happens there is whatsapp/hangouts video call? its about firmware
- drdaeman 9y agoRouters deal with IP traffic (and even have to mess with TCP, e.g. clamp MSS), not just the 802.1 and 802.11. For SOHO routers, high PPS multicast UDP may be something hardware-accelerated routing doesn't particularly account for. And if software routing kicks in, high packet rate can very easily overload poor device's CPU.
- X-Istence 9y agoIt's due to the way multicast packets are transmitted on Wifi... https://tools.ietf.org/id/draft-mcbride-mboned-wifi-mcast-problem-statement-01.html https://tools.ietf.org/id/draft-mcbride-mboned-wifi-mcast-pr...
- regnerba 9y agoInteresting. I have 2 Google Homes (1 regular and 1 mini), a Chromecast and a Chromecast Audio, and a Pixel 2. I haven't noticed any particular network issues. My network is all Ubiquiti gear. A USG, switch, and AP AC Lite. I have the private WiFi on the same network as my desktop PC and Steam Link. My home lab is on separate VLANs. Other then that its a pretty default configuration. Not home right now but when I get home I shall look into it a bit more. Curious if whatever update thats causing this hasn't rolled out to Canada or if the Unifi products are handling it better/some special way.
- Godel_unicode 9y agoI have a very similar setup and similar lack of issues even in a pretty challenging WiFi environment. Ubiquiti is so good for the price, I'm always amazed when I run into technical people who are running something else. It just seems like such an obvious choice to me...
- toast0 9y agoI would consider the Unifi gear, but I have issues with the form factor: how do you put that round thing on the top shelf of a bookcase or whatever? The in-wall ones might work better for me though -- although I think it's silly to have to terminate an in-wall cable to a plug to plug into the back.
- regnerba 9y agoIs there a reason you cannot mount it on the wall just above the bookshelf? One of the things I really like about the Unifi gear is how just small and inconspicuous it is. It really helped sell it when I suggested it to my mom and other family members. Mounted most of the APs for them on the ceilings, but a few of them are wall mounted as well. The ceiling ones look nicer than any smoke detecter I have ever seen. So I actually really like the UniFi gear for that when compared to some crazy Linksys gamer router that just looks... so over done.
- regnerba 9y agoGot into the Ubiquiti gear a while ago and definitely no regrets! Not a network guy myself and so really appreciate the controller just making it easy to mange things. I have myself, my mom's and several other family members properties all managed by one cloud controller. Things just work, and when for some reason they don't I have a fairly easy way of figuring out whats wrong and fixing it remotely. So very happy with their products.
- rcarmo 9y agoI was doing some home automation stuff with Node-RED and spotted that when I tried to figure out when a Chromecast was online - mDNS using ZeroConf would blow up Node-RED for no apparent reason, using SSDP worked OK. Now I know why...
- Yhippa 9y agoI have a Google Home and a Pixel 2. I didn't have problems until we added two Google Home Minis. It's knocked out 5G on the Verizon Quantum Gateway router and 2.4G drops out every now and then.
- hn2017 9y agoI'm having the same issue. Just bought a Google Home in December and my Verizon quantum router has been dropping repeatedly. I've had a Chromecast and Nexus 6P for years and never had any issues with it. I'm glad I finally discovered the issue, thanks to this article!
- wnevets 9y agoI thought it was the fios router just being shitty but I believe that I've been experiencing this issue aswell.
- DanCarvajal 9y agoWeird, I have a Chromecast and Google Home but have had no problems, though I do have Google Wifi...
- nathanm412 9y agoI have an Onhub with four chromecasts and five google homes and have experienced the issues described. I noticed that sometimes if I wake my galaxy s7, other devices in the room might lose connectivity for a few seconds. I couldn't place why it would happen sometimes but not others, but this makes sense. I wonder if it might also explain why if a media app is casting and goes to sleep, it forgets that it's casting when it wakes up.
- ggm 9y agoGoogle employ a small number of people to write TCP/IP core stack functionality. This is not a 'twenty hundred fiddy' people problem, its a six rising ten people problem. The core issue is: how do we get the team in question to acknowledge and respond, with a timely code change?
- dragonwriter 9y agoIt doesn't sound like it's a core TCP/IP stack problem, it sounds like it's a Google Cast support in Play Services problem.
- ggm 9y agoThe packet explosion in multicast had me thinking some upper layer call is being made, which the stack interprets to mean "keep going" in ways which then bomb the link layer out of existence. Its not TCP/IP I agree. I mis-characterized that. But I think the essential quality is the same: this heads to a single, or small number of people. Google chooses modes of operation which isolates those people from the feedback channels. I have had experience of this: go into a room, present on observed behaviour of a google service, zero outcome. Go into another room, repeat, the guy who can fix it walks to the microphone and says "thanks, I fixed that" There is no strong git, or feedback-driven path which determines success or failure notifying google about code problems. Some work, some which used to work don't work now, some which didn't work then work now. Its unstable. Its unpredictable. (for example, feedback inside bug reporting channels for Android, where the most common response from google staff is "this is the wrong channel to provide that feedback" including things which are bugs)
- ggm 9y agoOther write ups say that on wake(), the device detects a true time difference between when it said "queue up sends" and now, and rather than just sending 5, it sends the sum of all missed sends in the interval. Sleep for 5min, get 5,000. sleep for 10min, get 10,000 And, it is apparently a known side effect of a given java library, which has hit other people. (and its not a TCP/IP stack problem, its an upper layer problem so you are right)
- chubot 9y agoChromeCast 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 have problems with older phones, but that's not the only problem. mDNS on Linux with Avahi doesn't seem particularly reliable either (e.g. pinging a Linux box from a Mac.) Computers barely work :-( I guess this is why Apple insists on owning the whole stack. The compatibility matrix becomes tractable.
- rkangel 9y agoTo counter - I have had an excellent experience with my Chromecasts (I now own 3). It does everything I need, and while not completely perfect it has been really very reliable and generally 'just works'. As a user experience for playing content on your TV, the 'android as a remote' approach is great.
- jordanthoms 9y agoI have a similar experience, though I think a lot of the issues are actually with the apps - e.g. Netflix and Spotify will consistently not show my cast devices unless I quit the app and relaunch it, while other apps work ok. Google needs to get far more vigilant about ensuring the third parties are implementing it properly though - even if the bug is actually with a third party, it reflects badly on their product.
- oceanghost 9y agoI've done a LOT of chromecast development/hacking. They are to put it politely, unreliable.
- mgalgs 9y agoI have 7 Google home minis, 2 Chromecast Audios, 3 Chromecasts. Everything has worked fine up until a month or so ago. I've been using Chromecast since its initial launch and have never had these issues until now. Google severely broke something recently, that's for sure. We had a Christmas party and I gave up playing music because it kept dropping off every few minutes. It seems like it has improved the past few weeks, but still pretty shoddy.
- gkfasdfasdf 9y agoI haven't noticed this problem. I've got a Chromecast v1, Chromecast Ultra, Home Mini, Pixel phone, and Google onhub + WiFi mesh, plus a bunch of other non-google devices. Perhaps the Google routers are able to handle the burst? I do wish that Chromecast was in general a little faster at connecting / playing etc.
- innagadadavida 9y agoOh me either, but then I just have Apple TV and iPhone.
- bla2 9y agoGot a chromecast, and my phone has a lot more trouble connecting to it than it used to have. Sounds like this might be the issue. Hopefully now that it's been identified, it'll be fixed.
- habosa 9y agoI'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.
- Pxtl 9y agoI 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 isn't helping.
- SyneRyder 9y agoHmm. 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/ https://thewirecutter.com/reviews/best-wi-fi-router/
- mgcross 9y agoWell, I'm somewhat relieved to read that, in that I purchased one for the same reason but have been rebooting it at least once a day for a while now. I was initially relieved to see it may have been the Chromecast. Now I suppose it's both!
- cptskippy 9y agoI use to have my Chromecast plugged into my TV so people could stream videos and photos easily to share with people during gatherings. We use Roku for streaming. Then we took it on vacation and forgot to plug it back in. I realized the reason our WiFi was so awful in that room when I eventually plugged it back in and everyone started complaining. Now it is only ever used for vacation.
- xrd 9y agoHas 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.
- xrd 9y agoNone of my devices have guest mode turned on so I'm unsure. But, I definitely feel like these symptoms have been on our network.
- toast0 9y agoThis 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
- go_jonny_go 9y agoI am also having issues with chromecast and WiFi, weird slowdowns that never happened in the past. Casting pandora to the audio’s and mini’s always has problems. The phone will eventually start playing different songs than the cast, and at this point you are unable to control or reconnect to the cast. Like others I assumed this was a app issue.
- sghiassy 9y agoI set all my chromecast/ home devices (9 devices) to have an assigned IP from my DHCP router (ASUS). Situation has definitely improved. But still not perfect
- 27182818284 9y agoLots 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 SSID and it was confused as all heck. To its credit, though, so was my "Smart" TV. I gave up and just used a new SSID and everything worked again without all of the weird-ass problems.
- rkangel 9y agoI agree. I also regularly say that it's the best value money I have ever spent. The only unreliability I have is with certain apps that don't appear to have implemented the functionality that well. The "NFL Game Pass Europe" app for instance sometimes forgets that it's attached to the TV and you can no longer pause/stop (there are workarounds). Other apps like Netflix have been extremely solid.
- efrafa 9y agoI have same experience, it works for me all the time.
- astura 9y agoI've never had any real issues with Chromecast other than the volume cutting off a few times. I liked it so much a bought a second to replace the "smart TV" features of the upstairs tv. It's really the best UI in my opinion.
- ce4 9y agoWhich Android version do your phones run?
- sgt 9y agoI 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.
- 9y ago
- hn2017 9y agoDoes anyone know if Google is aware of this and is working on a fix?
- kwijibob 9y agoI use DD-WRT so there won't be a router update to fix this. I love my three chromecasts, however I can't really put up with this bug. What to do?
- imhoguy 9y agoMaybe some QoS rule on MDNS could help.
- toast0 9y agoWell, this certainly explains why my wifi has been feeling pretty iffy for the last couple of weeks. There was an awful lot of mDNS traffic coming from the (new to me) Google Home, and the two android phones, and mythtv (0.27) was sending every couple of seconds too. Running this tcpdump helped me track it down. tcpdump -n host 224.0.0.251 and port 5353 For the google home, I just turned it off; does anybody know of an offline voice activated clock/timer? That's the most compelling use for me. (yo clock, what time is it and/or you clock set a timer for 3 minutes / set an alarm for 5:30) For the phones, in settings / google / cast media controls, you can turn that off, I also turned off 'nearby links' in the google menu, in case that was related.
- tlog333 9y agoSounds like this issue affected my household as well. Been having wifi issues after bringing Pixel and Pixel 2 on to network with Google Home. Initially thought dropouts were due to so many neighbors in proximity.
- ce4 9y agoNot sure if it's the Chromecast. > Normally the device should send a couple of packets every 20 seconds, but in recent Android versions the apps sometimes send large bursts [...]. The longer the device has been in sleep mode, the more packets are send. I wonder if it's a side effect of aggressive battery optimization in the newest Android version (Deep sleep/Doze, etc) where packets are withheld intentionally to only be delivered in bursts and have the wifi/radio sleep in between. Naturally, Pixel get updated first. edit: typos
- colemickens 9y ago1. My Chromecast is far less reliable than it was a mere 3-4 months ago. I regularly am unable to cast from my desktop and have to resort to my phone. YouTube, especially with multiple tabs, on desktop is a nightmare to use with the Chromecast. 2. I'm basically desperate to find something to take it's place. I'm tired of the Apple-ification of Google, and I resent having to boot up Chrome just to be able to cast a video (they have it locked down to where they effectively control both sides of the infra, such that Firefox can't implement Chromecast support).
- clhodapp 9y agoIt would certainly seem like both the Chromecasts and the routers are misbehaving in this case, no?
- mosselman 9y ago"...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.
- kachurovskiy 9y agoI love Chromecast but a few issues keep making me sad. 1. Casting a photo from Photos app, pressing Android back button makes the TV screen go black. Have to remember to swipe left or right instead, or use in-app back button. 2. Photos on 4k Cast-enabled TV are shown in horrendous quality. It's definitely not 4k and compressed as hell with contrast loss. Same for videos. There used to be a ton of race conditions in YouTube TV app but those are thankfully fixed.
- madshiva 9y agoI have a Chromecast and get no problem at all. Streaming is fast, never bogus, not like all other solution that my old friends try to show me last time after 30 minutes of failure.