Google has the Chromecast, though the Australian availability has been limited to importing one from the US. Now ASUS is stepping up with a media caster of its own with the unimaginatively named Miracast Dongle.
The ASUS dongle plugs into your TV and a power point, then with any Miracast equipped phone or tablet – such as the Nexus 7 – you should be able to mirror your device’s screen straight onto your TV’s screen. I say should, as ASUS is being a bit tight lipped when it comes to device compatibility, only mentioning on their page that it will support certain ASUS products such as the MeMO Pad, Fonepad 7, Transformer and the Nexus 7. There is little reason that the Miracast Dongle won’t work with any Miracast phone or tablet, such as the Nexus 4 and Nexus 10.
The dongle will play whatever is on your phone or tablets screen in Full HD, and it also supports dual-band Wi-Fi (2.4GHz and 5GHz). It’s eminently suitable for casting games onto the big screen with you using your device as a controller, or watching movies/Youtube videos, photographs, web pages – anything that’s displayed on you phone/tablet.
It also comes with a gallery, so that any content that is loaded into the gallery can be played on your TV, even if you are doing other things on your phone/tablet, and with the gallery in use you can turn off the display on your device.
Android Community reports that the ASUS Miracast Dongle is expected to retail for 79 euros – around $113 – which is a steep price compared to the US $35 that the Chromecast costs in the States. No official pricing has been announced though, nor release details. We’ll keep you updated on this product as more information becomes available.
Do you have a Chromecast or similar product? How do you like it? Let us know in the comments!
Does miracast, or anything else, support input back from the mirrored screen (if it was touchscreen)? Because then it would be great to have Google maps display on a car dashboard.
I feel a little cheated that it won’t work with a N7 2012. I know the technical limitations due to single band WiFi but even at 150M I should still be able to stream SD video.
Love my chromecast! Great for house parties! Just get your mates connected then no single person is responsible for the music, be it on YouTube or G Music 🙂
I have a Chromecast which is great, but isnt really a Miracast device – the phone just tells it to download the content from the internet. Also have a Netgear PTV3000 which works well with the Nexus 5, but is terrible with the Nexus 7 and Nexus 4.