USB Sound when casting to a projector.

[Barreller]

When I cast from my Mac Mini to my  Chromecast I lose USB sound output.  Is there a way around this?

[Byteguy]

Are you talking about the USB sound from your Computer?

If so, no, there is no way around that.  When you cast the video and sound move to the device you are casting to (your projector).

[Barreller]

Thanks for the reply.  I have to ask why it is designed like this.  What I want to do seems simple.  I am casting to a ceiling mounted projector which has a small mono amplifier and I want to take a USB output into an external audio interface and then to mixer, amplifier and speaker cabs.  It just isn't practical to take a stereo output from the projector to the mixer.

[Byteguy]

Normally, when you cast the stream goes from the source (Netflix, YouTube, etc) directly to the Chromecast device.  Your computer does not transport the stream.  Your computer just gets updates and acts as a remote control.

Google does this so that your computer (phone, or tablet) does not have to work hard and cannot impact the quality of the stream.  In some cases you can even turn OFF your computer and the casting continues.

Because of this, your computer is no longer getting the sound (which could also go out of sync) to process.

Keep in mind that Chromecast was designed for use on TVs so the issue of projectors not having good speakers or being located well for output was not something Google was trying to solve.

[Barreller]

I do understand how casting usually works and indeed have been doing that from phones and tablets to both of the Chromecasts which I have.  The results have been very good.  In this case I am casting directly from the computer which is accessing APS such as YouTube and iPlayer and is also being fed by a video capture device.  The video and audio streams are being transported by the computer but I do fail to see why the USB output is inhibited when I cast from the computer.  I accept that there might well be synchronisation problems and have reluctantly decided that using the Chromecast is probably not viable.  I will have to investigate a networking solution but thanks very much for your input.