Rumor mill: Google is reportedly gearing as much as unveil its second-generation Chromecast with Google TV 4K 4 years after launching the first-gen mannequin. The corporate additionally launched a extra inexpensive HD variant in 2022, however this guarantees to be a full-fat sequel to the unique mannequin, full with 4K streaming capabilities.
The report comes from 9to5Google, which claims that the Android-powered dongle will ship with a brand new distant, however maintain its $49.99 price-tag, presumably making it an actual competitor in opposition to different similarly-priced streaming units from Amazon and Roku.
There is not any phrase on what to anticipate from the brand new gadget by way of its {hardware}, however Google will possible implement some adjustments to make it extra highly effective than its predecessor. For reference, the 2020 mannequin is powered by an Amlogic S905X3 processor, which has a quad-core Arm Cortex-A55 CPU clocked at 1.9 GHz. It additionally contains 2 GB of RAM and eight GB of inner storage.
Chromecast customers trying to improve from the prevailing mannequin shall be hoping that the brand new variant will carry a sooner processor, extra reminiscence and extra storage. On-line speculations recommend that it may include the newer Amlogic S905X5 chipset that’s anticipated to be sooner and extra energy environment friendly than the older processor.
The S905X5 is constructed on a 6nm manufacturing course of, which represents a generational change over the 12nm node of the X3 and X4. It additionally features a new CPU with Cortex-A510 Armv9 cores and a Mali-G310 V5 GPU. Together with these {hardware} enhancements, the S905X5 helps H.266 decoding. New Android TV containers powered by the brand new chip have already been introduced, though they’re but to hit the market.
As for the rumored new distant, a video discovered inside Android TV 14 beta final yr seemingly revealed that it may have a redesigned button structure that features 4 massive spherical buttons on the left aspect and two massive spherical buttons plus a 3rd massive rectangular button on the correct. In keeping with Android professional and former XDA editor-in-chief Mishaal Rahman, there may even apparently be a customizable “Magic button” that would let customers select whether or not urgent the button will “open a favourite app” or “view and change inputs for TV or different units.”