The Google Chromecast is a great travel companion to enable streaming to tv when you are away from home. You might be staying in an AirBNB property and there is a TV, but it is not smart. Maybe, it is but it doesn’t support your streaming apps or even you don’t fancy logging into your accounts. The Chromecast will enable you to stream over wifi from your phone to the TV. You can quickly plug the Chromescast into the television and configure on the google home app.
All fine and good then, but it does rely on you having access to a wifi network that allows you to configure the device. On a recent trip to centreparcs this was not the case – what to do?
Enter the Mango
Looking into this issue, I discovered the GL.iNet Mango. A low price travel router with a tonne of capability. At the time, this device was about £20, the same as 2 DVDs from the Centreparcs shop!
The device is one of the lower cost options from GL.iNet. This small device runs OpenWrt and can be configured via a browser or a mobile app. There are many use cases this device supports, but here I will take you through enabling casting on a network that doesn’t allow you to configure extra devices like Chromecasts. The trick revolves around the device using the provided wifi to connect to the network whilst setting up a wireless network that you are in control of.
You can configure the Mango to either clone the MAC details from your already joined phone or some other devices or you can use the captive portal functionality in the app. You are using it as a wireless repeater, but with the added bonus of having a full control of the wifi signal that you are broadcasting. With this configured you can setup the Chromecast and stream content from your own devices to the TV.
Extra Steps
I picked up an adapter that enable you to connect your Chromecast to a wired network to help ensure a stable connection from your router to the TV via the chromecast. You plug in ethernet and this is then fed to the device via the usb connection that also supplied power. This useful adapter has been repurposed at home and provides my Pi Zero running pi-hole a wired connection to my home network. The Mango has wired ports to enable connectivity to both a wan and to devices on the lan.
The OpenWrt firmware on the travel router will also support VPNs, so you can use the device to connect to your home network and stream from there, or connect via a paid service to another country to facilitate international streaming.
Additional Use Cases
There are so many useful use cases this device supports, a couple that come to mind are:
- run from a battery pack to enable wifi to reach places that might not be reachable
- simple file server using the usb port
- remote connectivity to your home network via VPNs or wireguard
- connect to other countries via paid VPNs at home
- create an additional home network to isolate your smart home devices
- if you are running pi-hole on your home network you can still use this when away from home by connecting to the Mango and using the Mango to provide a VPN connection to your home network
Wrapping up
My Mango tends to stay in my overnight bag just in case I need it when I’m away from home, and the Chromecast also comes with me on many trips as well!. Beyond this use case I really enjoyed playing with and setting up the Mango in different configurations as its flexibility and ease of use can often provide solutions to various use cases that come up.