Before Plex, Boxee and XBMC, there was Windows Media Center. Microsoft’s original media center software is still being used by plenty of home theater and digital media enthusiasts, and it just got an interesting new feature. Media Center Cast is a Windows Media Center extension that brings some basic Chromecast capabilities to the platform.
Once installed, users are able to beam videos straight from their iOS or Android YouTube app to their media center device. Casting is also supported for Chrome tabs as long as the browser is equipped with the Google Cast extension, as well as for Google Play Music. Netflix and Google Play Movies don’t work because of proprietary protocol extensions and DRM issues.
This isn’t the first time resourceful developers have brought Chromecast capabilities to other devices: Chromecast receiver apps also exist for Android, iOS and OS X, just to name a few. Someone even managed to get a Chromecast receiver running on a Raspberry Pi.
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