Do you still have an original Chromecast from 2013 lying around? The chances are not so great, because it was only with the second generation that the popularity really started to increase. The original Chromecast looked like a glorified USB stick. A kind of key for your television. This is in contrast to the second generation, where the round puck is connected to your TV via a short cable. To date, the original Chromecast still received software updates and this model was still usable. However, Google is discontinuing support for the original model and warns that performance may also decrease from now on.
The latest update is dated to 9to5Google from November 2022. Version 1.36.159268 fixed some bugs and made some improvements. It took that too several years until the previous update. The company promised in 2019 that the original Chromecast would no longer receive major updates, but launched an update in 2022. That appears to have been the last update. Although the product will continue to work for the time being, it can just be done without software and security updates. Google itself releases the following via the support page:
Support for Chromecast (1st gen) has ended, which means these devices no longer receive software or security updates, and Google does not provide technical support for them. Users may notice a degradation in performance.
The second generation of Chromecasts and the more recent ones Chromecast with Google TV continue to receive plenty of support, so you can still cast plenty.
