Can playing Stadia games on your Chromecast Ultra cause it to overheat? It would seem it’s possible according to some users on Reddit.
For clarification, a post on the r/Stadia subreddit from a user who goes by u/armadeon7479 says they played games through the Chromecast Ultra, and eventually it simply shut off in the middle of gameplay.
Other users appear to have had the same issue. During our review period prior to launch, our Chromecast Ultra also got extremely hot after playing games for around an hour or two. It didn’t shut off though.
According to this user, the gameplay session lasted for around four hours. The streaming resolution was also at 4K. So these are factors that likely contributed.
Stadia on the Chromecast Ultra shouldn’t overheat for everyone
According to a Google response who reached out to 9To5Google, this sort of thing was tested. Extensive testing also didn’t result in this kind of problem. Meaning Google claims it never experienced this.
It would also seem that more users are not having this issue than ones that are. Still, it’s something to keep an eye on. Other things to consider is that streaming Netflix or other video services for a long period of time can also cause the CCU to get pretty hot.
If you’re planning on playing for extended periods of time, it might be a good idea to take a break every so often to avoid this issue.
Google doesn’t have a reason for the shutdowns
As noted above Google says that it extensively tested Stadia with the Chromecast Ultra. And that it didn’t see this issue pop up. It also mentions that Chromecast Ultra doesn’t have any thermal throttling issues.
That may be true, but that doesn’t change the fact that some users are experiencing the shutdowns. Right now Google hasn’t spoken up about why some users may have run into this situation.
This might become a bigger problem though if more users end up with the same thing happening. That would be the last thing Google needs after the handful of launch issues, which included orders and codes being sent out to buyers out of order.
The takeaway for now should be that there appears to be no problems with the Chromecast Ultra units. More or less, them getting hot is par for the course if you use them long enough. In short, keep playing your games and maybe just take a break once in a while. Or switch devices.