Chromecast once again rooted, but new hurdles to root
The Chromecast has once again been rooted at software versions 16664. Unfortunately, much like the last time, you’re going to have to purchase some hardware in order to do it.
Teak Eureka is not releasing the root method for a couple of weeks, as they expect it to be patched fairly quickly by Google when the exploit is released into the wild. They are also not releasing it yet because you’ll need to order a device called a Teensy++ 2.0, and have a powered USB-OTG cable handy.
So essentially you’ll have about $30 sunk into rooting a $35 product when it comes down to it. You might be wondering at this point why would you want to pay nearly double to obtain root on the Chromecast.
Among other things, you can use your Chromecast in areas where it’s restricted by changing the DNS, change region-aware settings for services like YouTube, use services like put.io (torrent cloud downloader,) on the Chromecast, control whether or not you receive software updates, update the apps whitelist, and poke around some of the more obscure parts of the Chromecast.
Interesting stuff is possible with root on a Chromecast, however if it’s currently working for you as is there always exists the possibility that you could brick the thing in the rooting process, so there’s always that risk around also.
The root method will be released in the near future, so if you’re wanting to be able to root your current software version of the Chromecast you might want to go ahead and pull power from it and not let it connect to the network. If it auto updates before the release of the new exploit method, chances are you’ll have purchased $30 of equipment that will just be sitting on a table waiting for the next exploit method.
In the meantime, you can watch the video above to see what they’re doing, and keep up with the discussion at the source link below.
[xda-developers]
