If there’s one thing the global pandemic has made clear over the last year it’s how valuable it has become to easily connect a PC or mobile device to a big screen TV to engage in video conference calls, webinars and other virtual activities from the comforts of the living room.
The problem many of us have experienced is the difficulty running long HDMI cables from the source device to the television display, or trying to sync up incompatible mirroring applications between the PC/mobile device and the TV screen.
Type C+Display Alt protocol, so not all device is compatible with TwinX casting. Devices with USB-mini or full-size USB port are almost not supports DIsplay Alt protocol. So you may not be able to connect TwinX to these device via USB-C to USB adapter due to the DIsplay Alt protocol lack.
Enter EZCast, a Taiwan-based electronics solutions developer, which has just introduced its EZCast TwinX Package – a wireless transmitter dongle and TV receiver designed to wirelessly screen mirror content from a mobile phone, tablet or laptop. With Type-C+Display Alt protocol present on the device, users can easily mirror content without the need of a Type-C HDMI adapter or the installation of special software or apps.
Note that on older devices that lack USB-C+ Display Alt protocol support, the TwinX package is likely not going to work with media USB mini or USB adapters.
When linked to any supporting HDMI television users can blow up the mobile screen images onto the largest screen in the house in seconds. The system is compatible with iOS/Android/MacOS/Windows/Chrome OS, and supports Miracast, Airplay, DLNA and Chrome Browser Mirror platforms.
The system creates a wireless link between the computing device and an HDMI TV display over dual-band WiFi connections. It is integrated with wireless a transmitter and receiver for 2.4GHz and 5GHz standards and offers stable high-bandwidth connections under most household conditions.
In our run-through, we found EZCast easily and intuitively eliminated the tangle and the bother of connecting the laptop to the display by a physical cable, and without the need of any special software, apps or complicated settings.
With this solution a user need only connect the receiver end of the EZCast TwinX to the big screen TV and leave it there. Then when ever you want to connect your notebook or mobile device to the display, simply plug in the EZCast TwinX C-1 transmitter to a USB-C port on the device and you’re ready to go. The dongle even includes a large round backlit button to turn the link on and off for those who might prefer to leave the dongle connected over long periods.
In our review, the on-screen image on a 65-inch TCL Series 6 4K mini-LED LCD TV was tack sharp when working with an MS Word document relayed from a connected Lenovo ThinkPad. The transmitted image cast by the TwinX system to the big-screen TV is sent in Full HD 1080p resolution, but the 4K television we used for our test upscaled the picture with aplomb.
Text was legible from more than 16 feet away (in our case, even without the assistance of reading glasses). The only caveat is that when the television was set to movie mode, we noticed a slight lag, which made it awkward viewing and manipulating on-screen cursors in real time.
But we quickly remedied the issue by switching the TCL TV we were using to Game Mode to work with computer documents displayed or when playing streamed video games on a large screen. We expect more advanced gaming applications may exhibit some lag issues, however. We were similarly successful using the TV’s game mode in eliminating slight lip-sync issues viewing videos streamed by the notebook and viewed on the big-screen.
Why might you want to do this you may be asking? How about trying to involve the whole family in viewing a virtual program – like a large family video conference call or watching a speaker present a program from the local library in a way that everyone in the home can enjoy at one time. It’s even a great way to present a slide show or home videos from a PC or home server-stored content library.
It’s also a convenient way to engage in live YouTube vlog-casts. By casting the image from a notebook to a TV a viewer can participate in a live chat using the PC or tablet while viewing the full community chat and the video presenter on a big bright TV screen with the convenience and speed of a full-size keyboard at your disposal.
The one caveat is that the system supports only up to Full HD 1080p resolution, so you won’t be able to stream Ultra HD content from the web in full resolution to a 4K or 8K TV. The content will be down-rezed for transmission and upscaled by the display device on the receiving end. But we found the images were acceptably free of distracting upscaling artifacts with the TV display used in our trial. Your experience may vary depending on the quality of the television used.
See What Your 4K UHD TV Can Really Do With The Spears & Munsil 4K UHD Blu-ray Disc, $39.95.
Amazon’s Best Selling 4K Ultra HDTVs
Amazon’s Camera, Photo & Video Deals
Amazon Fire TV Cube Media Adapter with Alexa
Amazon Fire TV Stick with Alexa Voice Remote
Amazon Echo Smart Speaker with Alexa Voice Control
Amazon Echo Show 8 Alexa Voice Controlled Smart Screen
Amazon Echo Dot with Clock Voice Controlled Speaker
Amazon Echo Studio 3D Audio Alexia Smart Speaker
Best Selling Soundbars and 5.1 Surround Systems
Another experience the pandemic has made all-too-familiar is working from home. The EZCast TwinX package allows you to type a document or attend to emails on a big-screen display while stretching out on a sofa or even a bed without the need to grab the reading glasses (in our case, your vision might be better or worse). The connection is even compatible with Google Assistant voice commands.
So what is the EZCast TwinX Package exactly? It’s a diminutive $79 suggested retail kit containing the EZCast TwinX C-1 transmitter dongle that connects to a PC or mobile device via a USB-C mini input and the EZcast Compact CS2 receiver, which is a short cable with a full-size male USB plug on one end and a full-size HDMI connector on the other end.
The solution enabled us to make an almost instantaneous connection between the source device and the television.
To accomplish this we connected the TwinX CS2’s USB end to the USB port on the TV set and plugged the other end of the cable into one of the HDMI ports a few inches away. Most televisions are setup to accommodate this today. If you have an older television without a stable-powered USB port close by on the set, it might require getting a USB power adapter and a suitably long extension cable to connect the USB adapter end of the CS2 into the nearest power outlet, and the HDMI end of the cable then can be connected to the TV’s HDMI port.
The TwinX C-1 transmitter dongle will require a notebook and mobile device with a USB-C+Display Protocol type port. Again, most mobile devices sold in the past several years now include this type of USB-C port, but check your product documentation first, to be sure.
Another benefit of the EZCast TwinX C-1 transmitter is that it is compatible with other EZCast receiver solutions, so that signals from one EZCast dongle can be received by multiple display devices, like a TV and a projector, simultaneously.
Conclusion
For anyone in need of connecting a laptop or mobile device to a big screen quickly, easily, stably and without any long HDMI cable entanglement, we found the EZCast TwinX Package to be a high-value accessory product to accomplish the task. Hopefully, the Covid-19 pandemic has seen its final days but if it should linger on or flair up again heading into the winter months, the merging of both TV and computing devices fast and easily could be more than just a luxury to anyone entrenched in the world work-at-home or virtual commuting.
It even opens up new flexible options for streaming entertainment videos through a browser, when a smart TV or adapter lacks a certain app or web-site-specific entertainment video. We therefore rate the EZCast TwinX package a recommended buy and award it five out of five hearts.
The EZCast TwinX Package, which contains EZCast TwinX C-1 + EZCast Compact CS2, is available at $79 on the EZCast official store now and will be available at Amazon in July. Note that at the time of this posting, EZCast had launched the system at a 25% discount from the official store website.
The EZCast TwinX Package used in this review was supplied by the manufacturer.
Online purchases made using links provided on this site might generate a small commission for HD Guru.com. We thank you for your support!
By Greg Tarr
Have a question for the HD Guru? HD GURU|Email
Copyright ©2021 HD Guru Inc. All rights reserved. HD GURU is a registered trademark.
Stay connected