Do you want to play a video stored on your PC or Mac on your connected TV? Use Go2TV, a free and lightweight software that requires no additional hardware and virtually no settings.
To play a multimedia file (video, photo, audio) stored on a computer on a television, there are many solutions. You can simply use an HDMI cable or the Google Chromecast, the implementation of which we detail in our practical sheet. However, if you have a television connected, and therefore connected to your local network (via Ethernet or Wi-Fi), you can broadcast any multimedia content from your computer, Mac or PC, without connecting any cables and without spending one cent. All you have to do is install the small open source software Go2TV. The only prerequisite: your TV must be able to manage the UPnP (Universal Plug & Play) and DLNA (Digital Living Network Alliance) protocols. The first allows devices connected to your network to identify each other and the second allows content sharing between devices connected to the network. The vast majority of connected televisions are compatible with these two protocols. Then Go2TV does all the work for you. It thus offers to play photos, videos and also audio content stored on your computer on the TV. Go2TV thus recognizes several file formats such as MP4, AVI, MKV, MPEG, MOV, WebM, M4V and MPV for videos as well as MP3, FLAC and WAV for audio. In addition, it also allows you to read content stored online, directly from its URL (its Internet address). Go2TV requires no installation on the computer and no settings on the TV. The only small complaint: if the software allows you to associate a subtitle file with a video (in SRT format), it does not allow you to choose a language when the subtitles are integrated directly into the file (with the MKV in particular).
How to play video on TV with Go2TV?
Completely free and without any advertising, Go2TV weighs only a few megabytes. The app does not require installation and works on PC, macOS and Linux. It even benefits from an Android version. For the demonstration, we will use a PC running Windows 11.
► Download the version of Go2TV that suits your computer. Unzip the Zip archive then open the software.
► Switch on your TV. No need to search for a particular channel or any setting. Just make sure it’s connected to your network via Wifi or Ethernet.
► It is possible that Go2TV raises an alert from Windows about an attempt to pass through the firewall. Click on Allow Access.
► After a few seconds, the list of UPnP/DLNA devices detected on the network appears at the bottom of the window. Your TV should appear there. You will notice in passing in our example that Go2TV has also detected audio devices (Sonoro and Roberts) connected to the network. Convenient if you want to stream music there from the computer.
► Click the button Select Media File. Browse through your storage space tree to choose the video file you want to play on the TV. Select the file and confirm with a click on Open.
► Now click on the name of your TV in the list of devices connected to the network.
► All you have to do is click on the button Play to start playback on the TV.