Annoying (incorrect) concurrency error

[SRFman]

I have the NOW TV app on my Android 11 phone and a Sports subscription but I don't have the Boost.

I have two Chromecasts, one upstairs and one downstairs. After I have finished watching upstairs I select "stop casting" in the app. When I go downstairs and try and start the programme in the app ready to cast to the downstairs Chromecast I get the following error message :

Concurrency Error. Oops! Viewing has stopped as you're streaming simultaneously on the maximum number of devices. To watch on this one, you'll need to stop playback on one of your other devices.

But, as I have mentioned, I have already stopped casting upstairs, so why am I getting this message? I have tried clearing the app cache, forcing the app to stop and restarting my phone but it still takes at least 10 minutes before I can start watching again.

Why is there such an annoying delay in allowing me to swap my viewing device?

Thanks
Steve

[RoyB]

@SRFman 

Now need to be sure you have gone from the other device.

But if I were designing this, the dialogue would go:-

You have reached the maximum number of devices allowed.

Do you want to stop one to continue here? If so, please select one:-

(Up to three devices listed here)
Or if there is only one, the line would be:-

Do you want to stop it to continue here? If so, please select it:-

(One device listed here)

As Now can force a remote logout on any device they choose, I’m pretty sure they can force a remote stop on the stream, without going as far as forcing a logout.

[SRFman]

Yes, agree. The app should be more intelligent!

[RoyB]

@SRFman 

Now have clarified the rules about switching from one device to another, in a way that can avoid the ten minute wait:-

https://help.nowtv.com/article/managing-my-devices
(second item)

But I don’t quite know how this applies to casting, as I have never understood casting anyway.

If you (or anyone) knows or can figure out what works here for casting, can you please post back how you did it?

[Mark_Weinreb]

@SRFman One thing you could try is to unplug the power lead from the chromecast (as well as stopping casting) before watching on your other tv.

From my own experience, chromecast devices seem to “hang on” to the stream for a few minutes after you stop casting to them. Presumably in order to make reconnecting faster.

[SRFman]

Yes, thanks. I will try switching off the power to the Chromecast. Even though I shouldn't have to do that!

Cheers

[Rackers]

Did it work though? 

[CynicalOptimist]

I found this post while struggling with the same errors. I think I might have cracked it.

My solution was to skip directly to the end of the episode I was watching, I saw the last couple of seconds of the credits, and then my Chromecast went back to the resting "Now TV" screen (the same screen that shows if you start casting from the app, but haven't started playing any particular show).

After doing that, I was able to stop Now TV on my Chromecast and start watching on another device, without getting any concurrency errors.

Note: so far I've only done this once, and I don't know for sure whether my solution actually worked. Maybe the problem resolved itself, and it was just a coincidence that it happened while I was trying something.

But if this does work, then I think the key thing is that I stopped playback (I wasn't streaming any video) without stopping the app (My Chromecast was still showing a "NowTV" screen). That means the app was still running on the Chromecast, which meant the app could send a message to the NowTV servers, and actually tell them that I'd stopped watching.

This might be harder to do when you're streaming something live, like live sports, because you can't just skip to the end. But you could try switching to something else on the original device, and skipping to the end of that.