Comments from Google accounts on Twitter and Reddit say they are working on a fix.
Hey there, we're aware of an emerging issue impacting Chromecast 2nd gen and Chromecast Audio devices and are working on a fix. Do not factory reset your device - we will keep you all updated when the fix rolls out. If you have already factory reset your device, we will provide instructions to set your device back up as soon as possible. Thank you for your patience.
I bought a Chromecast Audio right before they were discontinued, trying to get in while I still could. It's the only way I cast to a wired speaker system from the 80s that works reliably.
I loved the convenience but I will not go along with their cash grabs. I will not buy their new product because they took away the old one that was still working.
They were discontinued because they lost a patent case. This one I won't blame on Google... cept maybe for their legal team not flagging it for patent infringement.
Just looked it up. It was with Sonos. It was also when they removed the ability to stream to multiple devices at once (I think that changed , but got rid of a lot of my chrome speakers due to the decline in recognition.)
I have to think there's some project out there where you could plug a 3.5 to RCA adapter into a Pi and use it in a similar fashion. Maybe would need a bridge app from the 'cast' function to connect to it, but I expect not impossible.
The computational capacity of the first gen compared to current gen is huge. As such, there are a few popular projects that try to be an everything-streamer