Google Home to be release Nov 4th

Now available for preorder for $129 which is less expensive than the full blown Amazon Echo device. The Verge discussed a unit that they were able to test  that they felt was smarter than Siri and the Alexa stating that it was able to understand context in a question and find information from around the web.

It is going to be available in different colors, and they felt the speakers had better quality than the Echo. Google Home works with YouTube Music and Google Play Music, six months of YouTube Red,  and integrates with Spotify, Pandora, iHeartRadio and TuneIn. Any of the third-party services can be used as the default music service if you like.

Home also acts as a Chromecast Audio receiver, so you can choose to cast the music to any Chromecast-connected television or speakers in the house, and you can play music in multiple rooms at once.

Click here to see The Verge’s article here.

Special offer on Amazon’s Echo Dot

At $49.99, this device is pretty interesting. Dan Seifert from the verge did a quick review that goes over the basic new functions that are coming out that make this very interesting. With Google coming out with its own product to rival this one we are in for some interesting new options in this market. Its worth a quick read above if you interested in this technology.

Amazon Echo vs. Amazon Tap

It is amazing how a seemingly simple device can so quickly become a part of your everyday life without you really considering its impact on the many different types of interactions you may have with it. The Amazon Echo has become one of those devices that hardly ever remains unused in the household either by myself or my wife. We use it as an speaker extension to our many handheld devices to entertain us through a davorite podcast while we play words with friends on a lazy weekend afternoon. We'll request from Alexa to play some accoustical music to give us some background music while we discuss and solve the many items that come in our daily lives. I come down in the morning and ask for my daily calendar to begin for the day's events that I must prepare to work on.

With the ability to play online radio stations, I can get information on what is happening on sports talk shows and other news stations in our local area. It has caused me to look for applications that will enhance its capabilities like finding a program to sync my outlook calendar with my google calendar so that I don't have to do double input in both areas. 

I love redirecting the playing of my Audible books to the Alexa to give my ears a rest from the earbuds I wear all night long. While the Echo might not have the rich bases that some other wireless/bluetooth speakers might have, it more then sufficient for the spoken word.

I just finished a review of the Amazon Tap that was written up on the Verge and can see many of the points that they brought with the Magic being lost with not being able to grab Alex's attention by addressing it from across the room. Having to physically touch a similar device to get its attention reduces its impact. But this drawback might not be as bad in certain types of use scenarios. I could see where the device is always at arms length, that reaching out to begin your interaction might not be so bad and the fact that it is so portable makes it nice to be able to bring it with you as your location continues change as it does so often during the long summer days.

It has a nice long battery life (9 hours), that makes it a functioning companion for a relatively full day of use. This makes it that much more intriguing to me to actually mke me consider adding it our household of friendly devices.

Amazon's Echo Speaker

I have been listening to one of my favorite podcasts for a while now and one of the hosts talks from time to time about how much she likes Amazon's Echo Speaker system and I finally saw an article in Engadget discussing the fact that Audible files now can be directly accessed through the speaker.

I am such a big Audible fan that having another source through which I can listen to the books I am reading, yes I understand that I'm listening to them but to me it's the way that I consume most of the books I read for enjoyment.

However, the Echo Speaker is available through invitation only through Amazon so I have to put my request for an invitation to purchase one through the Amazon service. As a Prime user you can an automatic discount of $50 of the price of the unit is $149.

Connectivity is one of the things that you always are looking for in today's new speaker devices and the Echo Speaker does a lot of the things that you would expect. First to connects through Wi-Fi back to the Internet so that as you are asking questions it will use that Internet connection to gather information to respond to you with an answer. It is also Bluetooth enabled allowing you to connect your tablet or phones back to the speaker so that you can play from applications that you are using on those devices. Also available for both Android and iOS devices is a companion application that allows you to connect to the speaker as well.

It also connects to your WeMo compatible devices using voice commands. A list of these controllers are available on the Amazon Echo's website. The Echo's brain is not built into the unit itself but is actually operating from Amazons Web Services. Over time, the Echo will continue to learn your speech patterns, vocabulary and personal preferences. All updates are done in the cloud so you don't have to worry about doing them locally on the device.

Echo is always ready, connected, and fast. Just say the wake word, "Alexa," for:

• New - Connected Home: Control compatible WeMo and Philips Hue devices with your voice.
• New - Pandora: Listen to and discover music from Pandora's library of over 1 million tracks.
• New - Traffic: Hear commuting time and the fastest route to your destination.
• New - Sports: Ask for sports scores and schedules from the NFL, NBA, MLS, MLB, and more.
• Music: Listen to your Amazon Music Library, Prime Music, TuneIn, and iHeartRadio.
• News, weather, and information: Hear up-to-the-minute weather and news from a variety of sources, including local radio stations, NPR, and ESPN from TuneIn.
• Questions and answers: Get information from Wikipedia, definitions, answers to common questions, and more.
• Alarms, timers, and lists: Stay on time and organized with voice-controlled alarms, timers, shopping, and to-do lists.
• More coming soon: Echo automatically updates through the cloud with new services and features.

With all of these features, how can you help not wanting to own one for yourself?