Amazon Echo

[NikNak]

Hi all

Can any one out there with an Amazon Echo help....

Looks like we'll be taking the plunge and buying one of the 'smart speakers' from amazon, and just wondering if i also went for one of the 'dot' speakers too, could i get it to play the radio in the kitchen and music in the bedroom.? Or would/do they just act as one speaker (connected to the same Amazon account) and only capable of doing one thing together.?

Cheers guys....


Nick

 

[sammy.se]

I assume one device will be the 'echo dot' and the other will be the 'echo'?

If so, they are fully independent devices and you can play different things on them. Also, you can communicate between both devices.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

 

[treeturner123]

Just make sure you don't have a talking parrot!!!

 

[RogerS]

A great story in today's times. Guy in a block of flats never needed his heating on when the neighbour below was there. Trouble was that said neighbour periodically would go away for work etc and turn the heating off. He uses Alexa. So the guy in the flat above used to go down to the neighbours' door, open the letterbox and say 'Alexa - put the heating on'. :lol:

 

[Phil Pascoe]

:lol: I nearly posted that one earlier.

 

[MARK.B.]

In a word Yes

 

[Fergal]

I have an echo dot and a google mini which are both pretty similar devices.

If you primarily want it for playing music, I'd say the google device has better audio quality as it has a better speaker. That said, my echo dot is the previous generation model and the current one (gen 3) may be better in that regard.

As for integrating with smart home devices, they both do a good job, with the google mini probably having a slight edge on that. It is also better at answering questions having the google search engine behind it, the echo dot often cannot understand what you're asking for unless it's phrased in a very specific way. Overall, I think the google mini is the better of the two, but not by much. My main annoyance with it is having to say "OK Google" to wake it up.

 

[petermillard]

FWIW you’ve been able to set up ‘voice profiles’ on the echo for a while, which would have prevented the Times story silliness.

My main annoyance with it is having to say "OK Google" to wake it up.

It’s the reason we went with the echo, tbh. The latest echo dot is much has a much better speaker than the previous, fine for spoken word and OK for ‘casual’ listening. What’s the English voice like on Google home? Alexa’s Pretty good, way better than the Siri voice.

 

[OscarG]

Sorry to bump an old thread but thinking of getting one of these as the price has just dropped.

Is there any difference between the Amazon smartplugs and another branded (alexa compatible) plug?

Can you have multiple smart plugs linked to Alexa?.... so you can say "Alexa...turn on kettle", "Alexa....turn on coffee machine" etc?

 

[sammy.se]

Short answer - yes, you can have multiple devices
You can even have routines, so that your kettle turns on at a preset time, or after an event, etc.

 

[sunnybob]

Beware too much technology.
My friend has his whole house wired with all this voice activated stuff (alexa, put out the cat and bring in the dog" )

fine untill the local internet provider had a 2 day line fault.
He couldnt even turn on the room lights when it went dark outside, let alone not watch any TV. and he was lucky it was warm outside. :shock:

 

[whatknot]

I honestly can't think of anything worse than a little box listening to everything you say

Its bad enough with laptops & smart phones listening in

I wouldn't have one of the voice response speakers as a gift

 

[Trainee neophyte]

You want to put a listening device into your bedroom? Are you sure?

Thank you for sharing.

 

[gregmcateer]

I honestly can't think of anything worse than a little box listening to everything you say

Its bad enough with laptops & smart phones listening in

I wouldn't have one of the voice response speakers as a gift

I know - the other day I asked the kids AGAIN, to come in for tea and they asked me why I was whispering. I said I was worried that the government or spies were listening in.
They laughed.
I laughed.
Alexa laughed.

 

[sammy.se]

I honestly can't think of anything worse than a little box listening to everything you say

Its bad enough with laptops & smart phones listening in

I wouldn't have one of the voice response speakers as a gift

I know - the other day I asked the kids AGAIN, to come in for tea and they asked me why I was whispering. I said I was worried that the government or spies were listening in.
They laughed.
I laughed.
Alexa laughed.

Lol

Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk

 

[John Brown]

You people must have far more exciting lives than I do.
We have an Echo Dot, and while I'm pretty certain it doesn't send anything over the net without the trigger word( it would be a fairly easy thing to prove with a bit of effort), I honestly couldn't give a tinker's dam either way. Nothing I say seems to be remotely interestingto my immediate family, so I can see a lot of headphone wearing operatives at GCHQ struggling to stay awake.

 

[whatknot]

I don't think anyone is daft enough to think that there are thousands of spies/government agencies hanging on peoples every word

But I am surprised that some seem quite happy that they use the data they gather to bombard us with ever more spam in various ways, the paper spam has mostly dried up nowadays but electronic spam has increased many fold

Some seem quite happy for our data to be used in whatever way MS et al decide, personally I take exception to it

 

[John Brown]

I think you underestimate the daftness of people.
As far as using your data goes, that's the price you pay for free apps, such as Facebook etc. This forum, that I hilariously refer to ad tmbr, is the nearest I get to social media, but I believe FB et al make it clear in the terms and conditions that they will sell your data to the highest bidder. Not that anyone reads Ts and Cs...

 

[whatknot]

I agree there is a price to pay *if* you allow it

A lot of smart phone aps request full access to all your data, regardless of whether its relevant, which gives them carte blanche to take your data and do with as they will, so I don't use those aps

Likewise facebook, if you play their silly games, of likes etc you will be bombarded with junk you don't want

But you can't get away from it completely, only minimise it, hence why I won't be having an Alexa any time soon ;-)

 

[sammy.se]

Amazon never sell data.
They may use it to personalize offers you see on the Amazon websites for you only, but they never ever sell it. Amazon have one of the best data policies on all the big tech companies.
There were some news stories about Amazon echo data being used in the US for a criminal investigation, but I don't know the details.

By the way, there is a button on the Echo dot, that you can use to stop the echo listening, when you want absolute certainty it won't listen for any wake words.

Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk