|
TraderStav posted:Does the echo only do mono? Yes, it's mono, instead of two small speakers it has one big downfiring speaker.
|
#
?
Nov 22, 2014 05:09
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 18, 2024 19:49 |
|
|
mikemil828 posted:Yes, it's mono, instead of two small speakers it has one big downfiring speaker. Oh, that's poo poo. I thought the complaint was they the Moto hint was mono. I withdraw my comments!
|
|
#
?
Nov 22, 2014 13:53
|
|
|
TraderStav posted:Oh, that's poo poo. I thought the complaint was they the Moto hint was mono. I withdraw my comments! I'm pretty sure the complaint was really that as a headset you can only hear the Moto hint through one ear, it's kinda silly to compare the two, even if they have similar features they are meant for different purposes, you aren't going to be casually listening to music with the moto hint.
|
|
#
?
Nov 22, 2014 18:17
|
|
|
It looks like a second, bigger round of invites just went out, so you guys might want to check your e-mail.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2014 18:41
|
|
|
mikemil828 posted:I'm pretty sure the complaint was really that as a headset you can only hear the Moto hint through one ear, it's kinda silly to compare the two, even if they have similar features they are meant for different purposes, you aren't going to be casually listening to music with the moto hint. Sorta. You could do an audiobook fairly well with it. And I have small kids, so I spend more time listening to music with only one earbud in that I'd like to admit. My thinking was more like this: A bluetooth earpiece costs about $20, but usually has stereo for that price. With always-on Google Now it costs $150. The mark-up for always-on Voice is about $130. A bluetooth speaker costs about $20, but usually has a battery for that price. With always-on Amazon Voice it costs about $150 ($100 to $200). The mark-up for always-on Voice is about $130. I consider Google vs. Amazon to be wash, so for my $130 I'd prefer a portable device over a stationary one. I understand that opinions will differ on that issue. What's making me back out right now, is the fact I can almost completely duplicate this experience with a $100 Nexus 7 tablet refurb and some Google Now settings. And the tablet has a screen. So I can use it for things I need to read or watch. My money will go to the first device that can tie itself into my whole house like a combination of the Echo, the NEST thermostat, and a home intercom system. This thing is neat, but without peripherals it doesn't add much that I can't already do. Unless I'm missing something fairly important?
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2014 20:36
|
|
|
Folly posted:Sorta. You could do an audiobook fairly well with it. And I have small kids, so I spend more time listening to music with only one earbud in that I'd like to admit. It seems pretty likely that the Amazon endgame for the echo is to have it become a centralized voice controller for Internet of things gadgets such as smart thermostats and wifi light bulbs among other things, it doesn't do that now however, mostly because it would be expensive to acquire the partnerships necessary to do this and they honestly don't know if all that many people would really comfortable with an always listening device. That's why incidentally they are doing this invitation system with the 180 day return policy, it allows them to gauge the interest of a particular product while avoiding a fiasco like the fire phone. If it turns out to be successful since the echo is mostly cloud based they can pretty easily add IoT functionality later, and if it's not they can back out without too much damage to their bottom line.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2014 21:19
|
|
|
Ya. That's how I read that too. In the meantime, it's like Google Glass. It's an alpha platform that they're using to model voice interaction. But they're just a little late. If they'd released it last year, they could have beat the Google Now settings that allow any android device to provide most of this functionality. They just need 1 more big gimmick to get out the door for me. It's clearly meant to be a centralized/shared device. If it had some true multi-user capacity, like the ability to bluetooth/WiFi itself to everyone's smartphones and act as an intercom or central messaging system/alarm clock/etc. Something more like a server-ish function, instead of a terminal. And it could do that with pure software. But right now, I just can't get excited about it. As it is, its greatest feature is that it seems substantially better at listening. My phone only responds to my voice (usually) and I usually have to hold it to my face and turn the music off. My cheap tablet alternative still requires a relatively quiet room. And I totally agree with their release plan. I think the biggest thing holding me back may be that I'm a little burned out on early adoption. The 6 month return option makes it almost doable for me, but it's just not enough to make me commit without something a little more killer. I'll be keeping my eye on it though.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2014 22:36
|
|
|
I got an invite. Part of me wants to pull the trigger for $100 because I want a speaker, the other part wants to just buy a set of speakers with that money.
|
|
#
?
Dec 8, 2014 17:42
|
|
|
Reminder that they're giving away Fire phones for free when like 6 months ago people bought them for $300.
|
|
#
?
Dec 8, 2014 18:56
|
|
|
Whirlwind Jones posted:Reminder that they're giving away Fire phones for free when like 6 months ago people bought them for $300. That's why they have the invite system, it's doubtful that they are making all that much of a surplus of them. Edit: For those on the fence it's probably the best Bluetooth speaker at 100 dollars you can buy. mikemil828 fucked around with this message at 19:09 on Dec 8, 2014 |
|
#
?
Dec 8, 2014 19:07
|
|
|
mikemil828 posted:Edit: For those on the fence it's probably the best Bluetooth speaker at 100 dollars you can buy. Is it? The only major review I saw was CNET saying it's pretty bad for music
|
|
#
?
Dec 9, 2014 17:35
|
|
|
baka kaba posted:Is it? The only major review I saw was CNET saying it's pretty bad for music I actually have the Echo (if you have any questions feel free to ask) and I haven't encountered any of the distortion issues that the CNET guy claims, not sure what the hell he's talking about.
|
|
#
?
Dec 10, 2014 04:00
|
|
|
baka kaba posted:Is it? The only major review I saw was CNET saying it's pretty bad for music I've had the Echo since Thursday. I can't say if it's a better buy than other $100 wireless speakers, because I haven't listened to any, but it sounds like I expect a mono speaker with a 2.5" driver to sound. I think the CNET reviewer's claim that it was hard to listen to above 60% is an exaggeration. I've listened to some pop, jazz, and classical tracks from Prime and Auto-rip music and I never heard any distortion until it went above 70% or more. I still wouldn't call what I did hear "hard to listen to." The only reason to turn it up that loud is if you're going to be so far away that you probably won't hear the distortion anyway. Within about 6-15 feet, I think 40%-70% is loud enough for most tracks. I need to try it in my more open downstairs areas to say for sure. The speech recognition is very good in that the words that Echo "hears" are almost always correct, but if it doesn't quite know how to turn them into an action it can do odd things. I wanted to add an album of songs to the "Now Playing" queue which appears in the app so I said "Add album x to my queue." and got the response "Which playlist do you want it added to?" Now confused, I said "current", so Echo replied "Ok, adding to playlist Christmas Cocktail Party." That is a playlist I have, but nothing happened to it, probably because I didn't create it.
|
|
#
?
Dec 13, 2014 20:26
|
|
|
Anyone looking to sell theirs? I'm still waiting for an invite.
|
|
#
?
Dec 14, 2014 07:19
|
|
|
I've had mine for a week now. I have to say I prefer my current bluetooth speaker a little bit more when it comes to music or podcasts played from my phone but the echo doesn't sound bad IMO. I do enjoy the news feature and the ease of just asking for some music. Its nice to get a quick news briefing while I get ready in the morning and to not bother with my phone when I just want some quick music. Not sure if ill replace my current speaker or if I drop this off on my parents (My Dad got a kick out of the voice controls). Just wish I didn't have to say "Alexa" or "Amazon".
|
|
#
?
Dec 16, 2014 07:05
|
|
|
Mortified_Cow posted:Just wish I didn't have to say "Alexa" or "Amazon". I don't understand why things like this, Siri, etc. don't let you change what you call them.
|
|
#
?
Dec 16, 2014 07:54
|
|
|
TheJoker138 posted:I don't understand why things like this, Siri, etc. don't let you change what you call them. When you get an Echo Invite, it says that they'll add more options for the wake word. The hardware in the device is probably only capable of matching audio samples to it's preset keyword(s), not real language processing. It seems like it should be possible for a user to store an arbitrary word or phrase, but maybe the programmers can't make that reliable, especially if it needs to be responsive to anyone who might speak to it.
|
|
#
?
Dec 16, 2014 17:57
|
|
|
Mortified_Cow posted:I've had mine for a week now. I have to say I prefer my current bluetooth speaker a little bit more when it comes to music or podcasts played from my phone but the echo doesn't sound bad IMO. I do enjoy the news feature and the ease of just asking for some music. Its nice to get a quick news briefing while I get ready in the morning and to not bother with my phone when I just want some quick music. Not sure if ill replace my current speaker or if I drop this off on my parents (My Dad got a kick out of the voice controls). Just wish I didn't have to say "Alexa" or "Amazon". What are your current speakers? I need some new ones and I'm getting impatient with Amazon.
|
|
#
?
Dec 17, 2014 00:51
|
|
|
Looks like they've sent out another wave of invites. I just received one.
Call Me Charlie fucked around with this message at 17:25 on Dec 19, 2014 |
|
#
?
Dec 19, 2014 17:20
|
|
|
Aw man, I have been waiting patiently but another round skips me 
|
|
#
?
Dec 20, 2014 16:42
|
|
|
Call Me Charlie posted:Looks like they've sent out another wave of invites. I just received one. I got one a few days ago, I'm having a hard time with all the reviews because they are all overwhelmingly positive yet I can't figure out what I would actually use it for, it doesn't seem to do anything useful, at least not that isn't covered much better with Google Now which actually ties into other things.
|
|
#
?
Dec 20, 2014 21:00
|
|
|
I'm usually in the first few rounds of anything that Amazon sells...I always thought they loved me. Not this time though
|
|
#
?
Dec 21, 2014 15:43
|
|
|
suddenlyissoon posted:I'm usually in the first few rounds of anything that Amazon sells...I always thought they loved me. Not this time though Me too. I haven't received an invite so I'm taking it as they value me as a customer and don't want to sucker me into anything. 
|
|
#
?
Dec 22, 2014 00:15
|
|
|
I signed up (kinda late afternoon) on the first day and never got an invite. When did you invited goons make your request?
|
|
#
?
Dec 22, 2014 01:01
|
|
|
If anybody has any questions about this, mine should be showing up tomorrow. I'm wondering if it has the same voice search issues as the Fire TV where it can't find Baby, I'm A Star because of the comma or Sign 'O' The Times because of the ' ' around the O. At least I can turn around and get double my money out of it if I don't like it. beanieson posted:I signed up (kinda late afternoon) on the first day and never got an invite. When did you invited goons make your request? Early first day. But I wonder if they're giving preference to prime members who also use Amazon Music. I also pay the $25 a year extra for my stuff. Call Me Charlie fucked around with this message at 19:57 on Dec 22, 2014 |
|
#
?
Dec 22, 2014 19:42
|
|
|
beanieson posted:I signed up (kinda late afternoon) on the first day and never got an invite. When did you invited goons make your request? Around 1 PM Pacific on the first day; received the invite on 12/8. Call Me Charlie posted:Early first day. But I wonder if they're giving preference to prime members who also use Amazon Music. I also pay the $25 a year extra for my stuff. I almost never used Amazon music until they announced the Fire TV stick because I didn't have a simple way to play it on my main audio system. I think they classify accounts into categories like "gadget-freak", "technophobe", "large family", etc. and then send invites to get as diverse a user base as possible given the limited supply.
|
|
#
?
Dec 22, 2014 20:26
|
|
|
I signed up first day, am a Prime user, and use Amazon Music in my car sometimes, and have not yet gotten an invite.
|
|
#
?
Dec 23, 2014 05:36
|
|
|
Ok, some first impressions. - The lights on top look really good. Amazon made the right decision to make it do all sorts of flashing during set up. But the only time you see it after that is when you say Alexa or adjust the volume. - Another cool touch, when it prompted me to say "Alexa, play some prime music." in the tutorial, it played a Prince playlist because I've listened to him a lot in the past. - The app holds your hand through the entire set up. Thankfully there's a browser version if you want to use it from a laptop. - Browser app shows to-do list, shopping list, timer, alarm, now playing, amazon music, iheartradio, tunein, settings, things to try, help, general feedback, voice training. Funny how none of the reviews I've read online mention the app since it's essential to the whole experience. - Everything you say to Alexia pretty much instantly pops up in the app on a card. Even weirder, you can click the phrase Alexia thought you said and it will play the recording of what you said. - If Alexa doesn't know the answer to a question, it will queue up the question in your app to search Bing. Click it and you usually get the right answer. - The mics are sensitive. I can stand in my doorway, talk in a normal voice and it still picks me up. - The windows on how long it listens after saying Alexa or the end of what it thinks is the command is a bit short. I've been cut off before. - It sounds good to me but I don't have any bluetooth speakers to compare it to. - Voice detection is better than on the Fire TV. It found Sign 'O' The Times with no problem. - They were smart to include a remote. Adjusting the volume and skipping tracks is the exact type of thing you don't want to use voice with it. - But "Alexa, next track" doesn't work  - Alexia loves shuffling. The only way to get it to play an album in order is to say "Alexia, play the album _______" - When you have multiple versions of a single song in your library, it will play the most recent version. - It reminds me a lot of the early stages of voice recognition where you have to use the proper phrasing to get the proper response. Like "Alexia, play SomaFM PopTron" will freak it out but say "Alexia, play SomaFM PopTron from TuneIn" and it will find it. - When it has doubt about what you said, it will ask for confirmation that ______ is what you wanted. You get three chances to clarify before Alexia just gives up. Funny stuff. - "Alexa, add 'go to dinner' to my to do list" Alexa adds gin + dinner to my to do list. - "Alexa, play The Black Album." Alexa plays some Black Heat. - "Alexa, add some M&Ms to my shopping list" Alexa adds some Eminem's - "Alexa, who is Stanley Kubrick?" No hit. "Alexa, Wikipedia; Stanley Kubrick" Hit. Turns out that she thought I said 'Who Theory Kubrick' the first time. Not so funny stuff. - "Alexa, how many seasons of South Park are there?" Sorry, I couldn't find the answer to your question. - "Alexa, when is the Super Bowl?" Super Bowl XLVI was on Sunday February 5th 2012 - "Alexa, who won the 1972 Superbowl?" Sorry, I couldn't find the answer to your question. - "Alexa, who is the WWE champion?" *error boop* Overall, it's pretty cool. Having a device that you don't have to mess around with is nicer than I thought it was going to be. It needs some definite work before it gets a primetime release. More refinement when it comes to questions. More connection between my other devices (if I could control my Fire TV through it, I'd be happy) and more content sources. It's pretty barebones at the moment but the potential is there. I'm still not sure if I'm going to keep it or not.
|
|
#
?
Dec 23, 2014 23:35
|
|
|
Call Me Charlie posted:- "Alexa, who is the WWE champion?" *error boop* Alexa watched the past three months of WWE programming in milliseconds in an attempt to answer this question and failed.
|
|
#
?
Dec 24, 2014 05:15
|
|
|
Sono posted:Alexa watched the past three months of WWE programming in milliseconds in an attempt to answer this question and failed. It should just always answer "John Cena." 90% of the time it would be right.
|
|
#
?
Dec 24, 2014 08:32
|
|
|
It sounds cool but unless it can interface with spotify its a no-go for me.
|
|
#
?
Dec 26, 2014 18:35
|
|
|
I caved. I used my invite. My Echo arrived this afternoon. I haven't opened it yet. Tomorrow. Tomorrow I'll mess with it. Just to see if I have TWO things to send back to Amazon Monday.
|
|
#
?
Dec 28, 2014 08:17
|
|
|
topenga posted:I caved. They're selling for like $200 on ebay 
|
|
#
?
Dec 28, 2014 14:54
|
|
|
I got mine today. Plugged it in, playing with it, I love this thing. When it does more (Spotify integration, Calendar access, more current events stuff, maybe able to serve as a bluetooth speakerphone for phone calls?) it will be even better.,
|
|
#
?
Dec 29, 2014 01:41
|
|
|
drat thing is like a stray cat. I looked at it, I fed it, now I like it. Guess it's a keeper.
|
|
#
?
Dec 29, 2014 02:24
|
|
|
Mine's due tomorrow. USELESS TECHNOLOGY FTW! I actually have a use for it: I sew in the living room and am currently streaming sound to an Oontz Curve from my laptop. Being able to stream my enormous library directly from the Echo will be good. Amazon's retroactively adding free MP3s of everything I'd ever bought means I have an enormous sound library. I can hardly wait to start saying "Open the pod bay doors,
|
|
#
?
Dec 29, 2014 18:00
|
|
|
The Echo arrived. The Amazon lovingly-crafted unboxing experience is very, very silly. The matte black box has three tiny arrowed pull strips. Everything inside the box is lovingly banded in clear plastic, including items like the power brick?!?!?!. The Then you get this big black cylinder. So, yeah, it's a mono speaker, the sound is FM-radio adequate but not spectacular. I'd call it as good as a kitchen radio or a typical manufacturer-installed car radio. That's good enough for me, for what I'm using it for (mood music away from the main sound system.) It's been doing a fine job on recognizing my and my daughter's voices, even when music is playing. However: The word recognizer is *terrible* for classical music. "Alexa, Play Beethoven" told me that I didn't have any Beethoven in my Amazon music library. Ha. It did recognize Beethoven, but something glitched in its searching my library "Alexa, Play i by Magnetic Fields" was also a dead loss. In general, it responds by shuffling music far too often. If it doesn't know that you own an album (for instance, because Amazon's autorip service was blocked), and the album isn't on Prime Music, it plays samples from that album, which is outright annoying. I'd rather that when it doesn't match, it just said "No match". We created an iHeartRadio account for it (it doesn't support Pandora right now) and that works acceptably. In particular, "Alexa, skip" works beautifully. I notice that after 4 or 5 songs it stops playing; I'm not sure if that's an iHeartRadio feature or an Echo bug or what. The suggested queries like "Alexa, what time is it" and "Alexa, what's the weather forecast" worked correctly. I can't see me using "Alexa, Wikipedia" very often; I'd much rather read it myself. The Echo is exactly what I need for situations where I have my hands full and want to listen to music: cooking, sewing, knitting, things like that. I'm keeping mine, and I look forward to see if it's enough of a success that Amazon adds interesting-to-me features.
|
|
#
?
Dec 31, 2014 02:23
|
|
|
Arsenic Lupin posted:The word recognizer is *terrible* for classical music. "Alexa, Play Beethoven" told me that I didn't have any Beethoven in my Amazon music library. Ha. It did recognize Beethoven, but something glitched in its searching my library "Alexa, Play i by Magnetic Fields" was also a dead loss. In general, it responds by shuffling music far too often. If it doesn't know that you own an album (for instance, because Amazon's autorip service was blocked), and the album isn't on Prime Music, it plays samples from that album, which is outright annoying. It could be because your Beethoven was under another artist name. A lot of his stuff from the Amazon store is under his full name or the conductor/orchestra that performed it. You can change that on the web player through your browser but it also changes the cloud files. I guess the same thing could have happened with The Magnetic Fields. I don't have them in my library but 'Alexa, play samples from the album I by The Magnetic Fields' worked for me. The sample thing is in there because it either has or will have the ability to buy music directly from the store. I'm not sure because I have no desire to test that out. Last thing I want is for it to spaz out and charge me for something I don't want.
|
|
#
?
Dec 31, 2014 02:50
|
|
|
Call Me Charlie posted:It could be because your Beethoven was under another artist name. A lot of his stuff from the Amazon store is under his full name or the conductor/orchestra that performed it. You can change that on the web player through your browser but it also changes the cloud files. quote:The sample thing is in there because it either has or will have the ability to buy music directly from the store. I'm not sure because I have no desire to test that out. Last thing I want is for it to spaz out and charge me for something I don't want. Excellent point, and I agree with you. Alexa just correctly answered "How many teaspoons are in a tablespoon?", which was fun. I also successfully paired the Echo with my Chromebook, so it's now streaming Pandora. No voice controls, obviously.
|
|
#
?
Dec 31, 2014 02:57
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 18, 2024 19:49 |
|
|
Arsenic Lupin posted:No, it correctly expanded it to "Beethoven, Ludwig van"... which actually might be the problem, depending on whether the album indexed it correctly as "van Beethoven, Ludwig". In any case, automatic indexing of classical records sucks in general, judging by my Olive Symphony. True. Alexia could be expecting you to say Beethoven Ludwig Van or Van Beethoven Ludwig as the artist. Their system is kinda weird like that. I could tell it to play St. Vincent but it wouldn't include the album I have with David Byrne & St. Vincent because it's listed as it's own artist.
|
|
#
?
Dec 31, 2014 06:22
|
|