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Google Home Reviews: Handsome Design Not Enough to Outweigh 'Rough Around the Edges' Feel

BruiserB said:
I'm sure that's a cool feature, but at least from reading about it, it feels like we're still a few years away on that technology and it's still too expensive. I'm not going to spend $50-$200 extra for every lamp, thermostat, door lock, etc that I'd like to control. Eventually I'm sure automation will become a lot more mainstream and it will be built in by default in these items. I always considered myself pretty super geek early adopter, but I'm also cheap.
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Early adopters usually aren't cheap. It's like an oxymoron. Early adopters will pay $1500 for a drone, Google Glasses or VR to be the first one to play with those technologies. Later adopters wait for them to get down to $50.

It seems that the home automation people must be very busy people with lots of money since these things are crazy expensive. Sure, I'd love to have the lights in my house change colors to fit different moods, and have music play along with this in all the rooms in the house, but I want to spend $1 a lightbulb, not $50.

It would be cool to say, 'Alexa... set the mood for my lady friend.' and have lights dim to a low red, LED candles flicker on, Barry White music on all the speakers in the house, fireplace lights up, heat on the thermostat rises a few degrees, shades draw closed, hot tub starts... sure, it would be nice, but not thousands of dollars nice. But if I was rich, yes.
 
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Derekuda said:
HAH!!! Riiiiight. All the cash/celebrity status from Tim didn't come from being the CEO of Apple at all? /s
Keep tricking yourself into believing that friend. o_O
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You come across as quite ignorant.
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bbeagle said:
Early adopters usually aren't cheap. It's like an oxymoron. Early adopters will pay $1500 for a drone, Google Glasses or VR to be the first one to play with those technologies. Later adopters wait for them to get down to $50.

It seems that the home automation people must be very busy people with lots of money since these things are crazy expensive. Sure, I'd love to have the lights in my house change colors to fit different moods, and have music play along with this in all the rooms in the house, but I want to spend $1 a lightbulb, not $50. It would be cool to say, 'Alexa... set the mood for my lady friend.' and have lights dim to a low red, LED candles flicker on, Barry White music on all the speakers in the house, fireplace lights up, heat on the thermostat rises a few degrees, shades draw closed, hot tub starts... sure, it would be nice, but not thousands of dollars nice. But if I was rich, yes.
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The ladyfrien bit was quite funny. Mine would run away and never come back though. Sometime inbetween the red LED and Barry White :)
 
Am I alone, or does anyone else just feel like talking to a machine feels odd? Talking to Siri or any voice assistant has always made me feel kind of silly. Especially if there's a chance someone else is around and hearing me.
 
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BruiserB said:
I'm sure that's a cool feature, but at least from reading about it, it feels like we're still a few years away on that technology and it's still too expensive. I'm not going to spend $50-$200 extra for every lamp, thermostat, door lock, etc that I'd like to control. Eventually I'm sure automation will become a lot more mainstream and it will be built in by default in these items. I always considered myself pretty super geek early adopter, but I'm also cheap.
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Spread out purchases over time.
 
dan110 said:
Why is this in MacRumors?
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I sometimes wonder the same thing but, then again, Apple doesn't do much that's newsworthy.
We're sure to have a report from Tim or Schiller rationalizing Apple's absence in this product category but assuring us that they've never been excited about future products, blah blah.
 
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coolfactor said:
I noticed you switched the words "supermarket Carrefour" from what would normally be said in English as "Carrefour supermarket". Does Siri handle swapping words like this with the same accuracy? Also, could accents and pronunciation be a factor in Siri understanding?

When I did a Google search for "supermarket Carrefour" (exactly like that), web results came up, but nothing comes up in Google Maps, but when I do another Google Maps search for "Carrefour supermarket" (in that order), I get the following match:
  • 79 Rue de Seine, 75006 Paris, France
So could Siri be entirely to blame for not understanding your query?
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Maybe.

I asked direction to Carrefour. If I type in Carrefour in Maps it correctly shows all Carrefour supermarkets around me. So it knows. And I think a smart assistant would know I want to drive to the nearby supermarket, not the city in Haiti 2000 miles away.
 
pally said:
So every big step forward feels like Windows 95 all over again?
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Kind of, in the sense that "Holy crap this is so much better than 3.1" and "But it's still crashing all the time and has great potential that is lost on several glaring issues."

Yeah, it's been going on for a long time. But the stuff today feels more futuristic, but has the same old bugs, which makes it a bit more of a letdown to me I guess? I was a kid when Windows 95 came out. I used to play on my grandpa's 3.1 machine before we got a Packard Bell in '96 with Win95 installed. I guess I just figured that things would be better by now. Things like "I've got this iPhone 7, but it still suffers sometimes from the same bug that has been present since iOS 1 on my original iPhone—the mute switch sometimes mutes video in certain apps until you flip the switch." Or things like "I've got this always on connected device connected to the cumulative knowledge of all mankind, yet it's a huge PITA to access what I need and interface with this information." So much potential, and still some frustrating issues that shouldn't even be bugs yet still are, in these beautiful, jeweled, thin devices of the future.
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coolfactor said:
I think, generally, people are getting more sophisticated. It takes a lot more to impress. Remember when the first iPod came out? It was impressive, but now it's ancient, and that was just 15 years ago. Barely a blip on the timeline. I also think that people, in general, are getting more ... desensitized and succumbing to the need for instant gratification. This puts pressure on companies to keep delivering new, more, better... but there's only so much that can be done in a relatively short timeframe. Even a year between product updates is a short time with the amount of effort required for design, engineering, production, testing, refinement, more testing, and then mass production for the sales cycle. Then they start all over again with a new version.
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When you put it that way, well, it makes me think that it's all gonna collapse at some point. Our constantly growing greed for gratification and the growing power of corporations. Eventually our society has to reset, right? Go back to the basics. I can't shake this feeling that things are becoming unraveled and it's not going to end well.
 
camperboy said:
I not understand, why people need this? for what this is? If I wanted to spend my money on something like that I would rather buy something more useful.
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Well, people kept asking the same about smart phones, and some still do....

I have lived with Amazon's Alexa/Echo for about a year now and I find them well worth the money.

I am so used to asking random questions now, like conversions, or trivia, or even the time.... Before I would go to my computer or my phone. Alexa and the Echo can hear me pretty reliably from up to about 15 meters, even when music is playing rather loudly.

I also listen to and change my music, skip or repeat tracks, ask who is the artist currently playing. ask for and play podcasts, news summaries, etc..

I have a whole house of LIFX lights and I simply tell Allexa to turn all of them off while I am in bed. Or change the color....

I personally find Alexa really useful. It's far from perfect, but it's pretty good at what it does, within its limitations. I have Google Home on order and expect it to be even better (and I find Google Play Music to be the best music streaming service (together with Pandora), so it will work with that, while Alexa works only with Spotify and Amazon Music).

There is a good reason why Alexa/Echo are among the best-selling devices on Amazon.
 
Derekuda said:
LOL! Sure you do. You don't use the "Hey Siri" function at all. Especially after apple spent millions in advertising that feature.
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You might be surprised to know that not everyone leaves this sort of feature enabled. I too prefer the long press to activate Siri, not that I use it much to be honest. AI in its present form isn't something I'm that bothered about.
 
62tele said:
Could you elaborate about what makes it useful.
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I use my Echo for all the normal things, music, shopping lists, weather, alarm clock, sleep timer, to do lists, my flash morning briefing, cooking conversions, multiple timers, and a hundred more by just speaking, while I use my phone for other things. Another benefit is skills. The one I use the most is simply controlling my harmony hub. Amazon has pretty good web information. Another note, new Amazon Dot, Echo without the speaker. Used with your speaker and or stereo system. Best part, the Dot costs $50.
 
Holy €rap! Is anyone actually going to plug this in their homes and allow google to link your google account to your home address to your voice and your kids voices and all your conversations and all of your "searches" and then let google data mine the €rap out of it all for free?!? Hmmmmm..... this is priceless.
 
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I see Google Home as a potential PA for work.

If you said "Hey Google, remind me to phone Mrs Jones at 4.00pm today"

I guess at 4.00pm the device would say "Dont forget to phone Mrs Jones".

But if you were out of the office at that exact minute and missed the important message would you get "Dont forget to phone Mrs Jones" ad infinitum until you say "okay Google thanks for reminding me"

or would that reminder be lost.

I see a big market here for Google "Office"
 
deany said:
I see Google Home as a potential PA for work.

If you said "Hey Google, remind me to phone Mrs Jones at 4.00pm today"

I guess at 4.00pm the device would say "Dont forget to phone Mrs Jones".
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Kind of feel an assistant already on your phone would be better suited for this particular example.
 
Tsuius said:
all your conversations
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Like the amazon Echo and Dot with "Hey Alexa" the connection to server only occurs after "Hey google"
Its not the "Holy Grail" for NSA, GCHQ, Scotland Yard, FBI, CIA, Mossad etc its NOT a bugging device.
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ErikGrim said:
Kind of feel an assistant already on your phone would be better suited for this particular example.
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Hi
I like the idea of the device in the office for a few staff to use as reminders and queries "whats the weather like tomorrow".
Our business relies on the weather. etc etc
Do you know if Google Home can carry out my "Phone Mrs Jones" example
thanks
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camperboy said:
I not understand, why people need this? for what this is? If I wanted to spend my money on something like that I would rather buy something more useful.
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Its where smart phones were nine years ago. A learning curve in more ways than one.
Also I see it as a fixed Personal Assistant for $129 one off payment instead of $25,000 approx a year on going.

SONOS integration ASAP please.
 
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H2SO4 said:
Maybe but the point is that is meshes with home decor more than the Echo and most likely more than any undoubtedly aluminium offering that Apple are likely to come up with which will only look right on the bridge of the enterprise.
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That's incredibly insensitive to those of us who live on the bridge of the Enterprise.
 
lostczech said:
"looks a lot better than the Echo,"

I'm sorry, but it looks like a cheap dollar store air freshener
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I feel like that's sort of the point - to blend in with your house without seeming like a blindingly out of place device.
 
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