I got my Amazon Echo yesterday (Dec 28) and I love it! Set up was relatively easy with step-by-step instructions. I did move it to another location in the house and it made an immediate connection to the internet. I find the volume to be perfect and the voice detection is very good as it will detect a normal speaking tone from the other side of the room. You don't have to shout or be directly on top of it.
There are plenty of 'skills' to choose from, although in Canada, they are somewhat limited, but I am sure that many more will be added in the future. Alexa's female voice is a bit robotic at times and I did notice that it is not interactive conversationally like Google is. But more like Siri. Example: "Who is the Prime Minister of Canada?" Response of "Justin Trudeau". "Who is his wife?" Response of "I don't understand."
If you want to listen to music, you have to be a subscriber of Amazon Prime (which I am) or Spotify. It will play some radio stations. I was very surprised that It will read Kindle books! Big plus!
It will make phone calls also, but you have to set it up through your cell phone and allow it to access your contacts. My wife and I tried it and the voice tone works very well. No echo, no muting, no sounding like you are are talking through a tube or in a tunnel.
Right now I don't have it linked to any lamps, etc. (you have to buy the plug adapters), but I will in the future. Alexa will set up wake-up alarms, reminders and egg timers.
My wife calls it a 'big boy toy', but I think its great. For $100; you can't beat it! For those of you who are considering buying one...go ahead and take the plunge for a C-note. You won't regret it. I will post more findings of my Amazon Echo (good and bad) in the future.
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Pretty good, but still lots of room for improvement!
Really like the Amazon Echo, but there is lots of room for improvement.THESE ARE SOME OF THE DRAWBACKS1) Must be plugged in all the time. Would be nice if it had a built in battery so you could move it easily to different locations in the house (i.e. the bathroom, outside during a BBQ etc) without bringing the power cord.2) The sound is pretty good, but lacks low end (bass).3) The ability to use voice control to select your own Spotify playlists (created by you) does not work. The ability to ask Spotify to play a "genre" of music does not work either. Apparently this works in the USA, but not in Canada.4) Navigation features for Alexa are somewhat limited. Alexa knows your location because you program in your postal code during the setup process. This is how she can easily tell you the weather based on your location. However, if you ask "Alexa, how long will it take me to drive to 555 Elm Street in Toronto, Ontario" you get this answer "I couldn't find that one, but I am working on adding more local businesses."5) If you store your iPhone contacts on an exchange server (like Microsoft) and not on the iPhone itself, Alexa will not recognize those contacts which will affect your ability to make phone calls via Alexa from your phone book.6) You cannot voice train Alexa in Canada. The feature is only available (settings --> accounts --> your voice) if your device is registered to an Amazon.com account (not Amazon.ca).7) When creating audio groups for multi room music, you can only add each echo to one group. If you try to add those devices to a second group, they are greyed out and inaccessible. I have 2 echos on my main floor, one on the second floor and one in my basement. I would like to have an audio group called "main floor" and also an audio group called "everywhere" but Alexa will not allow overlap of echo's between the two groups.8) As of January 1, 2018 it seems that Amazon has increased the price for the Echo by $20.9) The Alexa app takes about 10 seconds to load on my iPhone 5s.10) The Alexa web portal does not always sync with the Alexa app correctly. Smart bulbs that are renamed in the mobile app (for example "hallway lamp") still show up on the web portal as the generic name "First light: Phillips Hue White Light"11) The list feature is great, but would be much better if it allowed you to rearrange entries so you could group similar items together (produce, dairy, condiments etc).HERE IS WHAT I LIKE:1) You can link Alexa to your Spotify Premium account. By doing so, it will automatically provide you with your entire music library so when you request a song ("Alexa, play Love on the Brain") it automatically plays you the full complete song, not the sample from Amazon. Alexa's ability to play music and play the correct song upon request is her strongest asset. Make sure to select Spotify as your default music player in the Alexa App: Settings (3 stacked horizontal bars in top left corner) --> Music & Media --> Spotify.2) You can talk to Alexa with normal speed (as if you were speaking to another person) and she understands. There is no need to pause after saying "Alexa" or talk slowly.3) You can ask Alexa "play white noise", "play sounds of the ocean", "play sounds of rain" or "play fireplace" and your device has now become a sound machine.4) We have four Echo's (office, kitchen, bedroom & basement). Room to room calling works well for us "Alexa call bedroom".5) Voice over Internet Protocol (VoiP) works well and does not cost any money. You can call contacts in your phone book, tell Alexa to dial a specific number ("Alexa, dial (416)-555-5555) or other Alexa devices. My mother has an Echo in Florida and I have one in Toronto. I can say "Alexa, call moms echo" and it will connect me with her.6) You do not need to use the Alexa App to program the devices. There is a web page portal that is much easier to navigate and enter the settings: https://alexa.amazon.com/7) Multi-Room audio works well and is a good alternative to an expensive Sonos setup. If you have more than one echo device (echo dot, echo or echo plus) you can create groups of speakers (echo devices) and play music across all speakers in that group. If you have 2 echo’s on your main floor and 2 echo’s on your second floor you can create audio groups for the "main floor," and “second floor,” or whatever name you choose. Then say "Alexa play Footloose on main floor" and it will only play on the two echos located in that audio group. Great for entertaining and parties. While the sound quality is not as good as the Sonos Play 1, the echo costs $120 compared to the the Sonos Play 1 at $200.8) We had 2 TP-Link Kasa smart plugs which were very easy to integrate into the Alexa app. We use these to control 2 lamps on our night tables in the bedroom. You program the name of the smart plug and then they can be operated independently by saying "Alexa, turn on Aaron's Lamp" or "Alexa, turn on Ali's lamp". You can also create groups so Alexa can control both switches simultaneously by saying "Alexa, turn off bedroom lamps".9) The "List" feature works very well to keep track of things. I have a list for shopping, to-do, homework (for the kids). Just say "Alexa, add butter to shopping list". When you go to the store, open up the Alexa up, press "Lists", select "shopping" and sure enough, butter is there.10) Cross platform connectivity between all Alexa devices works pretty well. I can tell my FireTV Alexa to add something to my shopping list, or turn off a light, and it works.11) You can add "skills" to Alexa via the app or web interface. These skills are created by 3rd party manufacturers which allows Alexa to communicate with their products or their web content. I just added a skill for my Logitech Harmony Smart Home Hub (which I already owned) and can now tell Alexa to turn on my Honeywell fan, or turn on Netflix in the room where my harmony remote is currently being used.12) The echo has a 3.5mm audio out port on the back. This is great for connecting it to your stereo or external speakers. The echo dot and echo plus also have 3.5mm audio out ports.Pictured below are the Echo, Echo Dot and Echo Plus (in that order).
