Music has been a part of our lives for centuries. That is why in my opinion, living in the 21st century is a privilege for most of us. With all this technology and music we can easily choose to listen to what makes us happy. Amazon maybe shares the same idea and that’s why we will take a look at their new product “Amazon Echo”, which is a new type of music speaker, that will most certainly cause a chain reaction of similar to it versions in future.
The idea of a voice-interactive speaker started in late 2014 and ever since the company works on it. Recently they released an update of their product with way more voice commands of their assistant “Alexa” which will make our day and home life easier and better!
“Amazon Echo is a hands-free speaker you control with your voice. Echo connects to the Alexa Voice Service to play music, make calls, send and receive messages, provide information, news, sports scores, weather, and more—instantly. All you have to do is ask.” – Amazon
Echo Plus connects to the Alexa Voice Service to play music, ask questions, give information, etc. It has 360° adaptive sound, which is powered by Dolby and can hear your given commands from anywhere in the room. It’s getting smarter always and continues to add other cool features. It has a built-in smart hub, that you can set up with other smart devices – locks, switches, light bulbs and etc.
Probably now you think that it would take you hours to set up those devices, but no. All you have to do is just say “Alexa, discover my devices” and Echo Plus will discover and set up everything for you! Now if you forget the lamp, you won’t have to go out of bed again… just ask Alexa to switch it off for you, sounds cool, huh?
How does it work?
Echo Plus has 7 microphones, which makes it sure that your command will be heard from any point of the room that it has been placed at.
The coolest part of it, in my opinion, is that you could ask Alexa to dial contacts right from your phone and even send messages without touching it! And this may bring up thoughts that this way, everyone in your home could have access to your phone? No, when you set your phone and speaker, your voice is the only voice that could start up the commands. Alexa is always getting smarter because it does not stop to adapt to your vocabulary, speech and even preferences! In just a couple of months, these features were added to Echo Plus, imagine what will happen in a year or two?
Design
The design is plain, simple and effective! It is 235 mm tall and 84mm width on top and bottom and comes in 6 different patterns. You start it by just saying “Alexa” and you could see how the top ring lights blue – then it is on.It doesn’t have any buttons, that you won’t need. The volume is adjustable by turning the ring at the top of the speaker as if you are opening/closing a bottle. The only buttons are on the top to stop the microphone and an action button.
Technical details
The speaker is powerful because of the Dolby 0.8″ tweeter at the bottom, facing upwards and a 2.5″ woofer above it.The 7 microphones are at the right top of the volume ring and the Smart Home Hub is in the middle of the speaker on the inside.
It weights near 950gr. and you can connect it to either Bluetooth or Wi-Fi because it supports both. The Alexa app is compatible with Fire OS, Android, and iOS devices.
The price is estimated at $150 which is outstanding for such a speaker, that combines all these features in one! You can find it on Amazon, alongside other cool products from the Echo pack.
