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On Thursday, September 20, Amazon unveiled a whole slew of new smart devices in a surprise event in Seattle. By the end of the event, Alexa's army of gadgets seemed to have grown exponentially. For the audiophiles, Amazon debuted an Echo subwoofer , an amp and a receiver , along with software that will let you sync your Echo speakers in a stereo pair.

The Amazon Echo Auto will help the company's digital assistant Alexa spread to more cars, and Amazon debuted location-based routines -- so you can unlock your door and play your favorite song when you get home -- to give you that much more reason to bring Alexa with you on the road. For the smart-home crowd, Amazon debuted a smart plug , a smart microwave and even an Alexa-enabled clock. Your Alexa devices will soon get smarter as well, as they'll be able to listen for smoke alarms or the sound of breaking glass.

They'll be able to suggest routines. They'll help you set up your smart home. They'll even respond in a whisper if you issue a quiet command at night.

Amazon's big day was certainly impressive, and we're looking forward to testing these new devices and trying out all of these upgrades once they're live. Check out everything Amazon announced here. Below you'll find our original story outlining the entire Amazon Echo landscape as of May 5, The Amazon Echo is the biggest tech breakout in recent memory -- a voice-activated, internet-connected "smart speaker" with a built-in virtual assistant named Alexa that can answer your questions, follow your instructions and control your smart home devices. As Amazon likes to put it, the Echo is a Star Trek computer for your home.

Now approaching its fourth year, the Echo and its multiple offshoots, including the mini-sized Echo Dot and the touchscreen-equipped Echo Show , have found their way into millions of homes around the world. If they've found their way into yours and you don't know what to do with them, or if you're just curious about whether or not you should also buy in, then you, my friend, have come to the right post. Let's start at the beginning. Amazon introduced the Echo smart speaker at the end of It's a standalone Bluetooth speaker with an array of "far-field" microphones that can hear you at a moderate distance plus a Wi-Fi connection to the Amazon cloud.

You wake the Echo up by saying "Alexa," the name of Amazon's virtual assistant you can change this wake word to "Amazon," "Echo" or "Computer," if you like. Once the speaker hears the wake word, the ring around the top will light up blue to indicate that Alexa is actively listening for your question and command. Say something like, "what's the weather today," and Alexa will answer your question -- in this case, with a quick summary of the day's forecast.

Here's how that works: Whenever you ask Alexa a question or give her a command, the Echo records the audio and uploads the snippet to Amazon's cloud servers. Those servers translate the audio into text, then figure out the best way for Alexa to answer. That info gets sent back to your Echo speaker, where Alexa translates the text back into a spoken response. All of this happens in about a second. The Echo is always listening for the wake word, but it only starts recording and transmitting audio once it thinks it hears it.

Echo devices indicate this with that blue ring of light -- when it lights up, that means Alexa is recording and uploading what it hears in order to figure out how to respond.

Amazon uses encryption to protect those audio snippets whenever Alexa uploads them, and it stores them in the Amazon servers so that you can play them back in the Alexa app to hear what Alexa heard and see what she thinks you asked. You can erase that backlog of audio snippets any time you like here's how , and you can also press a button to "mute" the microphone and keep the Echo from listening for the wake word at all. In that case, the Echo's ring will turn red to indicate that Alexa is covering her ears.

Amazon is getting its IoT on with the $30 Echo Wall Clock

Click here for a complete rundown on everything you can ask Alexa. The Echo is great for streaming music, audiobooks, and podcasts. Now with multi-room music, you can tell Alexa to play across your Echo devices available for Amazon Music, Tune In and Spotify coming soon ; Bluetooth not supported. Use Amazon echo to switch on the lamp before getting out of bed, turn up the thermostat while reading in your favourite chair or dim the lights from the couch to watch a film—all without lifting a finger. Has this got a buit in hub to control your lights or do you hsve to buy one seperate.

No, any control equipment required will have to be purchased separately. Hello Hello Richard, thank you for your question. I can confirm that the All-new Echo 2nd generation cannot currently play tracks via a Spotify Free account. Thank you for using Argos Q and A.

Hi Robin, yes you can. The responses from Argos colleagues are accurate at the time of publishing. For the latest info, you should check the product page. Key features Technical details. Size x 88 x 88 mm Weight g Actual size and weight may vary by configuration and manufacturing process Wi-Fi Connectivity Wi-Fi required. Warranty and Service Amazon Echo is sold with a limited warranty of one year provided by the manufacturer. Available in a range of fabrics. See questions and answers. Is this feature helpful?

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Write a customer review. See all customer images. Read reviews that mention google home sound quality playing music playing music smart home voice recognition bit disappointed looking forward home automation shopping list easy to set echo dot available in australia audible books great sound definitely recommend sound is very good around the house works great work well.

Showing of reviews. Top Reviews Most recent Top Reviews. There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later. Charcoal Fabric Verified Purchase. As someone deeply entrenched in the Apple ecosystem, buying the Amazon Echo wasn't an instinctive decision. However, I identified a number of first-world problems that I thought the Echo could solve, so decided to give it a try. The installation and set up was simple and took very little time.

The two big things I'd wanted the Echo to do for me were to add things to a shopping list "on the fly", and set timers. For this reason, we installed it in the kitchen area. In addition to perfectly carrying out these "mission critical" tasks, I have been able to use a few IFTT triggers to duplicate the Echo shopping list on my Apple Reminders list, add events to my iCloud Calendar, turn on some smart bulbs. I would certainly recommend the Amazo Echo as a great starting point for voice-activated home automation. Alexa has a bit of "personality" and the regular updates from Amazon suggesting new uses or skills keep the device "fresh" and fun.

Heather Grey Fabric Verified Purchase. With the limited Australian skills this device works great and will only get better over time. Had the echo dot 2nd gen and this sounds a lot better with great bass. Will slowly convert my house to a smart home with this being the feature. Sandstone Fabric Verified Purchase. Many of the services are not available in Australia. I wanted to play my podcasts using the Anypod skill but it isn't available here.

The only work around is to upload them via iTunes on the computer, which is very clumsy. The Amazon app doesn't allow you to search the skills as the keyboard won't work in the app. Really the only thing Alexa does well is to tell you the weather, time and setup reminders and play from the few selected skills that you can see in the app.

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Until access is enabled to all the skills and the app is updated so that you can type in the search bar the Echo is underwhelming. How much fun are these, works well with amazon music as well. Been waiting for years for one of these and finally I have one.

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Bought this for my mum after she had been asking about smart home devices. My whole family absolutely adore our Echo and it has become second nature to use it. It intergrated great with our smart lights Philips Hues and was a breeze to set up. Even in the 2 weeks we have been using it there is a constant stream of new Skills for Alexa, which is incredible when you think it's only been released for a month in AUS.

This was my fist experience with the Echo range of products, and I couldn't be happier. It has been a pretty seamless experience so far, setup worked first time, re-configuring when I change my WiFi, perfect! However as with most assistants it doesnt always get words right and has issues hearing me when the portable air-con is on granted my google home has similar issues. The skills are great however its such a pity it has to be in English US to use most of them, prefer the Aussie voice. Looking to purchase a dot shortly. The Amazon echo does amazing things and I use it every day.

It helps me get ready in the morning, time conversions and many other amazing things! Another thing the echo can do which is just amazing is that it is compatible with Apple devices, including your iMac!