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Google Home and Google Home Mini - discussion

sim667 said:
You'd recommend then?
Click to expand...
I would definitely recommend it. I'm listening to spotify right now. And wow the speaker is loud. And really lovely sound!!
No you can't use a radio as an alarm at the moment. But it's very early. That will probably come.
It's so easy to set an alarm though. You just say "ok google. Set an alarm for ...." And it's done.
I just love it.
 
xsunnysuex said:
I would definitely recommend it. I'm listening to spotify right now. And wow the speaker is loud. And really lovely sound!!
No you can't use a radio as an alarm at the moment. But it's very early. That will probably come.
It's so easy to set an alarm though. You just say "ok google. Set an alarm for ...." And it's done.
I just love it.
Click to expand...

So someone told me a little trick where if you record yourself saying "Ok googe, play radio 1" and then set that up as your alarm sound on your mobile phone, it will obviously set it off ;)

I just bought a now tv box, which I'm regretting, I should have looked into this a bit more earlier and got a chromecast, then I could have used the two together.
 
The reminders function is great, it's much easier to just yell at the mini than find and unlock my phone. I've also got a spreadsheet set up tracking my spending and I can just say to the mini (or my phone when out and about) 'I spent X in Y' and it will log it all for me. The cheapness is a bit of a con though - cos now I feel like I really really need to spend money on smart lighting.

The main issue for me at the moment with the mini is not enough apps working with it - it would be great if it worked with BBC iplayer, and Mixcloud, but am sure that will happen at some point.
 
editor Can we get a more sensible thread title please? The product is called Google Home, which also has a Mini version.
 
sim667 said:
So someone told me a little trick where if you record yourself saying "Ok googe, play radio 1" and then set that up as your alarm sound on your mobile phone, it will obviously set it off ;)
Click to expand...
Ooh, interesting! Undermines my ultimate goal of not having my phone in my bedroom, but could be a neat little workaround in the meantime.
 
Lord Camomile said:
..Will I just be selling my data to pretend like I'm in the future for three minutes before the novelty wears off?
Click to expand...
You've been on the net for about 20 years mate...what do you think they don't have by now?

btw this isn't novelty...it's the actual future. Just coz you're not saying "Computer, earl grey" or "ORAC, where is Galifrei?" is semantics.

Voices are becoming the IO device.
 
DexterTCN said:
btw this isn't novelty...it's the actual future.
Click to expand...
It certainly looks like voice UI is the way things are going, but until we actually get to the future I'm not sure how much there is a Home or Echo can do in a non-smart household. Still having a bit of fun trying it out, though, and can certainly see it being the gateway drug to all sorts of faff.
 
I've installed google assistant on my iphone to try it out before buying.

Its so so much better than siri. I've been switching all my calendars, mail, shopping lists, notes etc to google anyway (and keeping them in sync with my iphone using IFTTT).
 
Doing the voice training so it knows my wife’s and my voice and can access each of our calendars etc. Works pretty well.
 
Do they only play music via chromecast? I've got a bluetooth sound bar and an Apple TV3 I'd ideally like it to play music on
 
You can play to Google Home using Bluetooth. You can also play to the device using chrome casting. You can also issue instructions to play on other chrome cast devices, like the google cast audio dongle which could output into a sound bar via optical or 3.5mm stereo. Otherwise, the device will link to streaming services (I’m on google music so it integrates perfectly.)
 
Poi E said:
You can play to Google Home using Bluetooth. You can also play to the device using chrome casting. You can also issue instructions to play on other chrome cast devices, like the google cast audio dongle which could output into a sound bar via optical or 3.5mm stereo. Otherwise, the device will link to streaming services (I’m on google music so it integrates perfectly.)
Click to expand...

Ah ok, but it won't work direct on my soundbar that already has bluetooth built in.

Its not the end of the world, but it would have been a nice touch.
 
Hmmm. So my TV will accepted casted media if it has the right app (eg. Netflix or Youtube). Can I cast stuff to my TV by talking to Home if I don't have a Chromecast for it?

I tried this with Assistant on my phone, but it can only see the chromecast in my bedroom TV.

I also changed my Nickname to My Lord so my robotic servant treats me with the correct deferential tone :D
 
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Does the calling work on google home yet? That will probably be my decision maker...... I'm sick of trying to decide between dot and home.
 
If I were to shell out for one of these things, could I log in more than one google account. For me and the missus likesay?
 
sim667 said:
So someone told me a little trick where if you record yourself saying "Ok googe, play radio 1" and then set that up as your alarm sound on your mobile phone, it will obviously set it off ;)

I just bought a now tv box, which I'm regretting, I should have looked into this a bit more earlier and got a chromecast, then I could have used the two together.
Click to expand...

You know Now TV is Sky/Murdoch bollocks don't you?

I highly recommend a ROKU. Amazon/Google are knobbling each other's services.
 
Despite not having one I've been playing about with google assistant on my phone and a project called phlex...... got a pretty nice workflow with it.

I can now say "Ask Phlex to download Frozen" (I'm using frozen as an example here, but any film really), So google assistant sends a request to ifttt, ifttt sends the request to radarr, radarr adds the movie as wanted, and then looks at jackett to see if there's a torrent in its indexed cache, if its found radarr grabs the torrent and adds it to deluge to download it, once its downloaded radarr automatically adds it to my plex movie folder, plex rescans and voila its in my library.

It should work with tv shows too, (via sickrage not radarr), but when I asked it to download the latest episode of lost it grabbed the whole of season 1.

You can also use it to control plex playback, but unfortunately I don't think I've got a compatible client, so I'm looking to see whether I can make one on a pi.

I also found another plex plugin that automatically dims philips hue lights when you play a film, and I'm thinking about getting some of those anyway next year, so will report back on that when I've got em.
 
mwgdrwg said:
You know Now TV is Sky/Murdoch bollocks don't you?
Click to expand...

Yes I do...... the man's got his finger in everything now though, and its the only platform where Vice tv is available, and the discovery channel without actually having sky. They're the main two things I watch.
 
Crispy said:
Hmmm. So my TV will accepted casted media if it has the right app (eg. Netflix or Youtube). Can I cast stuff to my TV by talking to Home if I don't have a Chromecast for it?

I tried this with Assistant on my phone, but it can only see the chromecast in my bedroom TV.

I also changed my Nickname to My Lord so my robotic servant treats me with the correct deferential tone :D
Click to expand...

When I click on the cast button on my phone it offers our DNLA bluray player as well as my chromecast so i'd have thought it was possible.
 
souljacker said:
When I click on the cast button on my phone it offers our DNLA bluray player as well as my chromecast so i'd have thought it was possible.
Click to expand...
Yes, the cast button works fine, but can you say "Ok google, play Sense 8 on Bluray Player" ?
 
Crispy said:
Yes, the cast button works fine, but can you say "Ok google, play Sense 8 on Bluray Player" ?
Click to expand...
My gut feeling is that it will be exactly the same as the assistant on your phone - if you can't get that to communicate with your TV I doubt the home mini will be able to either. Seems odd that the cast button would see the device and not the assistant though.
 
So I'm going from what's the point to that's quite a cool toy after seeing my sisters. She's got the Google Home so music and the like comes through that.

I've already got a few Chromecast Audios to link various old kit in the home to the modern world.

Has anyone here liked a Mini to Chromecast and does it play nice? I know in theory it does, but it work seamlessly?
 
UnderAnOpenSky said:
So I'm going from what's the point to that's quite a cool toy after seeing my sisters. She's got the Google Home so music and the like comes through that.

I've already got a few Chromecast Audios to link various old kit in the home to the modern world.

Has anyone here liked a Mini to Chromecast and does it play nice? I know in theory it does, but it work seamlessly?
Click to expand...

Seamlessly. You can set it up as the default receiver in the app so none of that specifying where to cast stuff to.
 
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