Google Home

Thanks for this.
I might get one then.
Amazon are flooding the TV with adverts for the Echo and my better half keeps asking if we are going to get one. :smile:

If I have 2 GHs in different rooms, lets say one in bedroom and one in living room; can I tell the living room GH to play music in the GH in the bedroom? I know they said it’s supposed to do it, but has anyone tried it? Also, can tell one to play music in both rooms at the same time?

At the present time google home is sold in the US only and understands only American accents. If you do import one, you will void the warranty, and a number of people in the UK have posted online that it doesn’t understand them at all. So right now the UK edition of echo has some advantages.

FWIW…

Hhmmmm.
Now I really am in a quandary.
Ah ha. Here’s a thought.
We have a US airbase near us.
Perhaps I need a lodger to talk to it for me.

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Or maybe look into Echo/Dot?

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Yes to question 1. You can play music on GH#2 from GH#1. I’ve done it. Yes to #2 also. However the only way I tried was by putting them in a group together. Might be possible to just say on “all” that I did NOT test.

Let me add by saying that functionally in the Google Home App (old cast) the GH devices appear much like the Chromecast Audio devices. Meaning anything you can do with Chromecast Audio it appears you can do with GH as a speaker.

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Hi, everyone. I just created a video for the fine people at SmartThings to demo some of the Google Home integrations I’ve configured. Thought I would share here as well. Sorry for the length, but hope you enjoy… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qc9vuXt_b1c

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Love it…
I want one AND I WANT IT NOW!!!
Blast. I’m in the UK and can’t have one yet. :grimacing:

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SUCKS doesn’t it! I can’t decide whether to invest money in echo now or wait until home comes out in the UK… just wish we had any idea when the UK release might be. Given the echo is here now I’d presume they wouldn’t want to wait too long but who knows…

Given Google’s spotty record with overseas releases, I’d go for the echo now, or at least a Dot. They aren’t too expensive, and if Home ever comes out in the UK, I imagine you can have the two running concurrently. You can just put them in different rooms. One may handle some things better than the other.

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I’m from the UK and have multiple echos, currently over in the USA and purchased a google home to test out. When I get back I’ll let you know how I get on when I get back.

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After only 4 days there is no doubt I’m sticking with GH. My Sonos speakers and connect are going on ebay and so are my Echo devices. GH does everything I’ve used Echo for and faster. I never really used some of the skills Echo has. I mostly use it for smartthings control, getting information and playing music. Google Home is working perfectly with Smartthings (after some naming configs changes) including my Harmony hub and the obvious Chromecast and Chromecast Audio. The fact that I replaced my Sonos Connect with a $30(on sale at walmart now) Chromecast Audio puck is fantastic. I’m up to 3 GHs in the house now with 2 more coming.

One bit of advice. Do your best to stay away from “key” words with Googe Home namings. AKA don’t create a group for speakers called “All Speakers” something like “House Speakers” works better. Key words like “All” seem to throw off GH. Use a combo of the “Nickname” feature in GH smartthings AND good naming in Smartthings itself for devices. Basically naming seems to be key here. Get that right and GH nails it every time and it’s fast. Also you can create multiple chromecast groups with different sets of speakers. All, first floor, second floor, etc. so a speaker (either a GH device or Chromecast audio device) can be in more than 1 group.

Also GH doesn’t having TEXTing abilities now. However IFTTT does! And let’s you create multiple variable inputs to be used in things like sending emails and text messages. My kids can easily now say “Ok Google, Tell dad I’m going to the neighbors” and I’ll get a text. This took all of 60 seconds to create. No “trigger” word either.

Garage door…still is more reliable to say turn on and turn off the garage door. However if you really want to just say “ok google close the garage door” that is very easily done with IFTTT also. I used to have more complex things to do with Echo like askalexa that I don’t need to do anymore. I just hope Google sticks with this product…

And finally the multiple sequence questions nail it for me. To have a conversation like this:

OK Google, Who sings Africa
Toto…
Ok Google, What album is it on
Toto IV…
Ok Google, play that album on my house speakers
or
Play that song on Family Room TV (which will play the video)

Volume works by group too. If you play something on all speakers you can then say turn “House Speakers” down or to a specific level, which will effect the whole group. Or you can specify which speaker you want to turn down or up.

Curious to see how this will evolve over time.

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Thanks for sharing! I love mine too. I have a question, you don’t need a chromecast audio to share music between GH, right?

So I woke up ask Alexa to turn on light. Ok nothing. Asked two more times get ok and nothing. Grab my pixel phone asked google assistant to turn it on and came on instantly.

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It’s rigged LOL

Fantastic review thanks! A few questions if you don’t mind…

How do you like the sound quality of the GH? A WSJ review opinion said it’s inferior to the Echo. If you’re switching out Sonus I would expect you’re fairly happy with it.

Second, when you ask it to play some random music, does this result in a charge from whatever streaming service you’re using?

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Review from wired, again, this reviewer were clearly has both devices and isn’t just reading off a spec sheet . :sunglasses:

Some interesting callouts, particularly about Amazon’s prime unlimited music.

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I don’t exactly know what you mean by share music. However you do not need a chromecast audio. If you have 1 GH you can play music right on it. If you have 2, one named bedroom and one named kitchen and you create a group with both of them named “house speakers” you can do all of the below.

(while you are in kitchen)
Ok Google, play {song/artist/playlist/whatever} in bedroom
{music will play in bedroom}
Ok Google play {song/artist/playlist/whatever}
{music will play in kitchen}
Ok Google play {song/artist/playlist/whatever} on house speakers
{music will play on both}

Expand that and add a Chromecast audio attached to your stereo and named “stereo” add stereo to “house speakers” group and it will play on all. Or say

Ok Google play {song/artist/playlist/whatever} on stereo

Make sense? Alternatively you can stop music the exact same way
Ok google stop music on stereo

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Right! Multiple GH’s appear exactly like Chromecast Audios.
After a week… here is my comparison.

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Good Question. For my purposes they are “close” I think the google home has better sound overall however the Echo gets louder while keeping the sound quality. For where I use them it’s perfectly fine for me. (Kitchen, Kids rooms, etc) So this isn’t exactly fair because I really use a home audio receiver with multiple zones for most of the house. This is where I used the Sonos Connect the most. So now I just replaced that with a chromecast audio and use the receiver’s amp to power my speakers in all the rooms. So obviously that sound quality stayed the same.

I used a Sonos Play 1 in my kitchen which I replaced with the GH and everyone in the house is perfectly fine with the Audio. Is it as good as the Sonos Play 1 for Sound quality? NO. However the ease of use and how the whole house works with it I think overrides the SQ difference. I’ve also realized that now I can dig out some of my old Amp’s (or speakers) to use with the CCA and they become smart and useful again in this scenario.

Also a plus was that I’ve been using Google Music for years so all my music is there including a family subscription as all my family members use it. Obviously these two tie in very well together.

When you set them up they ask for your “default” music source (Pandora, Google Music, Spotify) and a few other show up as options. There is the option to log into them if you have an account. Because I have Google Music. I do not know what it would do without this.

I know it sounds like I’m raving…I am. This FINALLY made playing music where I want and how so easy. Easy enough that my 3 year old daughter uses google home to play songs she wants all the time now. Yes it understands her.

As you can see. I use the voice control in my house mostly for music and smartthings control. Of which GH is doing great.

I will tell you where it really kind of doesn’t work. Youtube. There are millions of videos named all kinds of things. So asking for a video is pretty much good luck in getting what you really wanted. About the only good thing about the youtube/GH integration is the fact that you can ask for a song video. Which I never do. Supposedly they are going to tie it to more accounts like Netflix/hulu etc where you will be able to ask for shows to play but that does not work currently. From what I can see casting music or music videos is only viable right now. You can say “play a youtube video about smartthings on the family room tv” however you will like not get what you really wanted. At least that’s been my experience.

I do however have it controlling (through smartthings) my harmony hub. So anything I can do in Harmony I can do via GH. Which if you want to spend the time in Harmony is a lot. Voice control over watching TV isn’t a massive goal for me. I basically have two routines. One that sets the receiver to music (the chromecast audio now) and one that switches things back to TV. I use a Nvidia Shield with no cable. So all of the TV/movies we watch are on apps on there. Plus it has it’s own voice control which works perfectly. IF there was a way to trigger with GH directly to fire the voice control on the Nvidia I wouldn’t need to touch anything.