the problem is the americans, apple included, think everyone on the planet has an awesome busy life and lovely white teeth. the reality is most of us dont have much of a life to warrant an ai assistant :smirk:

wow really? I love mine.

Turns the lights on & off without leaving my bed. Can turn off the tv without reaching the remote. Set alarms without looking for my phone, play music, blinds up and down, tell it to call my phone when I can't find it... everything... just by telling it to do it.

Pretty freakin' awesome if you ask me.

Hove Heating??
For Brighton residents only maybe?

Google made a boo-boo by not releasing Google Home in the UK when it first came out as I'm sure like myself, many others decided to go down the Amazon Alexa route instead. Personally, I'm waiting for Lenovo to release their Smart Assistant which is for all intent and purpose is an Amazon Echo but with better sound quality. http://shop.lenovo.com/us/en/smart-home/smart-assistant/

£150 plus £4 delivery Used - Like New. Comments Unused code etc blah blah. Should be here next week. Seemed a good price but felt a bit too good if you know what I mean.

Good luck, hopefully you will have better luck than I! What price did you pay?

I was on an Amazon Warehouse deal looking at this and decided to buy from a seller on there who had promised unused installation code so will see what happens when this arrives next week (the price seemed a little cheap though), hopefully have a better experience then it seems you have. I tried to screenshot as much info as possible in case of a dispute with Amazon 3rd party agreements.

You can get the hive plus installation for about £163 from Amazon (via a warehouse deal) yesterday it was £161, so price fluctuates a little depending on the stock available. In my opinion, worth the extra the 30 quid to get British Gas to install it for you!

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-listing/B011B3J6F4/ref=dp_olp_used?ie=UTF8&condition=used

I got this in-store for £119 after they put through the £10 off. Listed on receipt as "Price Promise".

Looking forward to setting it up tonight, asking it inane questions and asking it for a Raktajino or something...

Thanks OP

Hope it's better than Amazon version where you have to ask 2-3 before it understands you.

What I would love to do to the amazon (small one) is use them for clay pigeon shooting.

I did have a talk to Google about the lack of audio out and they started push some chromcast thingy maybe even 2!

If you use an external speaker Amazons one can hear you better, a bit, possibly.

So it might not last if its none stop sell sell Google stuff.

Shame the don't do a small version like Amazon.

I must have got lucky, just explained the situation, showed the discount on my phone, and they just put it through, I did speak to a lovely manager though!

Just ordered another Google Home for upstairs in the bedroom and also the Philips Hue starter kit. Thanks for the codes. Cost me a bl oody fortune on gadgets I don't really need !

Tried in store. They wouldn't accept the code despite the online assistant saying they would. Had to return home and purchase for home delivery.

can't be used on click and collect?

anyone know if i can redeem the 3 months free play music if I'm already a member?

You can, raspberry pi, relay, wemo emulator. Can control anything easily that can be on/off or have 2 states. Or they might have the ifttt broadlink I'm looking to get, im looking to get electric curtains for the house which i intend on controlling with Alexa, either by the broadlink or wemo emulator route.

Security system cheaper at Amazon............

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00PVDHFBI/ref=pe_385721_37986871_TE_item

Dave

Agreed, nothing beats Google for a search engine BUT google are someway behind on the AI engine

Alexa, google home is very much at the iPhone 2 stage. I had an iphone 2 and loved it and almost everyone who saw it liked it but just called it a gimmick and used the old "my phone is to make phone calls not read emails, watch downloaded clips etc."

If you have the time to invest in Alexa, it is a fantastic product BUT its at the early adoption phase an requires "tweaking". I do however, have no shadow of a doubt, that as this gets rolled out in all modern cars, appliances etc, every house will have the Lex interface integrated in some way

(and no I dont work AWS)

PSA - It also responds to 'Hey Google' if you wanted to cut a syllable

I am getting on quite well with mine, just not with any of the out of the box options (aside from asking the time I suppose). Linked with a broadlink IR/RF blaster our echo can control the Nas box (via kodi) so can play what ever we want on command - It can also switch on the telly/sound bar or anythign that is infra red, control the lamps via those cheap rf plug sockets and switch off/on the main lights (the cheapy 1st gen phillips things). Granted, I can also do all of these things myself manually but it is much more fun spending 15 minutes trying to get the echo to understand the Scottish accent and play an episode of Veep than it is to waste 10 seconds of my life picking up the phone and pressing play on Yatse

I called Currys Knowhow, phone number is the confirmation email they send. And the guy on the phone said it should be ok for the store to apply the discount for you.

I then went to the store, but they were all sold out ... so I couldnt test what he told me was real.

This looks a great find but it's not too clear whether it records based on sensor activated motion detection. I think that's quite a useful feature from a security perspective

I got mine from Argos with their £10 voucher promotion.... I needed a nerf gun too so it worked out okay for me as I bought the gun after the Home.

thanks, just bought this to collect from Currys.

Do I really have to wait 4 days to collect this for Currys? Can I not just walk in and they give me one from their stock?

Yep, I love my Echo too. It's great for music at parties, I've got lights connected to it and the kids think some of the games are brilliant.

Google Home will probably be better in the long run as it feeds from Google and not Bing like the Echo does. But I believe more products are currently compatible with Echo.

I have to say I've been living with the g home now for the best part of five hours....

Linked to 2 chrome casts and it's great. Yes I'm still in the novelty phase but it will set a tv show going on Netflix, play the radio in the Kitchen and stream music from Spotify on its built in speaker and its timing my lad to get off his computer at the moment .... 3 minutes to go .... will it work?

I like it .... sound quality isn't too bad either.

Not HiFi but great for background music ... its great!

About £37 at Gearbest Not sure about the quality though ...

More pointless tech they'll want you to upgrade at least once a year!

anyone knows where to put the code I can't find that option for store collection

To be fair, I knew it was an issue after a few days, just tried to persist with it and am pretty busy. I think it's particularly poor due to the fact that it isn't "ai" as marketed. It is no where near, it is capable of responding to certain commands, no ai functionality - that part is a marketing gimmick.

Have an amazon echo, is an entirely awful and pointless product. It's going back to the store today, after six weeks of ownership I've finally had enough. Home looks decent, but it's fair to say all of these devices are gimmicks right now (and I have hive integrated also and Spotify etc).

The ring is a bargain for £129
Cannot recommend enough

Just an observation --

The RING doorbell is cheaper here on ebay even with the saving from the code. It looks to be the same device/model.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Brand-New-RING-WiFi-Enabled-Smart-Phone-Video-Security-Camera-Doorbell-/201882022640

Radar functionality would be cool. Maybe come in useful to detect incoming cruise missiles once the Trump presidency really gets going.

I'd check Sainburys for the D-LINK mydlink Home SMART Home HD Starter Kit as I bought it for £50 about one month ago. I took it back though as the camera doesn't have any memory card slot. Was easy to install though.

Google home does not play the songs asked for even if they have been up loaded to google play.

My home has all sorts of sensors, it's also got a sona system detects incoming from any part of the world.

download, not finalised :smile:

enable trackr skill and finalised the app to your phone

Tempted!.... so tempted!

That sounds very useful - do you mind sharing how you set that up?
I've seen an iftt applet that does something similar, but it's US only, and can't get it to work here in the UK

Blinds up and down.. I almost believed you up until that point.. lol

I've had a Home for about a month, shipped in from the states, but haven't used it much. I have a house full of Sonos gear and play all my audio via that, as a result the Home can't really hear me much! It can hear me fine if it's playing music itself, even loudly, but I don't use it to play audio due to having better options so really, it's not a good fit for me or anyone else who plays a lot of audio and doesn't want to switch to playing that audio via the Home. I tied it into my house control system but rarely use it to control that as it's only in one room, while my phone and watch are with me all the time, plus most of my lights are movement activated so no real need to control via voice. So, overall, I find these voice-control devices to be gimmicky, and anyone who has a mature house control system or plays a lot of audio will probably find what they have more convenient already.

very thougthful, thanks :stuck_out_tongue:

Also you'd think the so called 'king of marketing' wouldn't have made such a huge sequence of errors like this on something so key to the success of a product.

Cool. Another thing people are complaining about is that if their other devices are nearby, saying Ok Google activates those too and leads to errors.

Personally I would just prefer to name my devices as it would make them feel more human, to give them a personality of their own. I mean imagine naming all your pets Ok Google.

Only playing mate. I value the input. I've only went for it as I've got no Amazon devices or subs, but I've got Nexus tablet, phone and Chromecast.

Looking forward to playing with it.

There's a lot of people moaning about it on the internet. Ok Google just doesn't roll easily off the tongue like the word Alexa does. It's a shame as Google Home has much better AI than Alexa in my opinion.

It's better than Alexa in my opinion apart from the fact that you have to say 'Okay Google' all the time. Really irritating and until they change that people will be put off buying it. I certainly won't be buying one until they allow me to name the devices.

I was going to pre order for about 20 quid more tother week so glad i didn't, cheers op.

That's fine. My phone is nearly always nearby anyway to use the hive app. It's not a deal breaker for me , but I'm waiting before i take the plunge anyway.

What'a the dig with all these smart bulb? Doesn't sound environmentallu friendly if people are encouraged to replace bulbs to have smarthome functionality. Makes much more sense to have something convert existing bulbs.

yep, but a few things it falls short on...it's Hive, not IFTTT.
- Can't set desired temperature
- Can't boost for 30 minutes, only 1 hour
- Doesn't seem to turn heating off, even though it says it can.

Anything further complicated than the above, it also can't do.

How is the Hive heating system? I have an old boiler and there is no thermostat.
Thanks for help n advice ..

it's not longer apparently, i have done it, the myths are true!

Amazon have almost price matched the hive self install. Now £133.

Hello Google can you tell my wife to stop stabbing me please

also the Samsung Smartthings Starter Kit is reduced at £139.99 which is usually £199.99

Should see the deal heating up now.
:smiley:

Hove Heating??
For Brighton residents only maybe?

Amazing Curry's getting heat lol

Do I bite now and get Google home or wait? I've got hive installed and at present doesn't support it :disappointed:

Google made a boo-boo by not releasing Google Home in the UK when it first came out as I'm sure like myself, many others decided to go down the Amazon Alexa route instead. Personally, I'm waiting for Lenovo to release their Smart Assistant which is for all intent and purpose is an Amazon Echo but with better sound quality. http://shop.lenovo.com/us/en/smart-home/smart-assistant/

I'll wait for houses built by Google where all these would be inbuilt :stuck_out_tongue: