ARCHIVED FORUM -- March 2012 to February 2022READ ONLY FORUM
This is the second Archived Forum which was active between 1st March 2012 and 23rd February 2022
I really like the look of these but with the Amazon Echo out, why would I buy one? I remember at Struer saying that B&O needed to go for voice control and was told that this wasn't realistic. I want a system, probably for the kitchen, bathroom or bedroom that will work as a radio, alarm clock and music system where I can simply ask it to play what I want. I don't want to play around with a remote because I would have to find my glasses and probably the remote. I don't want to delve through the 34,000 songs in my computer to find one; I want to say, play x. And I want it to just do it. I realise the Echo is still in its infancy but it already does almost exactly what I want. But I really want the BS2 to do this. It will no doubt sound better and is likely to be far more tactile. But is simply not the right product now. Deeply disappointed.
Peter
I believe that if you get an echo dot and a BLGW device then it works in a fashion - but it's not very elegant really.
I like your thoughts Peter....
I to would like to see the BeoSound or similar with a voice integration system for setting timers, alarms, controlling lighting, adding entries into your diary etc as well as switching from say music source and volumes etc.... Sonos have declared support fo the Echo so why not bundle it all together for a neater smarter home solution.
You can see these home voice activated hubs becoming more and more popular
we tend to forget there is more to design than designing.
Coming back to this topic I've just read a review on GE's new smart lamp which includes a speaker called the "C".
Basically it's an internet-connected home lamp with smart bulbs, built in speaker and mic that will pair with your phone and Wifi and linking to Alexa.
The "C" has got me thinking, are we going to see a shift on small speaker design, moving away from the traditional stand alone and incorporating items as lamps etc.
I have a big thing with well designed lamps and feel this could be an interesting avenue for a company that holds design as a core part of its DNA.
Mark:Basically it's an internet-connected home...
The main issue with highly connected things like these is... that they need a connexion to a server, outside of your house (the computing power needed to analyse your voice is outside of your house).
This is a potential opened door for badly intentioned people...
The risk is real. It's already the case with connected toys like dolls. They can be hacked and then one can listen to what's happening in your house.
Even without this, your data, your voice, your wishes, your habits are stored, analysed, and potentialy accessible to third parties compagnies that you're not aware of.
Don't trust me. Read Siri's "small lines" carefully for example.
This may, or may not be a problem for you, but it's better to be aware...
Its definitely an interesting thought, and may well be the right future direction.....but B&O dont have the software chops to do voice activation well i think, and bear in mind although voice activation is becoming more embedded, at the moment its not very good, despite improvements.......B&O may well do this once it has become (a) a lot better and (b) more mainstream......but we are a way off that.....consider how many smartphones are out there in the wild that have voice capabilities (hundreds of millions i would guess), but the usage stats for the voice features are extremely low from what i understand......the Echo and the Google Home version are also pretty poor speakers from the reviews i have read.......so my guess is that you are right that one day this will be a way of operating music systems, but i'd give it 5 years.....