Amazon Echo Club

[tubemonkey]

Amazon Fire TV Cube can be used in the same room as Echo devices thanks to improved ESP

The Amazon Fire TV Cube has been announced and is available for pre-order. While we’ve learned a lot about Amazon’s new flagship Fire TV model, there are still plenty of unanswered questions and I’ll do my best to get answers to the most common ones. One question that has already come up several times in the comment discussion of the announcement post is whether the Fire TV Cube can be used in the same room as another Echo device. The short answer is yes it can, but there are some things to consider.

Amazon has told me that the Fire TV Cube uses an improved form of Echo Spatial Perception (ESP) made specifically for the Fire TV Cube that helps it function better in the same room as another Alexa device, such as an Amazon Echo or Echo Dot. ESP is what allows multiple Alexa devices to determine which one is closest to the speaker so that only one device responds and executes the request. The Fire TV Cube’s improved ESP is able to determine not only which device is closest to the user, but also which device the user is facing.

If you’re facing the Fire TV Cube when issuing a voice command, the Fire TV Cube is designed to respond even if it is not the closest device to you. Likewise, if you’re in a room with a Fire TV Cube and an Echo device, if you turn and face the Echo and issue a command, the Echo is supposed to respond to you, even if you’re physically closer to the Fire TV Cube.

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[wodin]

Thanks Monkey, but what they say and what they do's not always the same. When you guys begin coming in with real life experiences I'll weigh the comments and make a decision.

[OtinG]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

Prime Day is just a month away and Black Friday is 5.5 months away. Look for some good sales then.

Amazon has consistently been offering quite a few discounts on various Alexa enabled devices here lately. Almost every day I see discounts on the Dot or one or more of the other devices.

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by OtinG

Amazon has consistently been offering quite a few discounts on various Alexa enabled devices here lately. Almost every day I see discounts on the Dot or one or more of the other devices.

They have been, but usually not as low as Prime Day and Black Friday.

Check this site out. He tracks prices for all of Amazon's devices, including the lowest price.

Amazon Device Buyer’s Guide

Listed below are discounted prices you can expect for electronics made by Amazon. All prices are based on historical sales, such as Prime Day and Black Friday sales, with the "Great" price usually being the lowest price the device has ever been in the past. The release history for each device is listed to help determine if a particular model has been updated recently and the likelyhood of a new version being released.

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by wodin

Thanks Monkey, but what they say and what they do's not always the same. When you guys begin coming in with real life experiences I'll weigh the comments and make a decision.

But it was on the internet

[OtinG]

A couple of things about the Fire TV Cube:

First, this was probably already mentioned but I just now noticed it on the Amazon website, the initial sale price is only good through tomorrow (Friday June 8).

Welcome to hands-free TV. Prime members can pre-order Fire TV Cube for an introductory price of $119.99 $89.99. Offer ends June 8th at 11:59 PM EST.

So if you want to take advantage of the $30 discount you need to pre-order before 11:59 PM EST on Friday June 8.

Second, after I placed my initial pre-order, Amazon decided to offer the 5 monthly payments option. So I cancelled my initial pre-order and re-pre-ordered it using the 5 monthly payments option.

[CRussel]

More to the point -- if you want the $10 credit, you need to activate by July 1, and use the credit by August 31.

[OtinG]

Originally Posted by CRussel

More to the point -- if you want the $10 credit, you need to activate by July 1, and use the credit by August 31.

Thanks, I missed seeing the $10 Prime Video credit that you also get. That is good because even though I’m a Prime member it seems that every video I want to watch on Amazon isn’t covered under Prime and thus costs me extra. I usually pass when that happens. It seems too much to ask $3 or more even for very old made for TV movies.

[tubemonkey]

10 things the Amazon Fire TV Cube Can’t Do

There are many things that the new Amazon Fire TV Cube that was just announced today can do that no Fire TV before it could do, but there are also things you might think it can do that it can’t. Here’s a list of 10 things that the Fire TV Cube cannot do.

1. Does not work with HDMI hubs/switches
2. Can control the volume of either a soundbar or A/V receiver, but not both
3. Does not support Alexa Bluetooth Syncing
4. Does not support Alexa Calling & Messaging
5. Does not support Alexa Multi-Room Audio
6. Cannot be controlled through an external Echo device
7. Not compatible with Projectors
8. Not compatible with Universal Remotes
9. Can’t change OTA antenna channels
10. Does not support Sleep Timers

[CRussel]

10.) Yet.

Only a couple of those are things I might care about, and none of them deal breakers

[OtinG]

I would add:

11. Probably does not have the ability to control Roku, Apple TV, and some of the other similar boxes.

Many are speculating these competitive boxes want be in the list of things the Cube can control.

Some of the reviews, speculative at best, have mentioned that you will still need a remote for your various devices. Some devices are not under the Cube's umbrella such as Roku, DVD players, etc. Even the ones that are will require remotes because the Cube will have very little, if any, control over the menu systems of devices and most apps. And as far as controlling volume, the Cube must do so via voice command because the Cube's remote has no volume buttons.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by OtinG

I would add:

11. Probably does not have the ability to control Roku, Apple TV, and some of the other similar boxes.

Many are speculating these competitive boxes want be in the list of things the Cube can control.

In other circumstances, I would argue that a universal remote would have either learning functions or a standard library of codes, so I would expect all the popular devices to work fine, just as all brands work fine on most regular universal remotes, even if that remote is from, say, LG or Sony.

But this is Amazon we're talking about, the company that wouldn't sell Chromecasts, so I'm not betting against you.

[OtinG]

My main concern at the moment though is based on past experience with Alexa devices in the same room as my TV system. Every device I've tried--and that includes Echo 1st and 2nd Gens, Dot, and Tap--have been very difficult to use while the sound is turned on my TV. They all have trouble hearing commands. Also they all have issues of hearing commands spoken in TV commercials. That is a huge double whammy. The Cube supposedly addresses this with 8 mics all facing forward on the front, but unfortunately the Cube has to be installed near the TV so it is going t be very close to the speakers. I'm not convinced it will work very well in that regard. But the Cube remote does have a built in mic, so I'm hoping that I can use that and turn off the always listening function and have much better success. I use a Tap in the living room currently just for that reason. My Tap is set up to require the tapping of its button to hear me, so accidental activation don't happen. I got so tired of hearing my Echos or Dot start babbling for no apparent reason while watching TV, or obeying commands from TV commercials. Amazon could fix that if they would allow us to create our own wake word, but they won't do that.

[OtinG]

Originally Posted by ApK

In other circumstances, I would argue that a universal remote would have either learning functions or a standard library of codes, so I would expect all the popular devices to work fine, just as all brands work fine on most regular universal remotes, even if that remote is from, say, LG or Sony.

But this is Amazon we're talking about, the company that wouldn't sell Chromecasts, so I'm not betting against you.

I based my statement on some of the podcasts and reviews I watched wherein those guys were present at Amazon's unveiling of the Cube and initial demonstration thereof. You can probably expect issues with Youtube for example since Amazon and Youtube are not cooperating with one another. It would make since if Amazon didn't want to support competitor boxes like Roku, though I wish they would. I actually like my Roku much better than my Fire TV. Apple TV blows chunks so I could care less if they support it, but some will like that support.

ETA: I think Amazon could easily block device codes of Rokus and other devices. That would be relatively easy to program into the FW. I hope they don't, but they could.

[OtinG]

One question I currently have concerns remotes. My current Fire TV boxes (2nd Gen and 3rd Gen) both have RF (radio frequency) remotes. Most of my other devices (Sony Bravia TV, Spectrum cable box, DVD player, Roku, and probably others I'm forgetting) use IR (infrared) remotes. With IR you need to point the remote in the general direction of the device to make it work. With RF you can be in another room and it will still work because it is radio waves rather than light waves. In order to get my Fire TV to work with a universal remote I bought that is IR only, I had to buy an IR plugin dongle for the Fire TV. It works now with the universal remote, but it is rather slow to react compared to using the RF remote that came with the Fire TV. The Cube will come with an IR plugin dongle. What I'm not sure of is how the Cube will interact with other devices that use IR but not RF. Will it do so seamlessly? Will it be slow and clunky? No way of knowing until we get one and test it out.

Another major question is how difficult to set up the Cube will be. Programming a universal remote can be frustrating. Programming routines and scenes in Alexa is definitely frustrating and they don't always work because we don't understand the dos and don'ts. It was not clear that you shouldn't use similar sounding device names, else Alexa gets confused. For example, Bathroom Light and Livingroom Light are too similar and caused issues. I finally figured that out and changed them to Bathroom Light and Livingroom Lamp and now she doesn't get confused as often. With simple routines such a PITA to program, I fear that turning the Cube into a universal remote will likely take hours and hours and still never be totally the way you want it to be.

And one more thing that keeps coming to mind: I have intermittent issues with Alexa dropping out. Sometimes it is the Alexa servers dropping, sometimes it is smart devices dropping out, sometimes it is my WiFi (though rarely). This is not a major issue, but it can be frustrating. I've had Alexa say she can not communicate with a smart device, but when I use the smart device's app on my iPhone or iPad it works just fine. So Alexa still has many issues in the smart device control area. In a entertainment center setup like mine, I wonder just how reliable Alexa will be.