Amazon Echo Club

[OtinG]

Considering I’ve spent more hours than I should have trying to get my bleeping Show 5 to give me my preferred clock background and face without constant dimming in an attempt to display those @#$& Tips, and considering that I wasted another few hours today trying to get Amazon Photos to actually work, and considering I then tried to relax while listening to an Amazon Music xmas playlist that played one song then stopped, so I started another playlist and it stopped after two songs, I don’t think Amazon will ever win me over to their ecosystem. Everything in Amazon’s ecosystems seems to have serious flaws. Perhaps if they hired decent programmers they might get something to work, but I’m not holding my breath. Aaargh!

ETA on Nov 26: Just got an email from Amazon stating that on Nov 25 (yesterday when I wrote this post) that Amazon Photos had some kind of failure resulting in it not being functional, but saying the issue has been corrected. I indeed was able to use the app this afternoon without issue and was able to set up several photos to be used as screensavers on my Fire TV Cube 2nd generation.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by ApK

I just ordered the Dot 4. It says it won't be here till December, but I'll report back. I have an Echo 1, Echo 2, Dot 2, and Dot 3 to compare it to.
It's intended use is to replace the echo 2 in the kitchen, hoping it will hear better when next to a tile wall.
My son does most of the music listening, and says he can't tell a difference between the Dot 3 and Echo 2 the way he uses them, so I saw no reason to try the Echo 4 over the Dot 4.

ApK

We got our Dot 4 the other day. Bad news out of the way first: I think I can say objectively that at the higher volume settings, the speaker quality sucks. Above level 6 or so, music is distorted, a bit noisy, and tinny, like a '70s-era pocket radio.

At level 6, which is still reasonably loud, even in a kitchen with fans and appliances running, things become far more subjective.
I find it sounds almost identical to our Dot 2s in most settings. I think the speaker arrangement of the older Dots and Echos make the sound more heavily influenced by the acoustics of wherever it sits, for better or worse.
My son notices a difference between the Dot3 in his room and this Dot 4 in the kitchen, more so than with the Echo 2, but not so much that he says it matters to him. I think he prefers the Dot3 to the Dot4, and I think I do too. Maybe it's because of the acoustics in his room. But it's good enough.
My daughter prefers the Dot 4 to either the Dot 2 in her room, or to the Echo 2 in the kitchen. She says the 4 sounds "clearer." I think she prefers the lack of bass.

For everything else, so far the Dot 4 is performing better that the Echo 2 did in the kitchen. It's responding to voice more reliably, and I was even able to change the wake word in the living room back to "Alexa" because the the Dot4 is recognizing when we are talking to it better than the Echo 2 ever did.

And, since the Echo 2 is working better in the basement where we moved it to replace an old Dot that had the habit of ignoring my wife like a sullen teenager, I definitely think the gen 4 shape just works better near the kitchen tile wall than did the older shape, which admittedly had instructions saying "do not place close to walls."

For $28, I'm keeping it in the kitchen. Since we don't need the smart home hub feature, the Echo 4 would have to sound a LOT better than the Dot 4 to make it worth the extra money for me, and it probably does, but we just don't care enough to find out.

ApK

[mlewis78]

Originally Posted by OtinG

ETA on Nov 26: Just got an email from Amazon stating that on Nov 25 (yesterday when I wrote this post) that Amazon Photos had some kind of failure resulting in it not being functional, but saying the issue has been corrected. I indeed was able to use the app this afternoon without issue and was able to set up several photos to be used as screensavers on my Fire TV Cube 2nd generation.

I have my Amazon photos as a screensaver for my fire tv cube. Sometimes I am doing other things on the laptop while the screen goes suddenly to my mother, father, aunts and uncles (all dead), cousins, my brothers (2 are dead), nephew and my grand nieces and nephew (living).

[OtinG]

Originally Posted by mlewis78

I have my Amazon photos as a screensaver for my fire tv cube. Sometimes I am doing other things on the laptop while the screen goes suddenly to my mother, father, aunts and uncles (all dead), cousins, my brothers (2 are dead), nephew and my grand nieces and nephew (living).

I use Amazon Photos only to provide my personal screensaver images to my Echo Show 5 and Fire TV Cube 2nd gen. The photo service is pretty awful and must have been written by lackluster programmers. But the implementation of personal screensavers on both the Show 5 and Cube are so poorly written I guess it doesn't matter. On the Show 5 you have to jump through flaming hoops to get a screensaver or background to display properly, and after a while they will screw up regardless of what you do in the settings. On the Cube, they show up with less complication, but they seem to only cycle once then the screen goes blank. Bezos needs to ask Santa for some programmers who actually know the difference between their backsides and a hole in the ground. It is really frustrating having to deal with such garbage for FW on Amazon devices. They get the hardware designs pretty good, but they always screw up the FW.

[mlewis78]

I put one photo on my Echo Show 5. I started out with the rotation of Amazon photos, but it showed a lot of things I don't want to see. I have a photo of an ocean wave in my hometown that someone else took (I copied it from WebPhotos a long time ago. I think that site went out of business). I use the round clock with the sweeping second hand on it.

[John F]

My first impressions of my new Echo 4...

Taking it out of the box, it looks larger than I thought it would. The setup was fairly simple, although the quick install instructions weren't very helpful: it said to open the app and follow the instructions but when I opened the app there were no messages/instructions.

No comments on audio quality, I haven't played this at louder sound levels.

In case this helps anyone... I added this to an existing group, and when I went to play music, it said something like "... the service is unavailable ..." (I don't recall the wording). I quickly called Amazon, and then found that in the group, audio was going to the Dot that was in the group (and the Dot was powered off).

[ApK]

Originally Posted by John F

In case this helps anyone... I added this to an existing group, and when I went to play music, it said something like "... the service is unavailable ..." (I don't recall the wording). I quickly called Amazon, and then found that in the group, audio was going to the Dot that was in the group (and the Dot was powered off).

I ran into something similar when I first installed the new Dot. I asked it to play music, and after she said "now playing..." just got silence. Turned out there is a new (to me) setting in the app to set the "default speaker" for a group, and the now-unplugged Echo 2 I was replacing was still the default.

[OtinG]

Unfortunately Amazon is notorious for changing the menus in their apps and failing to update their online documentation to reflect those changes. Some of their online documentation for devices looks like it hasn't been updated in a long time. I recently tried to use the Fire TV OS app via my TV and Fire TV Cube 2 to restart my Fire TV Recast when it stopped allowing me to delete recordings. Occasionally it does that, but restarting it fixes the issue. I keep the Fire TV Recast in my study next to my WiFi router, so if I have to get up to go restart it manually it means going into another room. I'm lazy in my old age and prefer to keep comfy in my recliner, so using the menu to restart it is a lot better for me. Long story short, Amazon's documentation was outdated and the Restart menu item wasn't where it had been. It took a while to locate where they moved it, and a quick internet search was involved.

The Amazon Alexa app for iOS and iPadOS change constantly. Keeping up with where menu items get relocated is a royal PITA! Plus Amazon often adds new features and turns them on without telling us, so stranger than usual behavior often occurs after FW updates to Echo devices.

[OtinG]

Originally Posted by mlewis78

I put one photo on my Echo Show 5. I started out with the rotation of Amazon photos, but it showed a lot of things I don't want to see. I have a photo of an ocean wave in my hometown that someone else took (I copied it from WebPhotos a long time ago. I think that site went out of business). I use the round clock with the sweeping second hand on it.

I use only one photo now too. Same issue for me as far as rotating multiple photos. The Echo Show 5 would repeat only a small percentage of the photos I used, was too quick to rotate, and would show blank screens and other crap I did not want to see. With just one photo and rotation turned off, I still get a dimming screen every few minutes followed by a Tips item on occasion. Very frustrated with that. Someone needs to tell Amazon that NO means NO when it comes to rotation items. Setting them all to HELL BLEEPING NO should keep them from ever displaying, but it doesn't.

[OtinG]

Originally Posted by John F

My first impressions of my new Echo 4...

Taking it out of the box, it looks larger than I thought it would. The setup was fairly simple, although the quick install instructions weren't very helpful: it said to open the app and follow the instructions but when I opened the app there were no messages/instructions.

No comments on audio quality, I haven't played this at louder sound levels.

In case this helps anyone... I added this to an existing group, and when I went to play music, it said something like "... the service is unavailable ..." (I don't recall the wording). I quickly called Amazon, and then found that in the group, audio was going to the Dot that was in the group (and the Dot was powered off).

Originally Posted by ApK

I ran into something similar when I first installed the new Dot. I asked it to play music, and after she said "now playing..." just got silence. Turned out there is a new (to me) setting in the app to set the "default speaker" for a group, and the now-unplugged Echo 2 I was replacing was still the default.

Did Amazon give you guys a free 3 months of Prime Music with your new Echos? They used to do that, but I’m not sure if they still do.

I've encountered group default speaker settings too. I think that setting was added during an update a while back. I had to do internet searches to find what the issue was. IMO, groups and scenes are still flaky in their implementations, and they don't always play by the rules.

[John F]

Originally Posted by OtinG

Did Amazon give you guys a free 3 months of Prime Music with your new Echos? They used to do that, but I’m not sure if they still do.

...

Not that I'm aware of. This is my third echo, and I don't recall getting prime music trials (although I may have and didn't care at the time).

[ApK]

Originally Posted by OtinG

Did Amazon give you guys a free 3 months of Prime Music with your new Echos? They used to do that, but I’m not sure if they still do.

Mine came with a 6 month Music Unlimited trial. (Which is I assume what you meant, since all Prime Members get Prime Music included)
It was one of the purchase options sort of like where it shows me dot + free smart bulb now.

[Catlady]

I FINALLY set up the smart plug I bought on Black Friday more than a year ago. I set up routines to turn my Christmas lights on and off at specified times--at least I hope I did; we'll see if they go on when they're supposed to this evening!

[OtinG]

Originally Posted by ApK

Mine came with a 6 month Music Unlimited trial. (Which is I assume what you meant, since all Prime Members get Prime Music included)
It was one of the purchase options sort of like where it shows me dot + free smart bulb now.

Yes I meant the free trial of Prime Music Unlimited. I should have been more specific. Last year they were including a free 3 month trial with some of the Echos bought during Prime Day and BF and some other occasions as well. I think it was a single device trial membership. I got that when I bought my Echo Plus 2 and also when I bought my Echo Show 5.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by OtinG

I think it was a single device trial membership.

This 6-month one, which I got during the BF/CM period, is the $7.95 version, which works on all devices, but just one stream at a time. Worked out well, my kids use it a lot.

ApK