Amazon Echo Club

[Tarana]

On Prime Day, I bought the Echo 4 to replace the Echo 3 for my Mom. Just wanted to mention that the microphone is just a little better and my elderly Mom doesn't have to repeat herself as often. The disadvantage is that the indicator lights are on the bottom instead of the top so she misses notifications. Can't really move it from where it is or the cats will knock it off the table. So traded one problem for another. Notifications aren't quite as critical since I see them. My Mom uses the Echo all day long for timers. Now I have to figure out which dot will get replaced by the extra Echo.

[Tarana]

Originally Posted by DNSB

Anyone here still allowing their Amazon Echo devices to eavesdrop on their lives 24/7?

Yep. The whole point is to have it available to hear me when I want to give it a command. Same with Siri.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by booklover6

The sound the echo makes after turning on my plug changed and I don't know how to change it back. Anyone else have their sound change?

Hmm. This might explain something.

Recently I was walking around humming a tune that I couldn't place. It was driving me crazy. Thankfully my wife recognized it as the "Perry Mason" theme. I've certainly seen Perry Mason, but not recently, and I could not think of any reason why the theme would have come to my mind.

Then I told Alexa to turn on our air conditioner. The AC played it's power-on sound, then Alexa played her confirm sound.

Together, they are the Perry Mason theme.

[booklover6]

Originally Posted by ApK

Hmm. This might explain something.

Recently I was walking around humming a tune that I couldn't place. It was driving me crazy. Thankfully my wife recognized it as the "Perry Mason" theme. I've certainly seen Perry Mason, but not recently, and I could not think of any reason why the theme would have come to my mind.

Then I told Alexa to turn on our air conditioner. The AC played it's power-on sound, then Alexa played her confirm sound.

Together, they are the Perry Mason theme.

I have 2 different confirm sounds now, one for turning on my plug and a different one for setting my alarm. One sounds like cha-ching, the other like a game show noise or something. They are both SO ANNOYING. I can find NO way to change these default sounds. I just listened to the Perry Mason theme song and I would rather have that!

[booklover6]

Originally Posted by DNSB

Anyone here still allowing their Amazon Echo devices to eavesdrop on their lives 24/7?

I have two "Shows" with cameras off. But multiple dots and echos with microphones on.

I have the original Alexa next to my bed. And the full size Echo (big round one I named Sanctuary Moon) across the room with the microphone off. I have a fire tablet bluetoothed to the Moon. It's working great, I bring up Spotify on the tablet and hit play, and it automatically plays on the Moon. It's a pleasant way to listen to music while I read! And the visual interface is great for making sure Spotify is playing what I want instead of venturing off into chaos like it does.

I know people use their phones for things like that but I don't normally have my phone in my bedroom.

But if I keep the microphone on, on the Moon, it tries to butt in when I'm talking to my Alexa.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by booklover6

But if I keep the microphone on, on the Moon, it tries to butt in when I'm talking to my Alexa.

Change the wake work for the Moon? It's what I do when Echoes are within earshot of each other.

[booklover6]

Originally Posted by issybird

Change the wake work for the Moon? It's what I do when Echoes are within earshot of each other.

Oh yeah, I forgot I could do that! Thanks.

[issybird]

A notification just popped up from Alexa. She wanted to tell me how many gigabytes the Yankees are.

As an aside, I would love to turn off the Yankees notifications, but cannot find a way to do it. I could turn off notifications altogether, but the delivery notifications are helpful.

[issybird]

Alexa just told me that at 2PM, it'll be 62° with intermittent clouds. And a 19% chance of ice.

Sigh. I don't know why I talk to her.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by issybird

Alexa just told me that at 2PM, it'll be 62° with intermittent clouds. And a 19% chance of ice.

Sigh. I don't know why I talk to her.

For the amusement value?

[cc_in_oh]

My Govee strip lights worked well for quite a while but now have gotten flaky. A routine turns them on at sunset but recently they fail to light and it takes several manual commands before they respond. No indication of a connection problem, Alexa says "OK" but nothing happens. They're plugged in only a few feet from the router.

I have to give some credit to Kasa - smart switches and plugs far from router are working flawlessly so far and recover from power outages with no problems. (Some other brands, e.g. Sengled, have to be deleted and set up again from scratch after outages). I suppose I should mention that my router is a TP-Link AX5400 - that may be a factor in the reliability of Kasa products.

[DiapDealer]

I'm having issues with light groups lately. I used to be able to say "lights on/off" to a particular Echo and only the lights that were grouped with that Echo would turn on/off. Now I'm getting random "bleeding" into other groups of lights. Echo reboots seem to help for a while, but then eventually, lights grouped with other Echos in other rooms start turning on/off when they shouldn't. 100% of the lights are Kasa (made available to Alexa via the Kasa Skill) and 100% of the groups are created in Alexa (not Kasa).

"Lights on/off" has worked to turn only the lights in that room on/off for several years without fail. I will miss it if I have to go back to saying the various light group names in my commands.

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I'm having issues with light groups lately. I used to be able to say "lights on/off" to a particular Echo and only the lights that were grouped with that Echo would turn on/off. Now I'm getting random "bleeding" into other groups of lights. Echo reboots seem to help for a while, but then eventually, lights grouped with other Echos in other rooms start turning on/off when they shouldn't. 100% of the lights are Kasa (made available to Alexa via the Kasa Skill) and 100% of the groups are created in Alexa (not Kasa).

"Lights on/off" has worked to turn only the lights in that room on/off for several years without fail. I will miss it if I have to go back to saying the various light group names in my commands.

For lights on, try 'Alexa, It's dark in here'.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by CRussel

For lights on, try 'Alexa, It's dark in here'.

Thanks. It seems to work ok. But "Alexa, lights on/off" seems to be behaving itself right now, too, so who knows! I'll use the newer suggestion if I have to, but I don't find it very intuitive to mention how dark it is to get the lights turned on. Giving hints to inanimate objects so they can suss out my wishes is not in my nature. I prefer the direct (Star Trek-ish) practice of "Computer, lights".

I'll keep playing just in case its an update that I can compensate for.

[DiapDealer]

There's clearly been some algorithm changes RE lights and group names. "Turn on/off the lights" seems to work better for me now (granularity-wise) than "Lights on/off." Also, Alexa seems more particular about not having "lights" be part of a group name (where in the past It caused me no problems).

So after some judicious group renaming and creating some routines that automatically convert "Lights on/off" voice commands to "Turn on/off the lights," I seem to have things back to the way I prefer them. So far, anyway.

Then I'll have to see what all of that renaming might have broken with regard to the TPLink integration with my Home Assistant server.