Amazon's all-new Echo Show comes with a larger screen, fabric design, built-in hub
Google seems to be finally inching closer to the official announcement of its first in-house smart display, so naturally, the company that laid the groundwork for both the smart speaker market and smart speakers with touchscreens is beefing up its product roster.
Meet the “all-new” Amazon Echo Show, which unlike many other devices billed as “all-new” by the e-commerce giant, actually stands out from its predecessor in a number of meaningful ways.
First and foremost, the second-generation model comes with a “vibrant” 10-inch HD screen, offering “twice the display area” of the original 7-inch Echo Show. The redesigned gadget is obviously much taller, wider, heavier, and even thicker than its forerunner, but for what it’s worth, the new Echo Show is wrapped in fabric as a not-so-subtle nod to the Google Home family.
Still, this is not what we’d call a stylish product, but who cares about style when the upgraded Echo Show integrates a smart home hub for easy setup and control of compatible Zigbee smart home devices, as well as “improved” sound quality?
We’re talking two 10W speakers with Dolby processing for “room-filling” sound, as well as dual 2-inch premium drivers, and a passive bass radiator. All in all, this bad boy is unlikely to take on Harman Kardon’s priciest Citation models in terms of audio performance, but the upgrade over the first-gen Echo Show should be pretty massive.
The same goes for a new 8-mic array advertised as including Amazon’s “most powerful mics ever”, letting you order Alexa around while music is playing. As far as Alexa skills are concerned, these continue to evolve and expand practically every day, but the most important ones are still hands-free video calling and messaging, video streaming, audio streaming, and kitchen assistance.
Meanwhile, YouTube support continues to be missing, but if it makes you feel any better, the Echo Show can now surf the web on Firefox and Amazon’s own Silk browser. Up for pre-order today, the vastly improved device is available at the same $230 launch price as the original version, which in turn is likely to stick to its discounted $130 tag for good. The all-new Amazon Echo Show is scheduled to begin shipping as early as October 11.
Meet the “all-new” Amazon Echo Show, which unlike many other devices billed as “all-new” by the e-commerce giant, actually stands out from its predecessor in a number of meaningful ways.
Still, this is not what we’d call a stylish product, but who cares about style when the upgraded Echo Show integrates a smart home hub for easy setup and control of compatible Zigbee smart home devices, as well as “improved” sound quality?
The same goes for a new 8-mic array advertised as including Amazon’s “most powerful mics ever”, letting you order Alexa around while music is playing. As far as Alexa skills are concerned, these continue to evolve and expand practically every day, but the most important ones are still hands-free video calling and messaging, video streaming, audio streaming, and kitchen assistance.
source: Amazon
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