Amazon Echo FAQ

giftgrub

Have requested the Dot from the other half for Christmas, seems like a good punt for 50 nicker. I plan to plug it into a seperates system in the living room, it'll be able to link to the Bluetooth speaker in the kitchen as well, which will basically cover the downstairs of the house.

A lot of my music is Spotify these days, and more and more podcasts are moving there as well so i'm looking forward to that, the only issue would seem to be Tune In and irish stations.

Just one thing, and sorry if this has been asked before, whats the deal with the address in settings? Do you have to specify what country you're in for the best results?

mrcheez

giftgrub wrote: »

Just one thing, and sorry if this has been asked before, whats the deal with the address in settings? Do you have to specify what country you're in for the best results?

You don't specify where you are, you specify where each device is located. So I set one Dot to Belfast and the other Dot to Dublin. Tune In requests on the Belfast device were recognized whereas I had problems on the Dublin device.

There's no discernible benefit to setting location to Dublin from what I can see since you need to specify "in Dublin" when asking for the weather forecast regardless.

Also I cycle everywhere so have no need for traffic information in Dublin.

Cabaal

Really annoyed with my Echo dot since the clocks changed,

If I ask it for the time it tells me the correct time, but if I ask it to set an alarm for 7am and then ask it what alarms it has set it tells me its set for 8am!
Bloody annoying

Thelomen Toblackai

Cabaal wrote: »

Really annoyed with my Echo dot since the clocks changed,

If I ask it for the time it tells me the correct time, but if I ask it to set an alarm for 7am and then ask it what alarms it has set it tells me its set for 8am!
Bloody annoying

If you re-save your address it should fix that. I had the same issue when I first bought the Echo. The alarms must work off different time settings or something and don't get updated until there's an address change.

Stoner

mrcheez wrote:

Also I cycle everywhere so have no need for traffic information in Dublin.

Plus don't you set to and from addresses for the traffic information so technically the dot address in meanness wrt the traffic address ?

mrcheez

Stoner wrote: »

Plus don't you set to and from addresses for the traffic information so technically the dot address in meanness wrt the traffic address ?

I have the traffic address as Dublin, but the Dot address as Belfast and it keeps directing me from Belfast... so I guess that's a bug for them to sort out!

ECO_Mental

Does it work with Groove music? Did a few Google searches and I don't it does but I may as well ask. Thanks

degsie

ECO_Mental wrote: »

Does it work with Groove music? Did a few Google searches and I don't it does but I may as well ask. Thanks

Groove = Microsoft, Echo = Amazon, so no.

Stoner

ECO_Mental wrote:

Does it work with Groove music? Did a few Google searches and I don't it does but I may as well ask. Thanks

Prime music or Spotify only

Or local NAS drive

jogdish

Can you ask the echo questions like, "opening times Argos" or phone number of certain hotel?" "play song from you tube"

i.e information questions that OK Google can handle? And If so are the results good?

degsie

Stoner wrote: »

Prime music or Spotify only

Or local NAS drive

How do you play media off a Nas?

Stoner

mrcheez wrote:

I tested out some local video files stored on my network and said "Alexa tell Kodi to start Avatar" and Avatar began to play.. then I asked it the same question later on and it said it didn't understand. So not really great there.

Mrcheez did it through Kodi

mrcheez

jogdish wrote: »

Can you ask the echo questions like, "opening times Argos" or phone number of certain hotel?" "play song from you tube"

i.e information questions that OK Google can handle? And If so are the results good?

No. It currently seems to fail on questions related to specific locations, such as traffic or opening times.

For "play song" it only works with a Spotify / Amazon Music account for now.

Google Home might be a better option if you want the full OK Google experience, and it will even play YouTube songs (though ads will still play unless you upgrade to YouTube Red.. only available in the US afaik)

RoYoBo

mrcheez wrote: »

For "play song" it only works with a Spotify / Amazon Music account for now.

Have you tried it out with Amazon Music? This is something that would be useful to me - have neither the Dot nor the Amazon Music account yet.

ECO_Mental

degsie wrote: »

Groove = Microsoft, Echo = Amazon, so no.

Yeah but you can get groove to play on your iPhone and your android phone so I don't think it would be a stretch to get them to intergrate with groove. I know that amazon want to push their own music service but all those iTunes people will just buy the apple home because it will support iTunes also the google machine will support other music subscripton services. They are missing a trick here in not getting people on board especially when the two biggest players are launching their own products as well.

I was thinking of getting this myself but I don't know now, not a big fan of Amazon they only support the US and the UK and from reading the thread you have to trick the Echo that you are in Ireland and some people are having difficulty in doing that. Thing is with a product like this it HAS to work seem less all the time. I don't know if i got it and i asked it what the weather wo be like today and it have me the weather of Milton Keynes because it reset and updated that would drive me crazy. I will keep reading this and I could be proven wrong I think voice control is great as I have kinect on my xbone so it's the future but I think the Google machine might be better but that is early days.

bush

I bought one and I don't think it's great at the minute. I'm going to hold on to it and I'm just looking at it as an advanced Bluetooth receiver that wasn't all that expensive at 50 quid. Im not using it like I thought I could and I think ill keep an eye on Google home.

Victor2009

Everyone who has problem with setting up Amazon echo!!!
When you get to option to pair and after choosing Amazon-xx wifi, and not seeing next step Continue button.
I figured out after 2 days hard research.
You need some how do it over alexa.amazon.com and not other sites like co.uk or .de

When I tried to setup I was automatically redirected to .co.uk and was unable to setup.

Basically first thing you need change you Amazon account to point to US, this done is amazon account under "Manage you Countenance and device" in your account tab. Than you will see in Setting option, there you scroll and change your country to US (try to find any valid US address).
After you changed that you need logout and login. Then you need go to alexa.amazon.com (not other then that). And setup yours echo over there (at that point once you choose amazon-xx wifi you will get next step.
Once you done that you need go back to your amazon account and change back to UK country. After you done that you need go back to alexa.amazon.com and reset your echo. At that point echo will let you finish setup and it will give you 24 hours to push new firmware GB version to your device.

Let me know if you have same as I or I explain to complicated. Easy to fix, but at first time it will be huge brain storm.

Irish Gunner

Ok question re the Echo and the Dot



I am looking at getting the Echo for the main room downstairs and the Dot for upstairs. Can they be linked to each other so say I want to play a tune from Spotify can I say get it to play on both or if I want to listen to a station on TuneIn Radio can I have it so that it plays both downstairs and upstairs? Also can I use the dot as an alarm clock radio. So set it to wake up on certain radio station in the morning? At the moment I cannot bear Irish morning radio

Sorry for all the questions but over in the UK soon and not sure if to pick up one or both and trying to see the advantages of getting both. Also if bought in the Uk is it easy to change location to Ireland based on last post and to get update firmware etc

Victor2009

Irish Gunner wrote: »

Ok question re the Echo and the Dot



I am looking at getting the Echo for the main room downstairs and the Dot for upstairs. Can they be linked to each other so say I want to play a tune from Spotify can I say get it to play on both or if I want to listen to a station on TuneIn Radio can I have it so that it plays both downstairs and upstairs? Also can I use the dot as an alarm clock radio. So set it to wake up on certain radio station in the morning? At the moment I cannot bear Irish morning radio

Sorry for all the questions but over in the UK soon and not sure if to pick up one or both and trying to see the advantages of getting both. Also if bought in the Uk is it easy to change location to Ireland based on last post and to get update firmware etc

We cant change to ROI, only US, UK and Germany available. Yes you can choose device on what you want to play, or set alarm.

Irish Gunner

Perfect thanks no to muster up some Sterling while its weak

mrcheez

Irish Gunner wrote: »

Can they be linked to each other so say I want to play a tune from Spotify can I say get it to play on both or if I want to listen to a station on TuneIn Radio can I have it so that it plays both downstairs and upstairs?

I actually was doing this yesterday for TuneIn, sounded great and both were in sync so sound came across as stereo depending on my position in the house.

For Spotify you can only play one at a time, as this is a limit with Spotify themselves. I'm sure future updates will allow both to be synced though.

So the way I have Spotify working is...

- While upstairs "Alexa play <insert song name>".. starts playing on bedroom Echo Dot
- I go into the office and turn on the Bluetooth speaker, and the music automatically gets redirected to those speakers
- I go downstairs and tell my 2nd dot "Alexa play Spotify", the music then gets redirected to the downstairs hifi system (via the 3.5mm cable).

Meanwhile my hands are full of laundry... this is why it kicks ass, the music can follow you just using your voice and no need to dig out a phone and start an app. :pac:

Irish Gunner wrote: »

Also can I use the dot as an alarm clock radio. So set it to wake up on certain radio station in the morning? At the moment I cannot bear Irish morning radio

I theory yes, though you need to use an app on your phone to trigger Alexa to start playing TuneIn at a specified time.

I'm sure they'll add this functionality in a future update though.

At the moment the alarm only plays from a selection of pre-defined sounds.

Stoner

Anyone have an issue with the radio only playing for 10 seconds and then cutting off ?
Seems to happen a bit.

My one is right beside the router. I've read that this not a good spot for it.

Plus I'm having difficulty getting and Irish stations

Can't get any inky BBC stations

What are people saying to get
News talk or 98fm or today fm

mrcheez

Stoner wrote: »

Anyone have an issue with the radio only playing for 10 seconds and then cutting off ?
Seems to happen a bit.

My one is right beside the router. I've read that this not a good spot for it.

Plus I'm having difficulty getting and Irish stations

Can't get any inky BBC stations

What are people saying to get
News talk or 98fm or today fm

What location have you set for your Echo Dot, and what language?

Stoner

Location is Dublin.
Language is uk English.
It's set up fine.

If I ask it for RTE radio 1
It repeats
"You would like to listen to rte radio one, correct ?"
I say yes ,

It says it can't find them

Stoner

BBC radio no issue.

v10

Stoner wrote: »

Location is Dublin.
Language is uk English.
It's set up fine.

If I ask it for RTE radio 1
It repeats
"You would like to listen to rte radio one, correct ?"
I say yes ,

It says it can't find them

I personally find the only way it works well is to set language to US English and location to a UK (I use Northern Irish) address.

With it set this way Spotify works fine without saying 'on spotify' and almost all Irish Tune In stations work just by saying for example 'play station name' or sometimes 'play station name radio' depending on the name.

I use 'Big Sky' skill for weather which lets me set location within the skill so saying 'open big sky' gives me local weather.

And traffic also works perfect as I have 'from' set to my home address and 'to' set to my work address.

I have a mix of WeMo smart plugs, TPLink smart plugs and Philips Hue Bulbs around the place and they all work pretty good too.

I also have RTE news read to me when I ask for news, so I'm happy overall and surprised at some of the issues I read here !

paulbok

Stoner wrote: »

Anyone have an issue with the radio only playing for 10 seconds and then cutting off ?
Seems to happen a bit.

My one is right beside the router. I've read that this not a good spot for it.

Plus I'm having difficulty getting and Irish stations

Can't get any inky BBC stations

What are people saying to get
News talk or 98fm or today fm

"Alexa, play Today FM" works almost every time for me, I only have issues with station names that can easily be mixed up with foreign stations, eg,8Radio (think I mumble when I say this one for some reason), RTE 2XM (tends to go to XFM Manchester).
Any BBC station I've tried is fine.

I only use TuneIn though, no linked spotify etc accounts so wonder does that make it easier?

I have the Echo in the kitchen and my wifi signal isn't the strongest there so it can drop out every so often. Will be getting an extender soon.

mrcheez

v10 wrote: »

I personally find the only way it works well is to set language to US English and location to a UK (I use Northern Irish) address.

With it set this way Spotify works fine without saying 'on spotify' and almost all Irish Tune In stations work just by saying for example 'play station name' or sometimes 'play station name radio' depending on the name.

I use 'Big Sky' skill for weather which lets me set location within the skill so saying 'open big sky' gives me local weather.

And traffic also works perfect as I have 'from' set to my home address and 'to' set to my work address.

I have a mix of WeMo smart plugs, TPLink smart plugs and Philips Hue Bulbs around the place and they all work pretty good too.

I also have RTE news read to me when I ask for news, so I'm happy overall and surprised at some of the issues I read here !

Interesting will try some of these.. although I prefer BBC news for news.

How do I avoid it going to RTE for the news?

paulbok

Anyone seen this before?
Gesture control for tv/lights and others.

https://singlecue.com/

potential alternative to a dot in my sitting room, £27 on amazon, might get one once I check out what devices it supports or potentially can learn.

edit.
reviews on Amazon not promising.

degsie

paulbok wrote: »

Anyone seen this before?
Gesture control for tv/lights and others.

https://singlecue.com/

potential alternative to a dot in my sitting room, £27 on amazon, might get one once I check out what devices it supports or potentially can learn.

edit.
reviews on Amazon not promising.

Interesting but not quite sure what it has to do with echo.