Smart home diary

I’ve played around a bit with Alexa, and even considered buying an Echo Dot or two before the launch of HomePod , but in the end decided to wait it out. However, while Hunter Douglas is still promising HomeKit support for our Luxaflex Duette blinds , and was expecting to get there by now, certification has been delayed until later in the year. In the meantime, it’s gone ahead with the launch of the new bridge which brings voice control to the blinds – but so far only for Alexa and Google Home … Rather than wait for HomeKit, we decided to get an Amazon Echo Dot as an interim solution – which also provided an opportunity to pit Siri against Alexa in a real-life smart speaker test. Note that I say ‘Siri versus Alexa,’ not HomePod versus Echo Dot. As speakers, the two devices aren’t even in the same league. HomePod is a $349 device which gets into what I think of as semi-HiFi territory. It doesn’t compete with traditional HiFi brands, but is definitely into Sonos territory … [Read more...] about Smart Home Diary: An update to our blinds revealing that Alexa is no smarter than Siri

Once you start down the HomeKit route, the convenience of having everything controlled from a single app is pretty addictive. So these days I view HomeKit compatibility as a pretty non-negotiable item with any smart home tech. But there are limits. And paying £16,500 ($22,000) for a Lutron system was definitely well beyond them! However, the thing about having a lot of windows – especially floor to ceiling ones – is that good-quality blinds are expensive no matter what. And in the winter garden (glazed balcony) in particular, which is where we spend a huge amount of our time, we wanted really nice ones. So when we found that we could have great blinds with iPhone control and promised HomeKit support for a little under half that price, we gulped and went for it … I should explain that we didn’t decide on spending that kind of money casually. It was a somewhat gradual process. My partner loves Luxaflex Duette blinds – which I’ll talk more about in a moment. These aren’t … [Read more...] about Smart Home Diary: Ending up with iPhone-controlled blinds after all … [Video]

There are Apple products I’ve been more excited to receive, but I can’t think of any that I’ve awaited with such impatience. The reason? Curiosity about that audio quality! I wrote last time that it was Home hub and voice control of HomeKit devices for my partner that really sold it to me, and I wasn’t expecting too much from it on the audio front. Sure, it was going to beat out other smart speakers, but I didn’t see it as serious competition to proper HiFi brands. But as the reviews came in , I started to wonder … When What HiFi gave it a 5-star review, and The Verge’s Nilay Patel – a self-described speaker nerd – said that it ‘sounds incredible,’ then it did start to look like Apple might be onto something. But let’s start with the design … Look & feel This is clearly a Jony Ive design. Apple’s design head said that his ambition for the iPhone was ‘a single slab of glass,’ and it’s clear that his vision here was similar: a single speaker grille. I … [Read more...] about HomePod Diary: Hands-on, and this thing is a Sonos Play 5 killer