Alexa Can Do This! And This! And This!

For the uninitiated, first, who (or what) is Alexa? Alexa is to Amazon what Siri is to Apple and what OK Google is to Android users.  Alexa is a virtual assistant created by mysterious Amazon's Lab 126, which houses the company’s hardware, software and operations teams. Now thanks to Alexa, home automation, much of which had seemed to be in the realm of sci-fi till the recent past, is now a reality.

Amazon Echo is a smart speaker and it is really pretty smart in what it can do. Not only does it play good quality music by connecting to any of your phones or music players via Bluetooth/Wi-Fi, it connects to a could-based voice service that performs various functions. You can tell it to play music, reduce or increase the volume, search for a particular song by synching it to Amazon Prime Music, Saavn, TuneIn, Pandora, Spotify etc. It has multi-room music functionality so that you can play music across multiple Echo devices at the same time.

You can also search the net, set alarms, check the weather and make calls. When in doubt you can ask Alexa how to set up calling and you will be guided through the entire procedure. If you have any Zigbee (wireless technology for personal area networks) enabled devices in the home, you can ‘discover’ these with Alexa. You can control the compatible Philips, Syska, TP-Link and Oakter devices simply by using voice commands.

There is Amazon Echo, Echo Plus, Echo Dot and Echo Spot (1st, 2nd or 3rd generations) to choose from.  

Then there are some new Echo devices just added by Amazon. There is the new Echo Input a coaster sized device designed to pair with other speakers, the Echo Sub Subwoofer that works with other Echoes for surround sound. Then there is Echo Auto, which gets Alexa into your car; mounts on to the car dashboard. We are also to have amplifiers to go with the speakers and the Countertop Echo Show now has a bigger display and has internet browsers as well as Skype.

Now Alexa will also help you cook. The basics microwave from Amazon has an Alexa button, so you can now just tell it things like ‘defrost X gm’ of whatever you picked out of the freezer or tell it to bake you ‘one potato’. It decides what setting to work at for how long. You can also integrate this with the Echo so that you can ‘tell’ Alexa to stop the microwave or restart it etc. The device has dash integration too, so it lets you order stuff directly from Amazon.

This is more than just a wall clock. You can set the timer, in fact multiple timers and can also update daylight saving time. Before you get excited about all of this, you should know that many of the new devices are not yet available though you can preorder some for delivery later. Right now, amazon.in doesn’t even list these new items, though you can use the Echo and Alexa to remotely switch off some of the lights of your home right now.