Google Home FAQ

Atomic Pineapple

jogdish wrote: »

How do you find the volume and the quality of the mics?

It's pretty decent, I have it in a small room though, I'd imagine the sound would struggle in a larger room, mic pick up is excellent though, overall a lot better than the dot I've been using.

The high horse brigade wrote: »

To get Hue working try English USA

It turns out I had Hue setup on two Google accounts, it didn't like that, I removed it from both, added it back to one and it started working.

OldMrBrennan83

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OldMrBrennan83

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druss

I'm still waiting on delivery of my Home, but I'm hunting around for a universal remote system that'll work well with it.

I know Amazon prices will probably plummet at end of the month on the Harmony Elite, but I'm impatient .

For now the best I can see is €200 in a store here in Belgium.

Amazon.de has the Harmony Ultimate with hub for €140.

Is the €60 difference worth it? Or throw that the "savings" at some hue lights instead?

noel100

I bought Harmony elite on prime day sale 112pounds. Hub was great remote was horrible to use. Remote touch screen stopped working last week Amazon refunded me the item.

Will wait till black Friday might buy the hub or if there is anything better.

OldBean

I played with the advanced remotes for a while before settling for the most basic one - Nothing to do with cost, I just wasn't interested in the increased battery usage, and worrying about the touch screen. I think I got the hub and remote for $100 around this time last year. Didn't wait for Black Friday sales, but I reckon you'll pick up a steal if you do.

bk

I've both the Harmony Ultimate and Elite (had the Ultimate first, upgraded to the Elite, moved Ultimate to bedroom).

Both are great and highly recommended, they both do almost the exact same thing. Though the Elite has extra buttons to control Hue lights which is very handy for movie time IME

Having said that, I love the Elite remote, it just fits in your hand much nicer and the buttons are more sensibly laid out. Also it is heavier (which feels better) and fells more solidly built.

If you can stretch to the Elite, then I think it is well worth it. Also well worth waiting until the sales. I got mine for just £110

Btw sorry to hear your touchscreen stopped working! Mine is perfect after two years and multiple drops by my little monster!

druss

Thanks all. Despite the good advice, I ended up making a panic-decision to buy the Elite now as I wanted to have a remote here by time that the Google Home arrived. (Belgian post would have been a bit faster than getting the remote from Amazon). No worries on that front, looks like I'll have the remote on Monday and the Home by Friday..maybe.

I suppose I can be sensible and wait for Black Friday for the Hue Bloom lights. Maybe. Or take a spin out to Ikea and see whats there!

Benzino

Sorry for asking what am sure was already asked, but nothing came up on search. Can these not be brought on Amazon?

Amazon stopped selling competitor's products about two years ago.

Benzino

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Amazon stopped selling competitor's products about two years ago.

A shame, but makes sense. Thanks.

The high horse brigade

Anyone with a Google home, a chromecast or shield and hue lights in the same room say "lets get spooky". Pretty cool.

It plays a series of spooky sounds and changes the lighting to suit the spooky video it plays

matrim

The high horse brigade wrote: »

Anyone with a Google home, a chromecast or shield and hue lights in the same room say "lets get spooky". Pretty cool.

It plays a series of spooky sounds and changes the lighting to suit the spooky video it plays

Doesn't work for me

The high horse brigade

matrim wrote: »

Doesn't work for me

Are you set to English US? To get the most from your home you must set it to USA. Have you linked your Hue lights to Google assistant?

Atomic Pineapple

Patww79 wrote: »

How does it work with a Chromecast? What can you do with it? My big Home is unable to play Netflix to cast on my Shield.

I literally just say "play <movie name that's on Netflix>" and it automatically starts playing it on the tv my chromecast is connected to. Same for YouTube, for play music I just add "on my chromecast" and it plays the music through the tv instead of its own speaker

BrookieD

OK so i have a Nvidia Shield, Samsung S8, Belin Wemo lights and insight switch and getting the Google home this evening, looking forward to setting up integration on this lot - if works out going to get a Mini version for the bedroom as a bluetooth speaker to play internet radio through

OldMrBrennan83

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mrsWhippy

Where is the cheapest place to buy the Google Home?

The Black Oil

Hey Google. Tea. Early Grey. Hot.

OldBean

I'm still sore that you can use 'Computer' as Alexa's wake word, but we have to stick with Hey- or Ok- Google.

The Black Oil

Hey Google,

M50/M1 traffic – OK
Weather – OK
Alarms/timers – OK
Find my phone – worked for one Mini, not the other

Turn on/off Hue lights - Worked off with the first Mini. I only added the second tonight, hit and miss. Turn on TBO's lamp - works, but then 'sorry...' when I ask to turn it off. Could be a room assignment issue, I presume.

Cinema listings – No
What's this song - Very much no!
News headlines – defaults to BBC or Telegraph after it's done with t'Beeb. Can this be changed to an Irish based service?

moonboy52

The Black Oil wrote: »

Cinema listings – No
What's this song - Very much no!
News headlines – defaults to BBC or Telegraph after it's done with t'Beeb. Can this be changed to an Irish based service?

Cinema listings are working on my end.

What is this song works here when it is playing/casting

AFAIK no Irish content for news, just the list provided in the Google Home app

Double C

Anyone having trouble with home groups? I have a GH in the kitchen and a mini in the living room. I set up a group for them but when I cast to the group it plays fine on the mini, but it plays intermittently on the GH. I just rebooted both devices but no change. Any ideas?

ForestFire

Double C wrote: »

Anyone having trouble with home groups? I have a GH in the kitchen and a mini in the living room. I set up a group for them but when I cast to the group it plays fine on the mini, but it plays intermittently on the GH. I just rebooted both devices but no change. Any ideas?

I find intermittent play is down to the quality of you wifi connection to devices.
I presume you are steaming from spotify, but even from other sources I think it can be the same.

Unless you have the latest Wifi, the Wifi can only stream to one device at a time so constantly switches between the 2 devices streaming (Very fast switching). It also has to keep the two devices in sync.

You can use the following app to check you wifi quality around the home.
Play particular attention to congested bands and try to move your channel to a free areas if possible (Use the channel graph feature)

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.netgear.WiFiAnalytics&hl=en

the heathen

Cinema listings – works for me
What's this song - works for me too. They've also added support for asking 'what album is this song from' in recent months.

bk

Yes, cinema listings working well for me. Might just be a case of not having data for your local cinema.

wexfordman2

Am I going insane!!

I'm trying to check my home firmware version and to do so in open the home app, select the devices button on the top right, and then click on the three dot tab next to my device.

Only thing is, I don't have a three dotbtab, I just have a x next to each device offering me the option to unlink it.

I know I'm missing something stupid here, can someone advise ?

wexfordman2

Also, quick query, can I connect the home to an external Bluetooth speaker ?

moonboy52

wexfordman2 wrote: »

Also, quick query, can I connect the home to an external Bluetooth speaker ?

Not sure why the 3 dots are showing up for you man. Might have to wipe the cache and data and try again.

No linking to Bluetooth, got to use a Chromecast Audio

The Black Oil

I haven't subscribed to Google Play Music, maybe that's why it won't recognise songs.

It's a bit funny with Hue lights.

Turn on TBO's lamp. Fine.
Turn off TBO's lamp. Sorry, I'm not sure how to help.
Turn TBO's lamp on. Fine.
Turn TBO's lamp off. Fine.

Turn on front lamp. Fine.
Turn off front lamo. Sorry, I don't understand.

Does it have issues differentiating the words 'on' and 'off', depending how/where they're used in a sentence?