Google Assistant

Google’s October 4th event saw a number of major smart speaker hardware announcements, including the Home Mini and the Home Max. On the Google Assistant front, there were a number of new features including those for families and kids. This latter functionality will begin rolling out today.

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Google Lens has a ton of potential, and the bits Google showed off with it at I/O this May and GDD in September are incredible. However, basically none of that is live right now, and functionality is incredibly limited within the Photos app. Over time it’s going to improve, though, and a couple of Googlers have hit Twitter to give us more information.

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While Google is eventually going to be releasing a touchscreen version of the Google Home, it’s looking like that device will no longer be the first. A new product, Lynky, has just hit the web promising to be the first device with Google Assistant built-in and a touchscreen, and it does quite a bit more as well…

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Google Assistant is a powerful tool, but its usefulness depends on the hardware you use it on. You can take Assistant everywhere with your phone or watch, but nothing beats how convenient a Google Home is. Now that Assistant is extending to more form factors, we’re really going to see how well it can integrate into our lives, and the TicHome Mini by Mobvoi is one of the most flexible pieces of Assistant hardware to date.

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Two weeks ago, we revealed that the Google app was working on a bottom bar redesign. The latest version 7.14 shows Google refining that interface, while revamping the “Explore” page for Assistant apps, adding “Hey Google” on phones, and other tweaks.

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Before the announcement of the Google Home Mini, we got our eyes on the TicHome Mini. This small speaker has Google Assistant built-in and runs on a battery, allowing it to be carried and used around your house. After an extremely long wait, Mobvoi is finally opening up pre-orders starting today. What’s better is that if you pre-order the TicHome Mini right now, you’ll save a few dollars…

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The latest beta version of the Google app rolled out this evening and hints at Assistant finally being available on tablets, as well as other features possibly coming to more devices. Version 7.14 also includes some user-facing changes, while there are some mentions about the upcoming Pixel Buds.

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Google Assistant’s features are definitely fragmented throughout its various platforms. Home can do one thing, Android Wear can’t. Android phones can do one thing, Android TV can’t — you get the picture. Recently, Google finally flipped the switch on one of Home’s best features to enable it on phones — Chromecast integration.

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Google’s shopping service, Google Express, has been expanding quite a bit recently, and today that includes the launch of a partnership with Target.

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The Google Home Mini was announced at Google’s big hardware event last week, and it’s an awesome little product. However, it seems that at least some early units have shipped with a pretty major defect that brings our worst fears with these always-listening assistant to reality.

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Last year I said that the first Google Home was a great start, but not yet functionally up to par with the comparable offerings from Amazon. Google has all but caught up since then. The feature set of the original Google Home is fleshed out — it works with just about as many third-party services as you could want — and now Google has introduced a smaller, cheaper Home to take on the Echo Dot.

The short version is this: The new Google Home Mini joins the Chromecast as another impulse buy in Google’s hardware lineup.

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Truly wireless headphones are the latest craze in the “wearable” industry, and the top player right now, for good reason, is Apple’s AirPods. The $159 wireless earbuds are perfect for iPhone users, but they also work pretty well with Android. Now an Android developer has taken that to the next level by giving AirPods the ability to summon Google Assistant.

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Ahead of last week’s October 4th hardware event, Google rolled out male and female voice options for Assistant in English. A nice customization, the new voices also sound more realistic. This is due to work done by Alphabet’s DeepMind division and the new deep neural network being leveraged for sound synthesis.

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Google Home and other Assistant-enabled smart speakers are great out of the box, but they’ve just been getting better and better lately. Today, it’s been discovered that Google Home has a few extra tricks hidden up its sleeve…

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