Patiently waiting for Alexa Integration

First step is to see what the Show can do on its own with the improved speakers and built-in display... those answers are just a few hours away now.

And make sure it doesn't sound like a cat fighting a hedgehog

I can now assure you that it does not. To my ears it is a big improvement over the sound of the original Echo and plenty good enough for the kitchen and several other use cases but of course still no bass with those tiny 2 1/2 inch speakers. As far as usability it is already a huge hit at our house. Play a song or playlist from Amazon music and you get album art plus lyrics by default from a UI perspective it is a pleasure to use.

For $189 (sale price) I can't complain too much about the sound quality because it has not only improved over the previous Echo model but I also have to take into account that I get access to YouTube, Amazon movies and TV shows, video calling, security camera viewing, room-to-room intercom, weather, and so on all available today plus the promise of Sonos control sometime in the future. Until then I may stick a Bluetooth dongle on some decent powered speakers just to see what the experience will be like to use the Show in a higher fidelity scenario. I'm also keeping the Play5 Gen1 in the kitchen so I am ready to use the Show for testing Sonos integration as soon as it comes out.