Prominent Collaborator I

Amazon Echo 2

50 replies
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There are rumours of an Amazon Echo 2 being released soon, It'll be a very interesting time with all of these new 'Smart Speakers' being launched.

The Apple Homepod, the new Sonos speaker with built-in voice mics and the Echo 2 will all be competing to become the speaker of choice for those customers looking for a great sounding smart speaker.

Pricing will be critical, as although there are millions of people who are prepared to pay a premium for Apple products, mainly to keep everything within the Apple ecosystem, I'd imagine Amazon will have to undercut them significantly and Sonos will probably be somewhere in the middle if they release a new Play 1 style speaker with built-in mics.

The only issue that Sonos have is that they don't have their own voice control system, but will rely on Alexa, and Alexa already has a huge userbase, helped by Amazon using their affordable Echo dots as a trojan horse and 'converting' them to Alexa users before either Apple or Sonos have their own voice controlled speakers.

Although we all know that Sonos speakers sound fantastic, and it remains to be seen ( or heard! ) how good the Homepod or Echo 2 will sound, the sound quality advantage that Sonos currently has will be eroded, possibly to the point that for the vast majority of people will be more than satisfied.

Tough times ahead for Sonos, especially if Amazon announce the Echo 2 before the Sonos voice control.

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K

Kumar

I agree, and IMO, challengers to Sonos need to achieve stability of music play at home at/better than Sonos levels more than sound quality itself; although one could argue that this is just another aspect of sound quality. Nothing destroys the listening experience as quickly as music stuttering/stopping/refusing to play; all other aspects are those that the ear/brain adapts to quite soon.

pwt

Virtuoso

Tough times ahead for Sonos, especially if Amazon announce the Echo 2 before the Sonos voice control.

A counter-argument is that the emergence of Echoes & their ilk will hugely expand the total market for streaming speakers, and Sonos will benefit from that market expansion. If Sonos adds voice control, for muitple voice services, AND maintains superiority in sound quality, stability and flexibility (e.g., configs like stereo pairing plus SUB), it has a good chance of leading that market.

4 x P:5 | Sub | 4 x P:1 | 3 x Connect | 2 x Boost | Connect:Amp | 2 x One | Amp | Move | Port | Era 300

J

Johnnie WalkerAuthor

Prominent Collaborator I

Yeah, the stability is a critical part of the experience, there's nothing worse than constant stuttering.

I'd be interested to hear from anyone using the multi-room audio feature on their Echo's with their experiences of the stability of their systems.

Sonos are still the leading company for the combination of ease of setup, audio quality and configuration options, it'll be interesting to see if more options are added to the Echo's such as stereo pairing and adding subs etc, I think it's unlikely though.

When writing this topic I forgot about Google Home, maybe it's just me, but I really don't hear anyone talking about the Google Home, and don't know anyone that owns one.

I certainly think Sonos have made the right choice in partnering with Amazon rather than Google, but again, time will tell.

K

Kumar

Apple and Homepods may pose a bigger challenge I suspect, if Airplay 2 has made for much more stable wireless music play. From what I read, Homepod version 1.0 will beat Echo in sound quality, offer some sort of stereo play, and may not need a Sub quite as much the Echo may. I don't know how Siri stacks up compared to Alexa, but Apple isn't going to give up on that market. I am also not familiar with Amazon music service, but Apple Music is certainly another potent arrow in the Apple quiver.
PS: from the website: "Put another HomePod in the same room, and the two automatically detect and balance each other — for sound that’s even more lifelike."
Not a stereo pair perhaps, but more than just a single mono speaker source as Echo is.

S

Skelton

Prodigy I

The Homepod better sound drastically better than an Echo, or it's going to be a disaster. Remember, it's going to sell for twice as much as the stock Echo price (349 USD). Amazon has more Echo "sales" than they do weekends, so no one even has to pay the MSRP.

I'm very curious and probably overly pessimistic about the Homepod. Apple has proven their fans will take a leap of faith, even if their initial launch of a product line isn't ready for primetime, and those early adopters can provide the motivation it'll take to try and catch up to Amazon. That said, Amazon realized they stumbled across a gold mine, and have been pouring an incredible amount of development dollars into the Echo/Alexa offerings .

Heck, at this point they have so much hardware it's becoming confusing:
- Echo
- Tap
- Echo Dot
- Echo Look
- Echo Show

Side note: After typing echo a bunch the spelling begins to look weird...

U

upstatemike

...

I'd be interested to hear from anyone using the multi-room audio feature on their Echo's with their experiences of the stability of their systems.

I'm currently testing multi-room and so far am very pleased. I like the way you define a persistent group with a unique name and then either play a song on the group or use the name of a single player and only play in that room. When you have multiple Echo Shows in the group they all display the lyrics of what is playing, very cool for parties. Has been rock solid so far but I am going to expand the group size to see what breaks it.

Biggest weaknesses are no option for wireless stereo pairs and no wireless sub but have worked around both issues using a Dot with other equipment. Still waiting to see what Echo2 and Sonos integration are going to bring to the table but I could happily live with what is available today.

Local music library with carefully constructed playlists - no shuffling!, Integration with Homeseer Automation, No touch screen devices, No streaming services, No Apple products ever

passopp

like the way you define a persistent group with a unique name and then either play a song on the group or use the name of a single player and only play in that room.

Now that's really something!

melvimbe

I agree with pwt. I think voice activation is big enough that all can profit from it. I'm not convinced that Amazon wants to overtake the hifi market. It seems to me that they just want to do what it takes to be the leader in the voice control market. Apple is somewhat similar, but I do think they want a good chuck of the hifi market.

Regardless, I think Sonos is going to remain strong if it can do/maintain the following:
- Continue to have high quality audio. This is going to be less of a strength ans competitors catch up, but it still a must have.

- Contine to have a strong variety of music sources. Again, not a huge advantage anymore, but still a must have.

- Integrate well with tv audio. This is soemthing the Amazon and Apple are not close to. I can see where it would be a deciding factor for many people.

- Work well with voice activation. We've already seen people come here and say they are leaving sonos for an inferior sounding product just because of voice control, so this has to do well. It can be a big advantage to sonos if it works well, and works with all the major voice assistance out there. That's something competitors won't be able to do either.

It's all yet to be seen, but it's entirely possible that Sonos ends up bigger then they are now, this time next year.

Danny

M

mwiseman

Enthusiast II

Integrate well with tv audio. This is soemthing the Amazon and Apple are not close to. I can see where it would be a deciding factor for many people.

Sonos?

K

Kumar

The Homepod better sound drastically better than an Echo, or it's going to be a disaster. Remember, it's going to sell for twice as much as the stock Echo price (349 USD). Amazon has more Echo "sales" than they do weekends, so no one even has to pay the MSRP.

Apple certainly has set a high bar for itself with that price point, so the sound quality needs to be close to play 5 levels, with stable music play.

Interesting times ahead, for sure. Of the three, Sonos will obviously be the most challenged for being less capable financially because of being much smaller, and for being completely reliant on success in just this sphere. Both aspects can equally well be turned around to advantage of course.

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