GoogleReviews

The Google Home Hub is here, initial impressions

Google Home Hub initial impressionsThis isn’t going to be a particularly insightful commentary on the thing as I only have had a few minutes to play with the Home Hub today, but here’s the rundown of what I’ve found.

Packaging great, setup experience not as great as previous Home units. Device beautiful, sounds better than I expected it to, looks amazing although when I try to photo it it looks like it looks in the photos. Not sure what the display is but I just can’t get a good shot.

Objectively the display looks like a printed photograph and looks amazing.

Setup started with a couple of minutes of a firmware update, this caused there to be an error thrown into the Home setup app, some weirdness came about there. After the Home had power cycled on the update the weirdness went away (menus that didn’t work right, error messages, bleh).

2018 10 25 10.48.09 - for some reason we don't have an alt tag here Google Home Hub initial impressions

One of the Ambient Mode options is throwing up errors right out of the box – there’s a Select Family Members option from Google Photos and every time I attempt to get that I’m told I must sign into Google Photos as me. Errrr, I am. So what’s the holdup here? I’ll fight that beast when I get back to it.

Google Home Hub initial impressions

This Google Home device wins for hardest Google device to remove the protective covering from. Usually those screen protectors just peel right off, this was an engaged fight to remove it. Not a particularly great experience having to fight the thing and it honestly was the hardest cellophane removal I’ve ever run across in my life.

Google Home Hub initial impressions
There’s a mute switch up top – not sure yet if this is mute the mic or mute the device.

You can control volume in three ways with the Google Home Hub, this seems overkill. Buttons on the back, you can swipe up, or you can just say “Hey Google, volume up”.

Google Home Hub initial impressions
I seem to be suffering from the inability to take a picture of this device while the screen is on. Not sure if the display is different or it’s just that I don’t have the time and the lighting is terrible.

YouTube music, Google Play Music, YouTube are notably there. You can add some other services as well. YouTube TV does not work, which is sad since we have a touch screen and all. Maybe later it will.

That’s it for initial impressions, I have to get back to work and adult now.

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Paul E King

Paul King started with GoodAndEVO in 2011, which merged with Pocketables, and as of 2018 he's evidently the owner. He lives in Nashville, works at a film production company, is married with two kids. Facebook | Twitter | Donate | More posts by Paul | Subscribe to Paul's posts

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