Dr. Bob Thomas

8 de septiembre de 2026

Too many devices seem to confuse Alexa+

Alexa + is all through my home and garage. Primarily because I am disabled and this was the easiest way to obtain help if I needed it wherever I fell. It all works well, however; I will get responses from a device on the other side of the house from where I made a request. Specifically when setting an alarm. Why it does this, no one seems to know. I am certain that the device in the guest bedroom cannot hear me when I whisper in the master bedroom on the other side of the house. Yet “she” will set the alarm up to alert the “ghost” in the guest bedroom while I, on the other hand, sleep peacefully through the scheduled alarm in the master bedroom.Also, “she” appears to be slower on the uptake, or perhaps that is just “her” being stubborn and more life like?Ver más

2 personas la encontraron útil

Noah Briley

17 de agosto de 2026

Great compact hub for your home

Okay, we’ve been super impressed with this product! I’ll break it down into categories, but here’s a quick synopsis if you don’t want to read it all: great quality sound, loud volume, vibrant display, easy to use & customizeSound:I was a little apprehensive of the sound quality and volume level with the size that it was, but boy was I proven wrong. It’s got great audio quality for the average home user, and it can crank out some volume if you need it to! We rarely go above 50% and that’s even when we’re having impromptu family dance parties in the kitchen.Display:The quality of the images is great! We minimized the amount of information that was on the main display to keep things simple, but love that we can upload photos of our family to have rotating in there.The touch sensitivity is great, you don’t have to punch it to use it, very active and easy to use.Customization:I talked about it in the display a bit, but there really is a lot you can do with it! We mostly use it for our kitchen for music since we’ve gotten the echo show 21, but it’s still a great tool for accessing the smart home dashboard.Added note: it picks up audio super well when your 3 year old is in the other room asking for baby shark to play.Ver más

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William Depner

Great sound and touchscreen make this perfect for the kitchen

This smart display has been a great addition to my kitchen counter. The sound quality is impressively clear, and it gets plenty loud — I can hear music, news, or timers clearly even with the sink running or the exhaust fan on.The touchscreen is what really sets it apart for everyday kitchen use. Being able to quickly glance at or tap through the weather, alerts, and other info without having to ask out loud is really convenient, especially when my hands are busy cooking. Getting local weather updates and even things like heat advisories displayed right on the screen is a nice touch too — I don’t have to pull out my phone to check.It’s also made following recipes so much easier. I can pull up a recipe on the touchscreen and follow along step by step without having to touch my phone with messy hands. And if I’m having trouble reading a step because my hands are full or my eyes are on the stove, I can just ask it to read the instructions out loud — it walks me through the recipe verbally, which has been a huge help while cooking.It fits nicely on the counter and has become part of my daily routine, from checking the weather in the morning to playing music while I cook to following recipes hands-free. Highly recommend if you want a smart display that’s actually functional for kitchen use.Ver más

8 personas la encontraron útil

Irena

17 de octubre de 2025

Tech glitches galore

Honestly, I really wanted to like this thing so I can easily see who is at my front door on my Ring camera from my kitchen when I'm cooking and listen to music, but it does not function well for either of those 2 options, as well as others. Personally, it seems like the tech is trash. It has far too many glitches and either needs a software update, or possibly my device is just trash.1. It constantly disconnects from wifi or needs time to buffer when there is nothing wrong with the wifi. Such as playing a song and stopping to buffer every 10 seconds when my other Amazon device is still playing fine and doesn't have to stop to buffer, at all. And theyre all located on the same floor. For context, I have an older echo dot as well, and that device never had the same issues as this one, other than obvious wifi outages, my echo dot never freezes or needs to buffer a song multiple times before it finally tells me "I'm having trouble playing this song" and moves on or just stops playing entirely.2. Other issues I have had include; constantly having to unplug this device because it freezes on the Ring camera after it shows me who is at the front door. Sometimes I can just tell Alexa to "go home" after it freezes on the camera but it doesnt always work so then I need to unplug it. Also it freezes after asking it to do other functions as well but mostly seems to happen when the Ring camera is triggered, and it will just freeze on that screen eternally until you give it another command or unplug it.3. And if those weren't annoying enough, the most infuriating issue is that when I ask it to set a timer, half the time it works fine, and the other half, well lets just say it will acknowledge that I asked it to set a timer and tell me that it set a timer....but then no timer has been set, no numbers counting down, and when asked how much is left on my timer, Alexa responds that there is no timer set...this has happened on a few occasions when I had only 1 timer set, but also when i have had 2 timers set, there doesnt seem to be a difference. This is not okay when im cooking and baking multiple things at once and need to rely on a timer. I have almost thrown the device out my window because of this reason. Its a very simple, basic feature, however this device does not seem to do that well, either. At least not reliably.4. The last issue I have is that the device just simply can't listen or respond sometimes, like at all, and other times works fine. There are times that I am standing within 2 feet of the device, ask Alexa to do something and nothing happens, no response, no light flashing to show shes listening, nothing. So then i have to keep saying "Alexa" until the light comes on, which can take up to 10 times. Then other times the light turns blue like she is listening to my command but then just does not respond, and repeatedly does that until it can finally register that I said a command. Sometimes I need to repeat the command 10 times and get louder each time before it finally registers what I am asking, and it will be a simple command, like set a timer for x, or what is the time or weather outside, etc.Honestly, I wish I could recommend this device but it has been nothing but a frustrating, subpar experience for me. I believe the device has some back-end developer and coding issues that need to be sorted out to make it function more consistently and properly, and I hope they listen to people's complaints and suggestions.And just FYI, I am technologically adept and have set up the device correctly. I work in data analysis and troubleshoot IT issues for work all the time, there's really no reason for this device to have as many issues as it does other than just not being a fully developed, functioning product that hit the market too soon before they could work all the bugs out.I couldn't even contact the Alexa support about these issues because my specific issues are not listed as a troubleshooting option, so my best option was to leave this review. Thanks for making it this far!

MrSteveG

23 de julio de 2026

Newer---But Not Necessarily Better

I have owned an Amazon Echo for years and it has worked exceptionally well. I thought it "died" not too long ago and I ordered the Show 5 as a replacement. It turns out that the Echo was apparently getting a firmware update and needed several attempts to update. I have owned the Echo 5 for a few weeks now and I'm not overly impressed. Response time is slower than my older device, which responds to the same commands immediately. The Echo 5 is slower to respond and I need to say the command several times. The other thing I have noticed: sometimes I will ask my older Echo (which is on the first floor of my house) to play music and the Echo 5 (on the second floor) will actually play it. That can be annoying sometimes. I'm hoping it will improve over time, but at this point, my older Echo is proving to be more reliable and faster than the newer technology.Ver más

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Ron Ramsey

21 de agosto de 2026

A Nice Upgrade to My Echo Setup

picked up the Echo Show 5 during Prime Days to replace one of my older Echo devices. I already own five Amazon Echo devices, so Alexa is pretty well integrated throughout our house. After using the Show 5, I’m very happy with the upgrade.I use Alexa for much more than playing music or asking about the weather. I have quite a bit of smart-home equipment, including Hubitat-controlled lights, switches, plugs, and sensors, so voice control is something we use every day. The Echo Show 5 handles all of that just as well as my other Echo devices, but having the screen adds another level of usefulness.The display is a great size for a bedroom, office, or smaller room. I can glance over and see the time, weather, timers, and other information instead of having Alexa read everything back to me. That’s particularly handy when I’m cooking. I do a lot of BBQ on my Pit Boss smoker, and Alexa timers get used regularly around here.Setup was simple, especially since I already had an established Alexa household. It joined my existing setup without much fuss, and I was back to controlling my smart-home devices quickly.I also appreciate that it doesn’t take up much room. You get the benefits of an Echo with a display without having another large screen sitting on the counter or desk.If you already use Alexa around your home and have an older Echo that you’re thinking about replacing, the Echo Show 5 is a worthwhile upgrade. After owning several generations of Echo devices, I think this one hits a nice balance between size, features, and usefulness.Ver más

6 personas la encontraron útil