Echo 1st Generation Key Features
- Voice-control your favourite music
- Get news & weather updates
- Set reminders & alarms
- Voice-control your smart home
- Make hands-free calls
What is Amazon Echo?
Amazon Echo is a hands-free speaker you control with your voice.
Echo connects to the Alexa Voice Service to play music, make calls, send and receive messages, provide information, news, sports scores, weather and more.
Amazon Prime members can also ask Alexa to order eligible products they've ordered before and many Prime products. All you have to do is ask.
Echo has seven microphones and beam-forming technology so it can hear you from across the room - even in noisy environments or while playing music. Echo is also an expertly tuned speaker that can fill any room with 360 degree immersive sound. When you want to use Echo, just say the wake word “Alexa” and Echo responds. If you have more than one Echo or Echo Dot, Alexa responds intelligently from the device you're closest to with ESP (Echo Spatial Perception).
Voice Control Your Music
Amazon Echo provides hands-free voice control for Amazon Music - just ask for your favourite artist or song, or request a specific genre or mood.
You can also search for music by lyrics, when a song or album was released, or let Alexa pick the music for you. Listen to 40 million songs with Amazon Music Unlimited.
With multi-room music support, you can play music across multiple Echo devices simultaneously (Available for Amazon Music and TuneIn. Bluetooth not supported).
Echo also provides hands-free voice control to Spotify and TuneIn. Plus, Echo is Bluetooth-enabled so you can stream other popular music services like iTunes from your phone or tablet.
Echo has been fine-tuned to deliver crisp vocals with dynamic bass response. Its dual downward-firing speakers produce 360 degree omni-directional audio to fill any room with immersive sound.
Alexa, Answer The Call
With Amazon Echo, you can easily talk hands-free to anyone who has a supported Echo device or the Alexa App - no tapping or searching required. Additionally, you can send messages via voice or text to anyone with an Echo device or the Alexa App.
Alexa calling and messaging is available at no additional cost - to get started download the latest version of the Alexa App on a smart phone with iOS 9.0 or higher, or Android 5.0 or higher, and verify your mobile number.
With the Drop In feature enabled for room-to-room calling, quickly connect with Echo devices in your home. Let your household know when dinner is ready, ask someone for help with a chore or remind the kids to go to sleep—without having to raise your voice.
Far Field Recognition
Tucked under the light ring is an array of seven microphones that use beam-forming technology and enhanced noise cancellation. With far-field voice recognition, Amazon Echo can hear you ask a question from any direction - even in noisy environments or while playing music.
When you want to use Echo, simply say the wake word, “Alexa”, and Echo lights up and streams audio to the cloud, where the Alexa Voice Service is leveraged to recognise and respond to your request.
Always Getting Smarter
Alexa - the brain behind Amazon Echo - updates through the cloud automatically and is continually learning, adding new functionality and skills.
The more you use Echo, the more it adapts to your speech patterns, vocabulary and personal preferences.
Echo has Skills
Skills add even more capabilities such as ordering take away from Just Eat, requesting a ride from Uber, checking train times from National Rail and more. Enabling skills lets your Amazon Echo do even more - simply discover and enable the skills you want to use in the Alexa App.
Control Your Smart Home
Use Amazon Echo to switch on the lamp before getting out of bed, turn up the thermostat while reading in your favourite chair, or dim the lights from the couch to watch a film - all without lifting a finger.
Echo works with smart home devices such as lights, switches, thermostats and more from WeMo, Samsung SmartThings, Philips Hue, Hive, Netatmo, Tado°, Tp-link, Nest and others.
Size
23.50 x 8.50 x 8.50 cm (H x W x D)
Weight
185 grams
Wi-Fi Connectivity
Dual-band Wi-Fi supports 802.11 a/b/g/n (2.4 and 5 GHz) networks. Does not support connection to ad-hoc (or peer-to-peer) Wi-Fi networks
Bluetooth Connectivity
Advanced Audio Distribution Profile (A2DP) support for audio streaming from your mobile device to Echo or from Echo to your Bluetooth speaker. Audio/Video Remote Control Profile (AVRCP) for voice control of connected mobile devices. Hands-free voice control is not supported for Mac OS X devices. Bluetooth speakers requiring PIN codes are not supported
Audio
Built-in speaker for voice feedback when not connected to external speakers. 3.5 mm stereo audio output for use with external speakers (audio cable not included)
System Requirements
Amazon Echo comes ready to connect to your Wi-Fi. The Alexa App is compatible with Fire OS, Android and iOS devices and also accessible via your desktop browser. Certain skills and services are subject to change, may not be available outside the United Kingdom, and may require separate subscriptions or other fees
Our Expert review of the Amazon Echo 1st Generation Smart Speaker
What would you use it for?
Bigger brother to the newer Amazon Echo Dots, the Echo 1st Gen smart speaker was Amazons first iteration of their excellent family of speakers. With Alexa voice support the Echo acts as your own personal assistant. They can be added to any and every room at home or the office and with its huge set of skills it can tell you the weather, latest news and sports, set alarms, reminders, play games and work with other smart devices you have.
What’s good about it?
Reviewing this speaker in 2022, we half expected it to be obsolete but that isn’t the case. The Echo 1st Gen may be a few years older than the Echo Dot 3rd and 4th Gen but there is very little difference in performance. In fact it can do more or less exactly the same things. The 7 far field mics mean there is no need to shout at it so it hears you, in fact over time Alexa will learn your voice and speech patterns. Updates happen automatically do there’s no need to plug it in to a PC or laptop. The Echo can also work with other Echo’s and other smart devices. If you’re an Amazon Prime member you can ask Alexa to order products you’ve ordered before and other Prime products.
Are there any drawbacks?
You don’t have to pay a subscription fee to use the Echo and is base features, though if you want to listen to Spotify or Amazon Music for example then you would have to allow for additional 3rd party subscription fees. These are things to bear in mind but they certainly don’t limit its use.
Are there alternative products available?
There are other smart speakers available on the market from higher end names such as Google, Sonos, Bose and Apple, roughly around the same sort of price though some, like Sonos, are more premium and therefore do cost quite a bit more.
