Impressive.
Welcome to the party pals, you’re reading this week’s edition of Tech Corner and this week I’m finally going to let the microwaving my coffee line die and remain dead.
So you one last mention here where you can read why I no longer microwave my coffee.
That’s it. I’m done. No more talk about my coffee from now on.
Google’s second-generation Nest Hub smart display is doing its utmost to keep Amazon at bay by introducing some neat new features.
One thing I did not see coming in the era of wearable fitness trackers was the introduction of a sleep tracking feature of the Nest Hub. It’s effective and found it was mostly in line with what my smartwatch was telling me, although in general I believe fitness trackers are generous with the amount of time they say you sleep.
But yes, it’s a rather unusual addition to introduce a non-wearable sleep tracker into your bedroom.
The device records how long you sleep, restless periods and, optionally, how many times you cough or snore using the microphones.
For obvious reasons, Google also chose to rely on a sensor rather than a front facing camera to detect disruption in your sleep.
However, Sleep sensing is only in “free preview” until at least the end of the year which means you may be charged for the service if you want it going forward.
If you’re familiar with the first generation of the Nest Hub, you’ll be greeted with a similar but ever so slightly taller design on the second generation.
Now let’s talk about sound. If there was one criticism of the original, it was the quality of the speaker built into the fabric foot. But the 2nd gen has sorted out this issue by adding 50% more bass and while it’s not as good as Google’s standalone Nest speaker, it far outperforms the Home Mini or the Amazon Echo Dot.
The Nest Hub does all of the usual smart assistant things as well.
But I found it really useful as a second screen to watch videos from YouTube and Netflix, which although it’s perfectly capable of doing, I’m pretty sure that’s not what the Nest Hub was designed for.
If you’re looking for a combination of a smart screen and speaker, you should look no further than this €99 option.
LISTEN: You Must Be Jokin’ with Aideen McQueen – Faith healers, Coolock craic and Gigging as Gaeilge
