Already have a Google home and are looking for a central hub for all of your smart home devices? Or maybe you are just looking for home device to put in your kitchen
That's what we will be covering in today's BAD Tech & Gaming Review of the Google Home Hub with me, Brandon. So let's jump right
We have 4 categories great good bad and horrible
Starting with the GREATS
I am very surprised as to how this device flows through screen after screen like butter. Rarely does this device lag at all. Not to say that it doesn't freeze, the very first time I opened it and started it up after setting the device completely it froze and I had to unplug it.
Moving on how well this Smart assistant actually does what it says it does. Being more than just a smart speaker but a hub for all of your smart devices
More greats is how everything that you do with the normal google home device translates to the visual screen, some we expected like google maps which looks more like android auto than what you would see on a phone or tablet. To the games that it has. They look like they were originally designed for a screen based interface they look and perform great on this home hub.
The single handed most useful thing that I have used on the google home hub is that you can control all of your devices. From this one home hub. You can adjust your lights , turn your volume up or down on a sound bar or TV and much more. This means that as my smart home is growing I will plan to use this hub as the central device like a control panel.
Screen!!
I was worried about this being to bright or being hard to see in the kitchen with the overhead lights shining down onto it however the home hub delightfully surprised me with great viewing angles and when it goes into picture mode it is as if the photos are painted onto the screen. On the very first try google knocked this out of the park. I regularly walk by it see a photo on it and just stare at it and think wow this screen is beautiful!
Last thing in the great category is the video capability. While search-ability is not great with YouTube you can ask it to play a specific video and it will most of the time do it. You can also cast from your phone to this device which is super useful if you it is in a kitchen.
Onto the GOOD category
Speaking of kitchen this is something very useful, cooking the google home hub can read you recipes and will pause or repeat something to you if you need it to. However this is not all recipes but the list is growing. I also found it to be finicky sometimes it wouldn’t go to the next step and I would have to restart the device.
Speakers!!
this makes it into the good category because it is really clear and crisp in its mids. It has no base compared to similar speakers or even the original home speaker that came out before the hub. While I don’t need base in my speakers everyday it is still nice to have it when you are jamming out while cleaning the house.
Design!!
while it is overall good it is a really small device. Keeping with the streamline simplistic design google does a good job overall with this the plastic of the device feels sturdy and the fabric feels higher end. But in 2018 why are the bezels so large this could have a more modern look with a nearly bezel-less display but I suppose that would cost more.
There is only one item in the BAD and one item in the HORRIBLE category!
The BAD is that the device did freeze that first time starting it up now it has not done it since and was more than likely a one off glitch however this was concerning as I didn't even get to use the device before I experienced a glitch.
The one horrible thing is the build quality, this is not great. While the device does feel solid overall there is a dead pixel in the left side of my screen I have yet to call Google about this however this made for an awful un-boxing experience I plugged it in and it had to be restarted after setup and once I powered it back up it had a screen imperfection. Come on Google.
In conclusion
This device does what it sets out to do giving a great kitchen assistant that you can control all of your smart home devices making it extremely useful. Now there were some things that were bad however, after using the device for over a month now it has become clear that the screen imperfection did not effect performance and it never froze again making this a device that we do recommend at the end of the day. As long as your screen is fine the device is worth the money.
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Thanks for watching until this point in the Review, it is time to end
