2018-04-05 12:28:58 (edited by hadi.gsf 2018-04-05 12:29:37)

so i have just learned
amazon echo dot has an aux port that outputs audio  to whatever speaker you'd like
but google home mini does not, and you have to buy a chrome cast audio dungle device.
so if you're looking for a way to connect your  home max to other speakers, invest in a "chromecast audio". it's $35

twitter: @hadirezae3
discord: Hadi

2018-04-05 13:29:48

I know it is most likely not the case, but it's really sounding like GOogle is just as bad as the others when it comes to  using their and only their products.


I wonder if there's a PC server app that you could ue with Google's speakers to allow for streaming of your library from your PC. I Know the workaround is something like having a  web server stored  to your phone  like mentioned in previous posts.  I know Echo has or had something like that where I could stream my library from my PC.    Anyways, I  hope this google max thing works out for ya.  I am  certain that with anything else out there,  there will always be pros and cons.  But as  surely as that is,   it should still be enjoyable.

As for listening to music, I think we all do that to dome degree where we listen to  "new" music until it gets to a certain point in our lives.  After which we're just like "That's it, I'm not going any further"  I found mself doing this with some stuff too and I'm probably nowhere near as old as you are.

My Solo album, "A Life Seen Through Broken Eyes", available now:
iTunes Spotify YouTube
My YouTube Channel

2018-04-05 13:38:30 (edited by Orko 2018-04-05 14:43:13)

Thanks for the input everybody.

OK! Unless I hear different, I have been corrected and the 3.5 mm jack is for audio in.

Unfortunately, my music library is on a Victor Reader Trek. The Max isn't the only speaker the Trek won't connect to, I bought a Retro Rock Bluetooth speaker specifically to use with the Trek, but the Trek won't pair with it. Fortunately the speaker does have a 3.5 mm audio in jack, so that's what I'm using now, but I'd like to be able to use Bluetooth so I'm not chained down. I wonder what Humanware is doing that causes the Trek not to connect to Bluetooth devices like most other Bluetooth devices will?

I looked online for the offers, and found them, but the free year of Google Play Music wasn't listed, a year of Youtube Red was though, whatever that is.

Well, I guess I'm lucky I don't want to hook up another speaker to the Max, that's just ridiculous, I imagine that will turn off most people to the idea as well, so in the end, Google looses out.

2018-04-05 13:40:34

Gentleman just buy cheap Google audio cast & plug them in to any speakers. Surround. Hifi or portable speaker with aux
And just tell Google to cast to it
I have one every room & garden

2018-04-05 14:11:24 (edited by jack 2018-04-05 14:12:03)

The year of youtube red is exactly what you're looking for. Youtube Red just happens to be a catch-all for one price, i.e you get ad-free youtube and all-access for music all in one subscription. As for the Trek, my guess is that the Bluetooth protocols are incompatible, though they don't really tell you what Bluetooth antenna they're using in that speaker to be honest.

2018-04-05 14:14:16

Ok, Google Home Mini layout. Fabric covering that actually isn't too much to worry about cleaning unless you have, say, your home mini in the kitchen. Two touch sensors on the sides for controlling volume, and holding down either one of them ill control music play/stop, hang up calls and what have you. With either home device, you can control music playback remotely with your phone.

2018-04-05 14:46:29

Sorry, I'd have answered the question about the layout of the Mini, except I haven't opened mine yet, I'm planning to do that once I have a handle on the Max. One thing at a time.

2018-04-05 20:04:32

Thanks Jack, I really apreciate that.

I am myself and noone is ever gonna change me, I am the trolling master!

2018-04-06 15:07:49 (edited by Orko 2018-04-06 16:29:23)

I looked at Google Play Music, Spotify, and Pandora, and since I couldn't see any real difference, even in price, since I already had a Google account because I use GMail, I decided to go with Google Play Music. All three services start you off with a free 30 day trial, so I'm not committed. I found irritation with Google Play Music, when I signed up, it asked me to choose my favorite genres and artists, I decided to give that some thought, and figuring that I could always come back to it later, skipped it, only to find out later that there seems to be no way back to those settings.

I found it, on a web page with an article about Google Play Music tips & tricks, was a link that allows you to repeat those set up questions about your favorite genres and artists. Her it is:

https://play.google.com/music/listen?u=0#/uqg

2018-04-07 16:12:00 (edited by Orko 2018-04-07 16:14:33)

Here it is, confirmation by an actual physical test, no guessing.

I connected the headphone jack of my Victor Reader Trek to the Google Home Max's 3.5 mm jack, when I plugged the cord into the jack on the back of the Max, it confirmed the connection with a bleep. Then I turned on the Trek, and lo and behold, I could hear it coming from the Max, though at a very low volume level, which is understandable, because when I have the Max playing music, it is usually at a low, background music, volume level.

So, this little test confirms that the 3.5 mm jack is an audio in, not out, jack.

2018-04-07 21:15:47

You might want to contact Humanware about the Bluetooth issue. I have no idea what they're using, but it must be some really weird proprietary radio or protocol if it won't communicate with the Google Max or other Bluetooth headphones and speakers. Then again, it might be better if they simply built Chromecast support into the Stream and Trek. This would let the second generation Stream communicate wirelessly via Wi-Fi and skip Bluetooth altogether. I personally want to see this become a reality, so the more people that suggest this to Humanware, the more likely it is to happen.

Grab my Adventure at C: stages Right here.

2018-04-07 21:28:46 (edited by Orko 2018-04-07 21:33:29)

The Trek did work with the Max through an audio cable, it just wasn't as loud as I'd have thought, raising the Trek's or Max's volume would have fixed it, but I didn't bother. The whole purpose of doing this was to determine whether the 3.5 mm jack was audio in or out.

I'm not going to try pairing one to the other through Bluetooth because I'm not interested in using them that way. I already have a dedicated amplified speaker for the Trek, so I don't need the Max to be a speaker for it too.

2018-04-07 23:11:40 (edited by jack 2018-04-07 23:12:09)

@Chris: The Trek works with a lot of other bluetooth audio devices that I have, the mini jambox as well as my Aftershokz. Just not the home for whatever reason. Either device is using a different Bluetooth codec. Chromecast support is probably more technically possible in the Trek than it is the Stream2 as the Trek is an android-powered device.

2018-04-08 00:20:10

The amplified speaker I use for theTrek is also a Bluetooth speaker as well as a wired one and the Trek won't pair with it either.

I take back what I said in my previous message, if the Trek could pair with just one of these, then I could have it at my computer desk and still play my music library through a decent speaker in the living room.

If the dedicated speaker had worked, I wouldn't care about pairing it with the Max. For what it's worth, the dedicated speaker is a Tewel Retro Rock speaker, nice looking from the way it feels, and nice sounding.

2018-04-08 00:59:52

The Trek runs Android? I wonder what version it is? I don't understand why the Trek won't communicate with some Bluetooth devices. As long as it's using the SBC codec, it should be compatible with pretty much every device that utilizes Bluetooth audio via A2DP.

Grab my Adventure at C: stages Right here.

2018-04-08 07:04:14 (edited by Orko 2018-04-08 12:47:14)

Although we are getting a little off track here, I will say that I am rather disappointed in the Trek in several areas, I'm hoping its just kinks in a new system that need working out, but considering all the success they've had with the Victor Reader Stream, I tend to have doubts.

I've noticed that if you leave the Trek on for an extended period of time, such as over night when I forget to turn it off before going to bed, the speech synthesizer quits working and it takes a 30 second power cycle to get the voice working again, this never happened with the Stream. I've also noticed that conditions have to be nearly perfect, which is rare in the real world, for the GPS system to aquire all of the satellite signals. It doesn't take much to completely block the GPS system from getting the signal that they need. What good is a supposedly first map from TomTom when getting the satellite signals is so iffy?

2018-04-08 15:55:42

Orco, that must be hit or miss. I generally don't have much of a problem getting satellite signal. Although I will say that sometimes, particularly when you're indoors obviously, it takes much longer to get signal, usually when outdoors once you get a signal it typically stays fixed. I remember when my original Breeze wouldn't have much of a problem acquiring them, but there would be a fallout every so often.

2018-04-08 19:38:14

I have a Vizio SB-4551D sound bar and it has Chromecast built into it.   The bar is a 5.1 with wireless subwoofer and rear speakers.   Thought I'd mention this since this is about Chromecast and GOogle etc.     I don't have a Home speaker, so I couldn't test how  useful it actually is,  but thought I'd throw this out there.

My Solo album, "A Life Seen Through Broken Eyes", available now:
iTunes Spotify YouTube
My YouTube Channel

2018-04-08 19:44:21

My response about the Trek GPS is in the Victor Reader Stream's big brother thread.

The devil is in the details. Something else I've noticed, though is probably more of a problem with Amazon music than with the Echo or Alexa. Often when playing a playlist or a station from Amazon music, I'd have to adjust the volume because the tracks being played vary in their volume level. The previous track played was fine at volume 4, but the current track is too loud requiring that I change the volume level to 3, then the next track is too quiet, requiring me to raise the volume level back up to 4, really annoying. That annoyance doesn't seem to occur at all with Google play music. I can simply set the volume where I want it and it's fine all day long.

One thing I've considered about the various music services, it's kind of like email, before I discovered the convenience of never having to go through changing email addresses by using an email service that is independent of the internet service provider, every time my internet provider changed, I'd get a new email address, and just like moving, would have to tell everyone my new email address, what a pain. Using a music service tied to Amazon or Google could be the same, if I change assistants, I'll have to re set up the music service all over again, but if I sign up with an independent music service like Pandora or Spotify, then, just like an independent email service, as long as the new assistant supports the music service, I'm good to go.

2018-04-09 17:06:27

I like how you can make short cuts or even new commands with Google Home. For example I could set the phrase to party time and have Google home play my favorite music. There are also a few things you can do with IFTTT If This Than That my favorite being find my phone. If I tell Google home to find my phone it will use IFTTT to call my phone. Since it can make phone calls as well I could just tell it to call my phone but I do like this little feature. You can use IFTTT to send texts although you have to enter each number manually for each contact which is a bit tedious. If you are an Android user you can also use , Tasker to do a lot with Google Home , Tasker is not available for IOS and I do not know if it is accessible or not.

Kingdom of Loathing name JB77

2018-04-10 01:51:39

Well, I have hit my first stumbling block that makes me glad I decided to hold on to the Echo until I was sure I was keeping the Google Home Max.

We just had a hour long power outage, and when power came back on and I plugged the Max back in, it had lost all of it's setup information. That's crazy! The Echo always remembered its set up information even after being unplugged for a day.

So I grabbed my phone and tried to go through the set up again, but when it came time to reconnect to my WiFi, it couldn't connect. The only thing it does is it keeps repeating that it can't connect to WiFi, yada yada yada. I tried my Trek and checked my phone and both had no problem connecting to the WiFi.

So, I switched the phone's Bluetooth off and connected to the Max via WiFi, still the exact same behavior.

It seems to me the phone can't connect to the Max because after a wait of several minutes it times out and asks if I want to try again. I've tried via both Bluetooth and WiFi numerous times with no luck.

A couple of days ago I wanted to retrain Voice Match and ran into the same thing, after saying the training phrases, the Google Home app would attempt to connect to the Max to retrain it, but after several minutes, it would time out with no success.

So it seems to me that once initial set up is complete, you can't redo any part of it if needed. Again, that's crazy! If I needed or wanted to re set up the Echo, no problem!

So now I have a $400 brick! If I can't find a way to resolve this, it's going back to where it came from for a refund, and I'm going back to the Echo, it at least works.

2018-04-10 05:13:37

I had to do a master reset, then set it up all over again, but I got it working, for now. Tomorrow I will unplug it for an hour, then plug it back in. If it loses its settings again, it's going back, whether for replacement or a refund I haven't yet decided.

2018-04-10 15:59:47

Well, I wonder where that fly in the ointment came from, I did the no power test to see if the settings would stay put, and this time they did. Whew! For a second there I thought I might have to go back to Alexa.

One thing I did notice though, before the power outage I had signed up for a 30 day trial of Google Play Music and so far I like it, it may not have all the bells and whistles of Pandora or Spotify, but then I don't really need all that stuff. Anyway, I noticed that both Google Play Music and Youtube Red had subscriptions active, but I never signed up for Youtube Red! Is this a part of Google Play Music? And will I be billed separately for it? If so, can I cancel out of Youtube Red without canceling Google Play Music?

Thanks!

2018-04-10 16:33:06

As far as I know both Youtube Red and Google Play music are a packaged deal. You pay 1 price for both and I don't think you can just pay for 1.

Kingdom of Loathing name JB77

2018-04-10 18:34:05

OK, as long as they are not going to charge me $10 a month for each one, if they do that, I'll cancel and sign up with Spotify.

Now I have another problem that actually started yesterday before the power outage, and that is I can't get it to store any Voice Match profiles, I go through the process of training the Max to my voice, but when it's time to save the profile, the Google Home app just sits there until it times out with a "something went wrong" error message, I have tried a number of times to resolve this, including searching the internet but haven't gotten anywhere.

If I don't have an answer to this by Monday, this unit is going back, whether for a brand new replacement or a refund, I don't yet know.