New Alarm Clock with Internet Radio

photonic69

Looking for one of the above as I expect to be spending much time in bed during chemo.

I listen to a lot of BBC sounds radio plus some music from Amazon Prime.

It's primary use is an alarm click with snooze function.

What have you guys got and what works well without bugs.

sungod

not tried it, but it does the things you mention, reviews look good, friends had a previous one and it always seemed pretty good at doing what it was told...

https://www.amazon.co.uk/amazon-echo-spot-2024-release-smart-alarm-clock-with-vibrant-sound-alexa-black/dp/B0C2GGRBZR

photonic69

https://forum.bikeradar.com/discussion/comment/21100197#Comment_21100197

Good call. Just got one yesterday. Currently setting it up. Seems a very usable bit of kit.

Thanks for the suggestion.

daniel_b

I hope your treatment goes well @photonic69

I've also just ordered one of these for my daughter, she struggles to get up in the morning, so I thought this for alarms and music (Spotify potentially?) linked with a smart bulb in her main light to increase the brightness over a certain amount of time, may assist in that regard - we will see.

pblakeney

https://forum.bikeradar.com/discussion/comment/21100857#Comment_21100857

Ha! I remember being that way in my teens. The supposed solution was a noisy alarm with a flashing light at the opposite end of the room. A flying shoe took care of that for once and all.

photonic69

In my late teens I had a very early shift at the local paper. Had to be in for 5.30am

Terrible at waking up I had an alarm radio clock at max volume, a big wind up ticktock alarm in a metal biscuit tin and an annoying travel alarm with a loud beep. Still managed to oversleep some days.

Back to Echo Spot 2024 - it worked brilliantly as expected. Radio 4 came on at 5.50am. Switched over to 4Extra at 6am. The night mode is great as the display turns to a very dark red digit time.

Still tweaking it but I'd recommend it fully.

ddraver

Interesting...

For personal political rebellion reasons it's a shame it's so...amazon

daniel_b

@photonic69 how have you gotten on with the echo thing?

I managed to track ours down yesterday, after RM delivered it to the wrong post office, and then the tracking app would not tell me where it actually was - always helpful.

I started setup last night, but am under the impression I will need to set my daughter up an account, and that unless I want her to set up routines from my phone, she'll then need to use that account to login to the app on her phone, wherein she can connect to the device, and set up routines etc.

I have seen multiple posts that states if you put it in 'kid mode' or something like that, routines will simply not work, which seems nuts.

photonic69

Hi @daniel_b

Sorry for the late reply. How you getting on with the Spot? I can't really answer your question as I don't really know. I've just set mine up for me. My wife doesn't even use or acknowledge it! I've only set a few things on it like Waking up to Radio alarm every day at a set time and set it to Night Mode between 10pm and 6am so the display dulls to a deep red which is nice as I'm sleeping so badly I'm often squinting at the display at 00:31; 01:15; 02:55; 04:01.....

I think you might have to set some "Skills" up on your phone. I set up BBC Sounds and Amazon Muisc. Now I just use voice commands to play what I need or connect phone via Bluetooth to play stuff that Alexa can't or won't understand via voice.

The device is overall ok. TBH the sound is a bit dull. OK for music but for radio voice that I'm usually listening to then I have to set Bass right down and Mid & Treble right up.

daniel_b

Thanks @photonic69 , no need to apologise, appreciate you taking the time.

So far pretty good, we did indeed have to configure it on her phone with the app and an account for her, frustratingly I use TAPO bulbs and smart plugs, and although I have added it as a 'skill' on my phone, so my Alexa app can see them, hers cannot, so it looks like I have to configure TAPO on her phone as well, which is a little bit of a pain, but there we go.

My partner has configured it for spotify for her, so she can now listen to her playlists easily, and no ads, as she pays for the sub. Didn't realise you could setup BBC sounds, that's pretty useful, will look into that for her.

Also, as I have not read the instructions at all, was not aware you could connect to it via BLE, that's pretty useful too.

We've only had music on it so far, and for it's size and it's price I was quite impressed with the sound quality, clearly not a patch on a nice separates setup, but for what she needs I was pleasantly surprised.

I'll try and get her to set up some routines, and see how that goes, I think you can either set it timed, or more flexible I guess if she can initiate them by voice.

EDIT: Installed Tapo, but managed to set her up with a view of only her light bulb, as opposed to all the others, smart plugs etc etc, and we've added it as a skill, so it's all about the setting up of routines now, which is basically a workflow with a manual or automated trigger :-)

I think she will learn something from it to be fair as well.