- So, there's one thing I've wanted here at home
pretty desperately for a long, long time.
- [Man In Commercial] Now, brighten up everyone's day
with the new wild and wacky, singing, talking,
Louie the Large Mouth Bass.
- No, not that.
I'm talking about a whole, home hub, okay?
Sort of a smart screen that all my information
in one place that I can see all the time.
I kinda hoped that we'd gotten there
with the Amazon Echo Show.
Now, if you remember, I did a video on that a while back
and I was super excited about it.
It's a fun toy, but just not a necessity.
So, enter the Lenovo Smart Display.
So, this is the first entry from Google
with it's Android Things platform.
It's a display.
It's smart, it gives you information
and you can tell it to do things.
And you know what?
Looks pretty damn nice.
So, they sent me one.
And I've spent a week with it now.
Does it live up to my expectations?
My own self-hype?
Let's go take a look.
Alright, you know what we do first here.
Let's go do the basics.
So, the Lenovo Smart Display
is actually the first in a series of devices like this.
There are other manufacturers gonna make 'em too.
So, basically it's a Google Home with a touchscreen.
Speaker, the display, microphones, camera.
I mean, pretty much everything you would expect
in this sort of device, right?
Now, Lenovo actually has a couple of these, okay?
They sent me the 10-inch model to check out
and it's gorgeous.
It's got matte white plastic
with this really nice bamboo in the back.
And the display is better than the smaller one
we're gonna talk about in second, okay?
This one is $250.
And the smaller one is eight inches
and it's got a slightly smaller speaker
and smaller display, yeah.
And also a lesser resolution
and that means fewer pixels per inch.
Again, just a $50 difference.
Now, both sizes share a few other specs:
four gigabytes of storage, two gigabytes of RAM,
the five megapixel camera, and an 802.11 ac wifi.
And both are powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 624
Home Hub platform.
So, let's talk about the buttons and switches for a second.
You've got your typical volume rocker and next to that,
you've got a switch that turns off the mic
if you decide you don't want the smart display
to listen in on you anymore for you to tell it what to do.
So, right here we have probably my favorite feature
of any of the smart home devices with a camera
that I have ever used.
So the Lenovo has put in a physical shutter switch
to block the camera.
Now, before we've always had to trust it, right?
You'd say, "Turn the camera off,"
and you think it's turned the camera off,
but, do you really know?
Well, here you just flip the switch
and it's pretty obvious it can't see anymore.
Every smart home device needs to have this.
So as for the operating system,
it's this relatively new thing called Android Things.
So if you know Google Home and Chromecast,
you can think of it as a good bit more than that.
Though, it's also not like a full blown version
of Android the operating system that you might, say,
use on your phone.
Let me just have Google explain it to you real quick.
- So what is Android Things?
Android Things is Google's managed operating system
that enables you to build and maintain
Internet of Things devices at scale.
We provide a robust platform that does the heavy lifting
with certified hardware, rich developer APIs,
and secure managed software updates
using Google's backend infrastructure.
- So it's got the full weight of Google developers behind it
including longterm support for things like security,
and other functionality.
And that's a big, big deal.
Alright, so here's the hard question:
What the hell does this thing do?
So, let's start with the set-up process.
You're gonna use the Google Home app for that
either on Android phones or on an iPhone, or an iPad.
And yeah, that does mean that the Lenovo Smart Display
ties into your Google account.
So that means you'll be giving it access
to things like your contacts, your video calls,
or your calendar, or just your whole Google knowledge graph
of things you search for or things you want to do,
or eat, or go, or watch, or whatever.
But it is worth poking through the options
in the Google Home app a little bit
because that's where you're really
gonna get a sense of everything else this can do.
So, let's start with the background, okay?
It's what you're gonna see just kinda going on all the time
when you're not actively using it.
So it's called ambient mode
and you can choose between some great curated artwork.
Or there are a couple of neat clock faces, I guess.
But what I like to do when I get bored
is just make up my own photo gallery
with my own personal photos
and then you have a digital photo frame.
Nice.
So, let's talk about music for a little bit.
You can tie in all sorts of accounts, right?
Google Play Music, the new YouTube Music,
Spotify, which is what I use.
You can also just do Bluetooth if that's how you roll.
So music is super simple and remember,
because this is a Chromecast target,
anything that does Chromecast works.
And you can also pair it up
with other Google Home devices around your house
to have multi-room music.
Very cool.
So, how's the speaker on this smart display?
Ehhhh, look, it's not great, okay?
It's perfectly fine for casual listening,
like in the kitchen, maybe.
But it's absolutely nowhere near as good,
as say, Sonos, or Apple's HomePod.
Now with video, things get a little more tricky.
Here's what's going on.
Now, you saw in the setup, you can tie in things
like your HBO account and CBS, and stuff like that.
You can just use your voice
and tell it to play something on HBO.
Or play something on CBS, or whatever,
and it just works.
Voice also works really well for YouTube, obviously.
You say, "Hey, watch Modern Dad on YouTube,"
and it's gonna work.
YouTube TV, though, doesn't work via voice.
You're gonna have to use Chromecast to do that.
So you start it from your phone and send it on over
and it works great, it's just one extra step.
And this is true for some other streaming apps a well.
PlayStation Vue, for instance, works perfectly.
Things that do not work perfectly:
Netflix, it won't actually send video
over to the smart display.
Can't do it with your voice, can't do it via Chromecast.
Now, I asked Netflix about it
and they said they have nothing to share at this time.
Which means they have nothing to share at this time.
Don't know if they're gonna fix it or not.
Some other things are broken too.
DirecTV Now sends video but not audio.
And Sling tries but just totally fails.
So, things are a little broken on that front.
But if you use a service
that actually works with it right now,
it still makes it a really cool secondary display.
Let's just hope, though,
that they start fixing this stuff over time.
So, what else can you do with the Lenovo Smart Display?
Well, basically think of anything you can do
with a Google Home, or Google Assistant on your phone,
and now you just have this big display to do it on.
Well, I'll tell you what,
I'll just have the smart display tell you what it can do.
- [Voice On Smart Display] This is the home screen
where you'll find notifications, reminders,
and important information, and learn more about
what your Google Assistant can do you for you.
Say, "Hey, Google," to get started.
You can ask questions, play your favorite music and videos,
get step-by-step voice guidance for thousands of recipes,
control smart home devices, and more.
You could also ask your assistant
to complete multiple actions with a single command.
This is called a routine.
Just say, "Hey, Google. Good morning,"
and your assistant will show you your calendar,
the weather, your commute,
and whatever else you need to start your day.
Wanna share the moment?
You can video call friends and family hands-free
with Google Duo.
Also built in on new Android phones
and available for free on iPhones.
You can connect compatible smart home devices,
like the lights and thermostat,
through the Google Home app on your phone.
There you can set up news and media, customize routines,
and change the ambient mode,
which is what you'll see when you're not using
your smart display.
To adjust volume or brightness,
swipe up from the bottom of the screen.
And any time you wanna exit, just swipe from the left edge.
Give it a try now, and see what your smart display
can do for you.
- Alright, one more cool thing you can do with this,
video calls.
And in fact, that's actually the only thing
that the camera currently works with.
And, video calls themselves are pretty limited
because you can only do it over Google Duo right now.
Now, that's actually not a horrible video-calling app.
Problem is, nobody uses it, right?
So, if they're not using Duo,
they're using, say, FaceTime or WhatsApp,
or Facebook Messenger, or whatever,
you're outta luck.
You can only call someone through Google Duo.
But when you do it, it does work really well.
And by the way, this is the only other time
that you might flip it up and use the thing vertically,
and in fact, it's the only thing that works vertically.
I'm not gonna bother with that, though.
So, that is the Lenovo Smart Display in a nutshell.
I mean, after a week of it, it's pretty clear
it's gonna be a really cool device, I think.
I've thought that before,
but it's also very early in the lifespan of Android Things.
So we're gonna get more functionality over time.
It's just a question of when.
So should you buy it?
Well, again, the eight-inch model, $200
is only $80 more than the old school Google Home.
That's not bad for adding a display to the whole thing.
And while it's gonna depend a good little bit
on where you decide to put this thing,
whether it's in the kitchen or your living room,
or even the bedroom,
I think I might actually like that eight-inch size more.
It just takes up a whole lot of real estate,
especially if you're gonna try
to put it on a kitchen counter.
And, you know, $250 for the ten-inch model,
that's not inexpensive,
especially for a first generation product,
even one this cool.
And again, make no mistake,
this is one of the very first products
in the Android Things lineup.
There will be more, they will get better.
And in fact, this one's gonna get better too, I think.
And look, I need it to get better, okay?
Because a lot of the stuff
that I still want a whole home hub to do,
it just doesn't do yet, alright?
I want my Nest Doorbell to popup automatically
when somebody rings it.
I want more video calling
with services that people actually use.
I think Google will add more functionality as time goes on,
it's just early days yet.
So, should you buy it?
Maybe, just know what you're getting into, okay?
It's definitely early, it's definitely gonna get better.
And it's definitely not inexpensive.
Now, is it better than the Amazon Echo Show?
Well, I tell ya, we're already running long here.
That's gonna be a whole another video.
So, stay tuned for that.
Hey, by the way, be sure to subscribe.
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That's it.
See ya next time.