I'm not often one to buy the latest gadget without letting them work the kinks out, but I read and heard enough good things about the Amazon Echo to give it a go. If nothing else, it's a decent Bluetooth speaker for my lounge for the price, and the rest is a futuristic bonus.

Alexa, you don't look out of place on the coffee table
Alexa, you don't look out of place on the coffee table

Setup

The packaging is quite nice. Once unboxed you just need to connect the power (proprietary, not USB). Then you plug details and connect to WiFi and your various accounts via their app, which worked first time on Android, though it's a bit cluttered.

Playing music

This is mainly what I got it for, and is rather neat. You can tell it to play artists, albums or playlists from Spotify or Prime Music, and it can even hear you over itself when you say "pause" or "stop" or "shuffle".

News and traffic

It's a bit of a gimmick but quite neat to have the news read out to you. I've only asked what my commute was like once, and it gave me as good a time and route as Google Now ever does. Disappointingly it understands but refuses to answer queries about how long it takes to get to other places, claiming not to know your speed.

Hive integration

This is a "skill" provided by the Hive developers. It works, but has a couple of flaws - it always seems to end up back in "off" not "schedule" after a boost done by voice, and I could do without a machine saying "good call, it's hot in here".

IFTTT

The glaring omission from the UK version of the Echo is support for IFTTT (If This Then That), which would allow interfacing with lots of other services. By the looks of it, it would also allow me to bypass the dodgy Hive skill and make the heating do what I want. Sort it out, Amazon. It's allegedly coming soon but a date wouldn't go amiss.

Verdict?

" I spoke to the future, and it listened more convincingly than ever before ".