🎖▷ Lenovo Smart Clock: review of the multifunction watch with Google Assistant

Lenovo Smart Clock: review of the multifunction watch with Google Assistant

"Its compatibility with the Google Assistant gives you many more utilities than as a simple alarm clock."

Multiple functions
Decent sound
Current and practical design

Price slightly high
Google Assistant sometimes does not attend

At first glance, the Lenovo Smart Clock may go unnoticed as a conventional digital alarm clock, but it is not. With a touch screen and its compatibility with the Google Assistant is loaded with functions that go beyond its main use to get out of bed. With it you can listen to music, control other compatible smart home appliances, and its intention is to make your life in your home easier at any time of the day.

A careful aesthetic

With an ideal size for the nightstand, Lenovo Smart Clock brings a 4-inch touch screen, a size to see the time at any time, although this also depends on the design of the sphere you choose. The device is lined with a gray acoustic fabric similar in appearance to some speakers, such as the Amazon Echo Dot, the Google Home Minio the Citation ONE by Harman Kardon. It is a fabric that gives a modern aesthetic.

At the top of the clock are the physical volume controls. On the back, the entrance to connect the cable and plug it into the electrical network, a button so that the Google assistant does not listen and a USB port to charge the mobile phone on the nightstand.

Multiple functions

The process to start working is very simple: gross mode, first connect to the home Wi-Fi network through the Google Home application. Once connected, you just have to follow the application instructions. The functions are accessed through two panels, one at the top of the screen and the other at the bottom. Both appear and disappear by sliding your fingers. The alarm, Good Night mode and music playback are activated with the one above. The icons below to adjust the brightness of the screen, the volume, mute it and settings appear.

Alarm clock

As the name implies, it is a multifunction device with alarm soul. With the advantage that you can program the alarms by voice (and manually through the touch screen) and change the spheres even by putting your own images (you take them from Google Photos and they change as if it were a digital photo frame to the time the time is shown on the screen). And, of course, you have several sounds to choose from and different options for the alarm to be repeated (for example, every ten minutes for an hour, among other possibilities).

The clock has an option called ‘Dawn Alarm Clock’ with which, half an hour before the alarm sounds, the light turns on little by little to get used to it before getting up. In Routine mode, Google Assistant is activated to wake you up with the alarm you previously told it and then (once the alarm is turned off), it tells you the weather in your area and news (headlines of TVE's La 1 newscast , podcast from ABC.es and newsletters of Cadena Ser) for 15 minutes.

If you want to add some more routine, for example the traffic from your home to your workplace, it is done through the Google Home application. For this function, make sure that the volume is high if you have it low, since the alarm of the alarm you will hear it well but when passing the news you hear much lower.

Soothing sounds

The possibility of listening to sounds that help you relax to fall asleep was one of the functions that caused us the most interest. These sounds are linked to the ‘Good Night Mode’ of the alarm clock and you can choose them through the Routines icon in the Google Home app. A routine, for example, will be: first it tells you the time of the next day or asks you to set the alarm and then starts playing relaxing sounds, music or nothing, as chosen. However, in our tests, we have only been able to hear one of the default sounds in the app (night in the field), which we didn't find relaxing at all. When we have selected other sounds in the app (there are nine, including a white noise) it has not worked and has put relaxing music from Spotify or directly the Google assistant has told us: Sorry, I do not know how to help you but I still learn every day .

Speaker to listen to music

Lenovo Smart Clock becomes a speaker for listening to music in the bedroom of your Spotify Premium, Deezer, YouTube account. It is possible to ask the Google Assistant to put you music or select it manually with a few touches on the screen, and then control the playback and adjust the volume from the smartphone through the Google Home application or the music service itself. We have tested it with Spotify and we have been able to listen to our playlists by activating the playback from the smartphone As speaker gives the size, it is heard with a good quality, if you do not raise the volume to the maximum.

Smart home control

The interaction with the Google Assistant facilitates voice control of all the comforts of a smart home from the bedroom (smart lights, temperature, speakers, robot vacuum cleaner, coffee maker …). For our analysis we have linked it with the Roomba and the clock has always responded to our voice requests to start or pause it.

Conclusion

Lenovo Smart Clock stands out for its design not only attractive, but also practical for its size and USB detail. Setting it up to start working is an easy process for any user. In sound it more than meets its goal. It plays music with decent audio quality and plenty of power for a bedroom environment, although with a very high volume the sound loses sharpness.

Everything we have asked for or configured on the clock has worked for us except the Good Night routine in which we have only been able to hear a (doubtfully) relaxing sound. This has disappointed us a bit because the relaxing sounds to help you fall asleep was one of the uses that attracts us most. We assume that this is not attributable to the Lenovo Smart Clock, but to the Google application.

The device is perfect to replace your mobile as an alarm clock. But if you are only going to use it as an alarm clock, it may not compensate you for its price of 89 euros in Spain (it costs $ 49 dollars in the United States). If you like listening to music in your room and want to control other compatible smart devices, you will get the most out of it and then maybe it is worth spending that money.

Amazon Echo Show 5 and Google Nest Hub are similar proposals in appearance, but they are not specifically intended as an alarm clock for the bedroom and allow more uses, for example, watching movies, so they are very different proposals and we do not consider them direct rivals of the device from Lenovo.

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