Why The New Nest Mini Is The Sensible Evolution Of The Home Mini

2023 Author: Sheila Hailey | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-05-24 11:17

But it is precisely the possibility to position the Nest Mini vertically that makes the small speaker with its now significantly improved sound a not only visually rounded thing. Because the biggest acoustic obstacle that Nest and Home Mini have to deal with is that, unlike Amazon's Echo Dot, for example, they don't emit the sound sideways but upwards. If the Mini is lying flat on a table or other horizontal shelf as before, it will sound up the room - where there is normally no listener. In combination with the sound performance, which is not exactly overwhelming in terms of price and design, the sound experience with the Home Mini has not yet been catastrophic, but it was also not an option for enjoying music extensively in this way.

View Nest Mini at Saturn

As profane as it sounds, Google has now created the Nest Mini with an opportunity or even a motivation to simply place the speaker vertically on the wall - where it can be seen not only visually with its fabric top in different colors to match the respective room act (or at least not disturb), but can also radiate acoustically into the room or towards the listener.

More mids and lows for a richer sound

As already mentioned, Google has also technically drilled out the sound of the Nest Mini compared to the Home Mini - of course, the small speaker is still not a full-fledged alternative for audiophiles and also not a party speaker. But on-demand background music played on the Nest Mini now sounds like podcasts or audiobooks, thanks to noticeably improved mids and lows, richer and more pleasant. The Nest Mini now fulfills one of its intended tasks, namely to simply and easily fill the room with sound, much better. So much better compared to the predecessor and the Echo Dot that you don't just demonstrate it as a party gag, but actually want to listen to music in certain situations.

View Nest Mini at Saturn

In addition, Google has made numerous other small but subtle changes to the Nest Mini: the fabric cover is now made from recycled plastic bottles, and a proximity sensor ensures that when the user approaches the LEDs in the housing indicate where the speaker can be turned up and down by hand and a tap in the middle of the top lets the audio playback pause or start again and a third microphone should ensure that the Nest Mini hears and understands its owner even more reliably.

Perhaps the best little smart speaker currently

All in all, these cautious-sounding, but ultimately very effective optimizations make the Nest Mini the best smart speaker for the small budget at the moment. So if you are thinking about finally making your home or office or garage or hobby room smart in terms of audio, the Nest Mini now offers a cheap but also sophisticated option - of course, not only for listening to music, but also for asking questions, for lighting and heating control, for timers on demand, reading out messages, the weather forecast …