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CNBC: Google's New 'Pixel Buds' Suck (yahoo.com)
Google's new Pixel Buds "are really bad" and "not worth buying," according to CNBC's technology products editor:
The stand-out feature of Google Pixel Buds is that they're supposed to be able to translate spoken languages in near real-time. In my real-world tests, however, that wasn't the case at all. I took the Pixel Buds out on the streets of Manhattan, speaking to a Hungarian waiter in Little Italy, multiple vendors in Chinatown and more. If you press the right earbud and say "help me speak Chinese," for example, the buds will launch Google Translate, you can speak what you'd like to ask someone in another language, and a voice will read out the translated speech through your smartphone's speakers. Then, when someone replies, you'll hear that response through the Pixel Buds.
The microphone on the Pixel Buds is really bad, so it barely picked up my voice queries that I wanted to translate. I stood on the side of the road in Chinatown repeating myself at least 10 times trying to get the phone to pick up my speech in order to begin translation. It barely worked, even if I took the buds out and spoke directly into the microphone on the right earbud, and often only translated half of what I was trying to ask. In a quiet place, I was able to allow someone to respond to me, after which I'd hear the English translation through the headphones. That was neat, but it barely ever actually worked that way. To mitigate this, I found it was just easier to manually open the Google translate app, speak into my phone's microphone, and then let someone else also speak right into my phone. This executed the translation nearly perfectly, and meant that I didn't need the Pixel Buds at all.
The article ends by answering the question, Should you buy them? "Nope. There's nothing I recommend about the Pixel Buds.
"They're cheap-feeling and uncomfortable, and you're better off using the Google Translate app on a phone instead of trying to fumble with the headphones while trying to translate a conversation. The idea is neat, but it just doesn't work well enough to recommend to anyone on any level."
The microphone on the Pixel Buds is really bad, so it barely picked up my voice queries that I wanted to translate. I stood on the side of the road in Chinatown repeating myself at least 10 times trying to get the phone to pick up my speech in order to begin translation. It barely worked, even if I took the buds out and spoke directly into the microphone on the right earbud, and often only translated half of what I was trying to ask. In a quiet place, I was able to allow someone to respond to me, after which I'd hear the English translation through the headphones. That was neat, but it barely ever actually worked that way. To mitigate this, I found it was just easier to manually open the Google translate app, speak into my phone's microphone, and then let someone else also speak right into my phone. This executed the translation nearly perfectly, and meant that I didn't need the Pixel Buds at all.
The article ends by answering the question, Should you buy them? "Nope. There's nothing I recommend about the Pixel Buds.
"They're cheap-feeling and uncomfortable, and you're better off using the Google Translate app on a phone instead of trying to fumble with the headphones while trying to translate a conversation. The idea is neat, but it just doesn't work well enough to recommend to anyone on any level."
See subject & you should know that a custom hosts file is always useful and essential for security. Of course, people are AFRAID of real security like my hosts file engine. They're also afraid of REAL SECURITY to prevent mass shootings, like BANNING BUMP STOCKS. It's an embarrassment that the right is fighting with every ounce of their strength to oppose any gun control of any sort.
I'm tired of the idiot who keeps parodying me. I guess I struck a nerve because someone must REALLY like their bump stocks. It's a tired act by now and takes away from the important messages about the need to ban bump stocks.
* Moderators will definitely CENSOR my post to -1 because they are also AFRAID of real security. Slashdot is an EMBARRASSMENT for allowing the moderators to CENSOR any posts they disagree with.
It's the same NONSENSE when it comes to REAL SECURITY to prevent mass shootings. The Vatican and the NRA are throwing lots of money to prevent bump stocks from being banned. They're also CENSORING posts here to -1 as you can see by all of my posts about bump stocks ending up at -1. Ban bump stocks and the mass shootings will stop. Perhaps AssFux...LOL... is a representative of the Vatican. Slashdot should stop this censorship garbage.
APK
P.S.=> I'm proud to continue HONORING THE LEGACY of those killed in mass shootings by calling for bump stocks to be banned. Those of you who censor my posts to -1 are dancing on the graves of the victims of mass shootings... apk
No way. I'm totally driving around Mars on my 3D printed car so I can go visit Elon Musk at his private Mars retirement home.
Yup.
Nothing is ever over-hyped.
Whoda thunk it?
do they still spy on you?
audio apps don't work on the streets in new york city, require reasonably quiet place / low noise environment.
also translation software isn't 100%.
MORE AT 11.
and often only translated half of what I was trying to ask
The guy was probably asking questions that are not compatible with Google's SJW agenda. They've done internal purges to get rid of dissenters and have tried to force Hollywood to embed their diversity propaganda in movies and TV shows, it was just a matter of time before they did it in their own products.
lucm, indeed.
What a surprise!
CNBC's technology products editor can't diss Google and remain employed. We're talking about Google.
If you have a Pixel phone, can’t you do all this without the earbuds? Or is there some sort of artificial restriction which checks for the existence of some connected earbuds?
#DeleteChrome
So, you take a brand new technology, that is expected to have some rough edges, you test it in the worst possibile environment (noisy and crowded streets with a lot of traffic) and you're surprised of the result? Moreover you used: a) a language (Chinese) that due to its nature is really difficult to recognize efficiently. b) a language (Italian) as spoken by Italian-Americans of several generations, so with a strong accent, regional influences and maybe a few grammatical errors in the mix (I'm Italian-Italian myself so I know what could be expected).
I'm not saying that Google buds are great, maybe they really do suck, but this sounds more like a rant than a well-informed test. Then, of course, can debate whether Apple's approach (bringing a technology on the market when it's mature, instead of jumping first on the bandwagon) works better or it's just a strategy to make your competitors fail in a series of inevitable pitfalls.
So you didn't read the summary?
Me neither.
Wait, you tried anything with speak to text in a noisy city area? LOL.
So you didn't read the summary?
Me neither.
I’ve just been trying to fit in...
#DeleteChrome
So if the slaughterbots work as well as the pixel buds we should have nothing to worry about. It's reassuring to know it was all just advertising B.S.
The announcement of these things was buried pretty far under the rest of the announcements. I remember tech sites getting there eyes on it and screeching to the high heavens about how great they were going to be, and how you could translate languages without and internet connection and it would work perfectly and...
And of course not. If someone, anyone, had that tech they'd demonstrate it on stage front and center, hyping it to the high heavens. Instead it's just a crappy pair of earbuds, that most every reviewer out there thinks is crappy for reference, just in case you're getting cognitive dissonance and trying to rationalize how this bad review is obviously biased or something. Of course they buried the announcement and hoped no one would notice, they knew it these things were crap.
So did he/she try another set to see if they just got a bad microphone?
long time FreeBSD Move any equipment and promotes our Problems with any Parting shot, Personal rivalries it there. Bring can connect to 5how that FreeBSD current core were
I basically feel Google simply added very little to a $150 pair of wireless buds that would add much function to them just being average sounding ear buds.
For me they would compare to a $20 pair of wired buds and I just do not see spending the dollars on wireless technology when the rest of the ear buds suffer. At the Apple Air Pods do audio quality half way decent and you can take calls with them. I think Google tried to one up everyone and they failed.
That Google, or anyone, is pedaling an item which is superfluous because another item already does the same thing, and better in this case, isn't surprising.
Nor is the fact that thousands upon thousands of people will buy said product, then complain when it doesn't work even though they already had another item which does work.
"An ex-plumber from Australia invented a $179 earpiece that can translate 8 languages in real-time"
http://www.businessinsider.com/an-ex-plumber-invented-a-140-earpiece-that-translates-in-real-time-2017-6?r=US&IR=T&IR=T
Fta : "Lingmo International, a startup based in West Gosford north of Sydney, launched its TranslateOne2One earpiece at the UN's Artificial Intelligence for Good Summit in Geneva, revealing that IBM Watson machine learning technology had been used for its algorithms.
Traditionally, converting one language to another orally in real-time is called "interpreting" whereas the term "translation" is reserved for processing text across languages with some delay. Lingmo founder Danny May, however, describes his product as performing "translation in real-time".
"It's a fully independent translation earpiece. And what I mean by independent is that it doesn't require any connectivity to your phone by Bluetooth or wi-fi. A lot of our competitors do," he told Business Insider."
Did you try shouting? That's what you're supposed to do when foreigners don't understand, isn't it?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Suction is the way they stay in the ears.
JK. But you know it could happen.
The current state of the audio filtering technology is not up snuff. So be it. These real-world tests will only make it stronger.
And when audio filtering does get good, the world will finally have a hearing aid that works.
I am a native English speaker living in Hungary and I can say without reservation that Google Translate is really bad at Hungarian. It can handle individual words ok sometimes but anything beyond that and it falls apart quickly. So even without sound issues, it's not really something you can use for any communication beyond the most basic.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
As per the title, this is a big let down for me...I was really, really looking forward to being able to use these to converse with my mother-in-law and some of my extended family. High hopes dashed.
I should have known better, but with Google the hype is usually kept to a dull roar and at the product (when it finally appears) is more-or-less as claimed. Still, I can hope they get better as time goes by.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
Good for cleaning your ears, then?
That'd be awesome ... I could use the androgynous 'guys' and the pixel , using Pixel Virtue Signaling (TM) can note proximate SJWs and translate appropriately.
In other words, they copy everything Apple does and poorly at that.
...so I figured I was supposed to stick them into my eyes. No?