Here’s something we’ve noticed at CES 2018: A.I. assistants are everywhere, and seemingly on every device. More companies seem to be equipping their products to fit in with the various internet of things (IoT) ecosystems out there, or are creating their own. Klipsch is one such company, and its announcements at CES 2018 include bringing one of the most popular A.I. assistants to its products.
A selection of Klipsch’s wireless speakers and amps will be supporting Amazon’s artificially intelligent assistant, Alexa, specifically Alexa connected speaker APIs (Application Protocol Interfaces), in the near future. These APIs give users the ability to fully control playback on their speakers and multiroom audio setups through other Alexa-supported devices. For example, you can use Alexa voice commands to change volume, play and pause content, or even fire up specific tracks. One the update rolls out, this can all be done through your Amazon Echo or Echo Dot device, or other Alexa-integrated devices.
Alexa support will be available on any of Klipsch’s DTS Play-Fi-enabled audio devices, including the upcoming Heritage Three wireless speaker, the Reference RSB-14 and RSB-8 soundbars, RW-1 wireless speaker, and the Gate and Power Gate amplifiers.
That’s not all; the upcoming Heritage Three wireless speaker will also support Google Assistant. We were lucky enough to get some listening time with the Heritage Three at CES this year, and found it to be a loud and powerful speaker. So if Google Home is your smart home ecosystem of choice, you’ve also got Klipsch options available.
These A.I. assistants complement Klipsch’s free smartphone app, Klipsch Stream, which lets users control their speaker setups directly on their phone or tablet.
Current owners of Klipsch speakers set to support Alexa will be able access the new features sometime in early 2018. You will need to download a free firmware update, which will be made available through the aforementioned Klipsch Stream app. Once the firmware has been downloaded and installed, you’ll have complete access to Alexa voice control functionality.
Klipsch is jsut one of the many companies talking about A.I. assistants and interconnected devices at CES this year, and you can find all the news and announcements from CES here.
