Scott Merryfield
Senior HTF Member
Will there be a way to stream music from my PC to the Echo whenever it arrives? I have iTunes installed on my Windows PC, and also have my music setup in the Amazon Music application running on the same PC.
I've had mine since last fall and love it. You can Bluetooth any device to it. Say"Alexa pair my device" and stream away!Scott Merryfield said:Will there be a way to stream music from my PC to the Echo whenever it arrives? I have iTunes installed on my Windows PC, and also have my music setup in the Amazon Music application running on the same PC.
noel aguirre said:I've had mine since last fall and love it. You can Bluetooth any device to it. Say"Alexa pair my device" and stream away!
Scott-S said:Awesome Ron...
How long is the lag between saying the command and the lights turning on?
The IFTTT demo on the Echo I saw online made it seem like it as 10 to 20 seconds. This was the one where he had a servo pour a glass of milk. I think that the items directly supported might be really fast, but if you try using the IFTTT aps, there is a lag. Just a guess on my part.
Hi Scott. But doesn't your PC have Bluetooth? For a key board or a mouse? Or is Alexa too far away?Scott Merryfield said:Thanks, Noel. Unfortunately, I want to stream from my home PC, where I have about 67GB of music stored -- not from my phone, which has no music. The PC is on my home network, so technically the Echo should be able to get to the PC via my home WiFi / ethernet network. However, it appears that is not possible due to limitations of the Echo application.
noel aguirre said:Hi Scott. But doesn't your PC have Bluetooth? For a key board or a mouse? Or is Alexa too far away?
dpippel said:Most desktop PCs don't have built-in Bluetooth. Besides, Echo is a wifi-enabled device and IMO Amazon NEEDS to add TCP/IP music streaming capability. There's simply no reason for them not to. Not everyone wants to stream Spotify from a phone. I also have an extensive collection of ripped music on my computer that is currently inaccessible to the device. While they're at it, maybe they'll FINALLY add multi-day alarm and sleep timer functionality too. Why this basic stuff hasn't been implemented yet is baffling to me.
Windows, since Vista, has Bluetooth support. You just need to buy a dongle. You need a dongle...even on laptops.Scott Merryfield said:Noel, my PC does not have any bluetooth capabilities. I never needed it for anything -- it's a desktop, not a laptop, and my keyboard and mouse are USB wired devices (I do not see the point of needing batteries for a wireless keybopard/mouse on a stationary desktop).
My thoughts, too, Doug.
Well, my Echo arrived today and I was able to get it setup on my home network. It took a bit of work to find the MAC address of the device (I use MAC filtering on my WiFi router), but was finally able to find it via the router. I have not done much with it yet, but did get my Pandora account and Google calendar setup.
schan1269 said:Windows, since Vista, has Bluetooth support. You just need to buy a dongle. You need a dongle...even on laptops.
1. I said "even laptops need them"(paraphrading myself), not "all laptops".dpippel said:No, you don't. Many newer laptops have built-in Bluetooth radios, just like they have built-in wifi radios. The point is that desktop computers, with rare exceptions, do not support Bluetooth because they don't have the necessary hardware to do so.
Right now...noel aguirre said:Hi Scott. But doesn't your PC have Bluetooth? For a key board or a mouse? Or is Alexa too far away?
A bluetooth USB dongle costs $1.50 on Ebay.dpippel said:Let's not argue semantics. The vast majority of desktop computers, Apple excluded, do not include hardware to support Bluetooth. Vast majority. It doesn't matter if the OS includes a Bluetooth stack if there's no Bluetooth radio in the computer. Sure you can buy one, but the point we're discussing here is that it would make a lot more sense for Amazon to simply leverage the transport technology that MOST people have in their home systems already - TCP/IP. Echo is a network-enabled device. Without that functionality it would be unworkable, which makes it a bit ironic that for now music streaming is restricted to Bluetooth.