Gadgetory

hey everyone Jessica's all hurt from CNET here with an early look at Microsoft's Cortana voice assistant in a minute I'll show you how Cortana so far stacks up against Apple Siri and Google now but first a caveat or three I've got Cortana on a pre-release version of Windows Phone 8.1 not even the developers have this yet Cortana is in beta and gets her knowledge from the hive mind that is the cloud which means that she isn't at her full capacity at this stage get it good now Cortana can do the same basic things the Siri and Google now like call and text set alarms get directions and search the web for practical answers to your questions it'll take 41 hours and 20 minutes to drive to New York Cortana can also tell you the weather start a note and set reminders for example wake me up in an hour creating a calendar item is a snap that you can't seem to vocally remove it if you change your mind set an appointment for 5:00 p.m. for happy hour happy hour dear calendar for today at 5:00 p.m. cancel my appointment for 5:00 p.m. tonight happy hour you have one event today at 5 p.m. happy hour this is something you can do with Siri though shall I remove it from your calendar yes okay I took it off your calendar beyond the basics Cortana has other tricks as well unlike Siri Cortana can open apps and turn on phone settings like turn on Wi-Fi thanks Cortana also has built-in song recognition to ID a tune Google now does this a little bit better since it hooks you straight into the Google Playstore like Google now you can ask Cortana to track your flights and tell you when you leave for appointments you turn on both of these in the settings one unique feature of that Cortana can do is run interference on calls and texts when you're sleeping or in a meeting Microsoft calls these quiet hours where Microsoft really toots its own horn is in the way that Cortana understands context for instance if you tell it next time I talk to my sister remind me to tell her about my vacation plans then the next time we text or call a reminder should pop up by the way you can set relationships in settings under inner circle this is something you can do in Siri as well another neat trick is being able to make follow up demands like when you're making a reservation show me three star Japanese restaurants here are ten Japanese restaurants that are three stars how far is number three how long will it take me to walk when it comes to having a cheeky personality it's pretty easy to beat Google now that thing is a software robot Siri is a snarky er contender but it really depends on what you say what's the story of halo at this point Cortana seems to be a pretty good blend of Google now in Siri however it's being based search results don't seem quite as convenient as Google now and you do have to press a button every time you want to speak but Cortana does have some promising integration with the rest of the phone that bridges what both Siri and Google can do things will get even more interesting as developers jump into the mix with Cortana commands that will work with their own apps as well well have much more on Cortana as the voice assistant UPS over time in the meantime I'm tossing a ball court for C net you can catch my thorough comparison among Cortana Google now and Siri etsy.com