Gadgetory

smart speakers are everywhere here at CES 2018 but smart soundbars there's a sum total of two and this one's got an Alexa dot that's been plunked right in the middle the $300 port command bar was designed in collaboration with Amazon over a period of two years but this is more than just a sound bar with a heavily modified dot in it it actually adds a lot of extra features to enable Alexa to work the sambar had to be carefully designed to limit interference between the speakers and the microphones and these mics are slightly raised about the surface to improve performance the speaker's woofers themselves are placed at the extreme ends of the sound bar which also helps to improve stereo imaging pulses as an Alexa by does all the things in echo can do including tell jokes and control your lights it also lets you control the EQ settings and the volume of the bar itself if you have other echos around the house the Pope will also work as part of a Lexus forthcoming multi-room system if you're tired of yelling Alexa because she can't hear you the pork remote comes with an Alexa button which automatically lowers the volume and wakes the assistant other features include HDMI inputs and Bluetooth and the sambar has a dedicated space for an Amazon fire stick at the back as well so you can control your TV content with Alexa the pop command bar will be available for pre-order in April and go on sale in mid 2018