Google’s smart speaker lineup is going through a rough patch. There has been no new smart display launched in over half a decade, and the only new device announced was the Home Speaker, which has nothing special about it except that it runs Gemini out of the box. And Gemini for Home isn’t something to gloat about. I’m particularly disadvantaged because neither Gemini for Home nor a single Google smart speaker is available in India, leaving the whole wide market for Amazon Alexa to capture.
Since I have a bunch of smart home devices that play nicer with Google’s smart speakers and dearly wanted a new Assistant/Gemini-powered smart display, I decided to take things into my own hands. I repurposed my Pixel into an always-on, always-listening smart screen with all the smarts of Gemini. It sounded doable in theory — I thought, what could even go wrong?