What you need to know
- Google says a fix will begin in late June for a bug that affected several of its smart speakers and SiriusXM radio.
- Users were given multiple errors last month, when reports surfaced, and they were unable to get their content streamed through the speaker.
- While this problem was solved, Google also released its new Home Speaker and expanded the Gemini Home for more partners.
Google has been busy with new launches and bug fixes since May. This week, it was reported that a major fix is on the way for the satellite radio problem.
About a month ago, users of the Google Home subreddit reported a sudden problem trying to listen to SiriusXM radio on their smart speakers (via Android Authority ). Getting down to brass tacks, Google responded to this month-old thread this week, saying “We’ve resolved an issue affecting the ability to stream SiriusXM to some Google Home devices.” These “problems” that Google refers to were highlighted by the OP of the thread (the original poster), who said that their smart speakers could not stream any content.
Specifically, the user says that his device will always give him the following error: “I looked for that, but it’s either not available or can’t be played right now.” They checked their Google Home settings and made sure their SiriusXM subscription was connected correctly. Spoiler alert: everything was fine. Further investigation revealed that they were able to listen to the radio through an app, not through their speakers.
Many other reports on the subreddit revealed similar stories. After contacting Google support, users were told to use normal troubleshooting procedures. Many users have already claimed to have done this themselves, to be fair. However, with these reports, Google admitted that it was a problem, at least that’s what users said after contacting support.
Now, about a month later, a fix for the radio problem is coming to Google Home smart speakers.
New speaker on the block
At the time when these issues were reported, Google introduced the Home Speaker, its future of smart speakers and AI assistance in the home. At $99, the Home Speaker is the brand’s first device built entirely around its own AI, Gemini. AI is able to understand normal speech, which means users don’t have to constantly memorize and regurgitate words. AI can act on multi-step commands, and users can participate in follow-up questions to keep their conversations going.
Since Gemini is so tightly integrated, we all know what that means: Home Gemini is its head. When Google expanded its presence to more countries, the company improved Gemini’s response times by 40%. In addition, it has improved AI’s ability to understand what device users are talking about (hopefully) to avoid erroneous commands. On a related note, Google has opened Gemini Home to hardware manufacturers and carriers.
This means that consumers will see more devices on the market that support Google’s AI natively.