Amazon Echo teardown exposes speakers on steroids

Since its introduction in November, Amazon Echo has been like an exotic bird: rarely glimpsed but intensely scrutinized when spotted

iFixit got ahold of the smart home assistant and did what it does best: tore it down.

See also: Amazon Echo is another step toward commoditizing your personal life

The dismantling reveals a complex, well-built and powerful system that, with a 7 out of 10 on iFixit's scale, is relatively repairable. However, the site notes that the lack of a repair manual makes reassembly quite difficult.

The 10-inch-tall cylindrical device, which will retail for $199 ($99 for Amazon Prime members), connects to the cloud and is packed with sensors. It learns your habits, has a built-in voice assistant (Alexa), provides you with news and weather updates and, of course, plays music. Someday, it may even work as a hub for controlling other smart home devices like lights and a smart thermostat. Read more...

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