Google Home and Now TV

[Nmpnmp]

My years subscription for Entertainment and Cinema is coming to an end. Am considering options and want to get something that integrates with Google assistant. Seems the Roku does, as does Netflix. Now TV is the only device in my home that doesn't work with Google. I have a number of devices including the smart stick.  It's frustratingly annoying to have to hunt down this remote if we want to watch Now TV, while I can demand load everything else via Google home. 

So my question is, are any of the Now TV devices able to integrate with Google Home? 

If not, are there any plans in the immediate future?

Thanks

[Nmpnmp]

I guess by the overwhelming number of replies Now TV are all over this. 

Boo to Now TV. I’m feeling such support. 

I guess Netflix is the way forward. 

[RoyB]

@Nmpnmp 

Indeed so; Netflix have all the same programmes as NowTV, after all.

Oh, wait......

[Nmpnmp]

Hi @RoyB

Thanks for your oh so helpful and relevant reply. Such an un-condescending and thoughtful response that I’m almost at a loss for words. Answers my question and provides me the ‘support’ that Now TV seem unable to provide themselves. What a wonderful community we have here. 

Just to clarify for those lacking in comprehension, my requirement was purely based on smart / home assistant integration, not content. There are many that would argue that Netflix provides better content than Now TV. At the very least, Netflix at least provides resolution other than 720p, so there is that. 

Anyway, thank you oh so much for you most helpful response.

[RoyB]

Hi @Nmpnmp 

I guess that’s an ‘option 3’ from my sig then. 😛

But let’s rewind to :-

‘I guess by the overwhelming number of replies Now TV are all over this. Boo to Now TV. I’m feeling such support.’

your sarcastic response above, which arguably started the downhill path....

People come onto the Community feeling entitled to a response, and sometimes kick off like that when they don’t get one.

This is perhaps to misunderstand that you are not talking to NowTV employees here, who might be obligated to respond to you, but to the wider population of NowTV customers, people like yourself, where some of us act as volunteer helpers, do what we can. And are free to respond in kind....

My point, though, was that Netflix versus NowTV isn’t an either/or - you can have one, both, or neither - and the services aren’t comparable, or interchangeable, like NowTV Broadband versus BT Broadband would be, and nor mutually exclusive, like where you can only have one broadband provider.

If you want to express your disgruntlement to NowTV, then the official responders are on Live Chat. About 50% of my posts on here have a chunk of boilerplate telling you how to access that, if you want to talk to them.

Not sure if you will get the answers you want there, or even answers at all, though I could be wrong.

Anyway, I’ve got a couple of Google Home devices, NowTV Sticks, a Roku Stick, so I could probably try whatever it is you want tried, if you can explain in a bit more detail what that is.

We talk to the Google device to turn our Hue lights on and off, play Spotify or Classic FM; we never cast, can’t be doing with it.

I guess I could get the Google device to control the Roku Stick from what you say, though whether that would allow control of the NowTV app on the Roku Stick, I don’t know. And I rather fear not.

But if we can get this thread back on a more civilised plane, and you could kindly explain what I ought to try on your behalf, I can perhaps do that.

[Nmpnmp]

I already replied but seems the message has strangely disappeared.

Let me be very clear here. This is a formal NOW TV 'Support Channel'. It even says so on the introductory thread. I am a paying customer. I am ENTITLED to a response from NOW TV.

I don't have the will, the time or inclination to dig out the cleverly hidden avenues to explain my issue to bots, online chat etc, where I no doubt will be asked if I've restarted my device yet. As a customer of Now TV, I have little choice in how I engage with the company.

My initial reply to my own post was expressing annoyance toward Now TV the organisation. I even explicitly named 'Now TV'! - Not any individual or group. Any perceived slight, is clearly in your mind.

Also, its a little late to be taking the higher ground now, after all it was your post that 'started the downhill path..' in this thread. My response was not offensive or rude, and was strangely enough, sarcasm on the internet aimed at a corporate entity that failed to service my enquiry.

Your reply added no value, simply detracted from my original question with a pointless rant about the supposed quality of the content of Netflix vs Now TV. Completely irrelevant to my question, and a waste of everyone's time. Except to increase your post count I expect.

I shan't bother trying to explain my issue any further to you, I expect it will be a further waste of both our time.

[RoyB]

@Nmpnmp 

Perhaps I should read that introductory thread then, as it might explain why we are at cross purposes, and needs to be changed to more exactly describe the strengths and weaknesses, and the advantages and limitations, of the Community as opposed to the formal support offered by NowTV.

Can you please give me a link to it?

And re strangely disappeared messages,  it happens from time to time in the Community that the ’Post’ option doesn’t take, and if you move away quickly, you don’t see that it hasn’t turned into ’Reply’.

But if you go and click on your avatar, choose My Profile, and look between Activity Feed and Private Stats, you may find a posting or postings in Drafts; click on them, and you can resurrect them, change anything you now need to change, and then Post them again, making sure this time that they show Reply before you move off again.

[Nmpnmp]

Always a good idea to read the 'welcome' and 'intro' forums lest one ends up looking sheepish. Though the thread is old, its clearly the position of Now TV, and I would expect they would know best, what their position is around the purpose of this platform. 

https://community.nowtv.com/t5/About-the-Community/About-the-NOW-TV-Community/td-p/284766

[RoyB]

Thanks @Nmpnmp 

That nigh-on five years old posting explains a lot. In those days, the Community Admins were much more active in the Community than they are today; but even then, it was never a promise that could really be honoured.

But I can certainly see how it has mis-set your expectations; as a Community Contributor, I will see what I can do about getting it replaced with a welcome that more accurately reflects:-

(I) that Community responders are almost entirely customers like yourself, who can choose to respond to certain posts but not others, for whatever reason;

(ii) that Community Admins do not monitor the Community for unanswered posts, so that no-one is ignored;

the combination of which means that no-one is entitled to expect a reply here, no matter what.

I agree this is unsatisfactory, but it is how things are set up.

(Iii) that there are a myriad of questions that we customers cannot anyway answer, as they relate to billing queries of one sort or another, and so will never be answered on the Community; and even if there were NowTV employees available to answer these queries, they would have to take the responses private, as all sorts of sensitive personal and financial information is likely to be involved. So the Community would always have been an inappropriate place to raise these issues,

(iv) and so the mechanism by which you can contact NowTV and be guaranteed a response is Live Chat, which is naturally private. If this was clearer (or even mentioned) in that About, and instruction on how to access this cunningly hidden service were given, it would save a lot of the constant redirection we do here.

So I am sorry if your expectations were mis-set; but they were.

[JonnyB147]

I have NOW TV and it provides glorious 1080p. A lot of people seem to think that it doesn't but it does via BOOST which is great.

[Anonymous User]

Coming back on this old thread to se if any progress has been made?

We have a home assistant setup of multiple nest mini V2 speakers, which are great. We also have the square Nowtv boxes which weve had a few years in most rooms, linked to disney, nowTV and Netflix, which have also been excellent!

The quandary we want to control the devices by our google nest. We hoped buying a chromecast would work, but were horrified to find that 1) they're dearer £28 vs £20 for the newer NowTV stick in B&M bargains. 2) they dont have remotes (fine if they work perfectly with your voice/phone) 3) The big one! You cant install apps directly on the chromecast so NowTV is only watchable by kicking the app off one phone then choosing to cast to TV, not ideal in a family setting especially if having guests.

So does any NowTV playing device offer voice control from Google assistant or Alexa?

[nst]

@Anonymous User 

Yes... The Amazon Firestick does.

You'll find its a cheap alternative.  If you buy now you'll get the standard one for £24.99 or the 4K one for £29.99

Being an amazon product of course its Alexa compatible and since Now stopped their Roku partnership and no longer offer an 'official' box or stick... the Amazon one seems the de facto choice for Now and is 'unofficially' at least the preferred option.

Also, being amazon... buy it.. try it... and send it back if you aren't happy.

[RoyB]

@Anonymous User 

The latest Chromecast does have a remote.

But why the emphasis on voice control? We have Alexa, Nests, a Firecube with a voice remote, and it’s a crapshoot if any of the commands, some of which seem to need to be excessively long, work as intended. And I speak RP, and my wife is a GPO-trained telephonist. (She is understood slightly better than me, admittedly).

We get on best with an LG Magic Remote, which changes its personality according to the device you are addressing, so we can seamlessly start the Roku Stick plugged into our LG TV, and use it via the Magic Remote, including voice on that remote.

We still use an Echo Show and some Nest devices, and they make very useful timers, ‘browsers’, radios/streamers and Philips Hue light controllers, but if they act properly on two out of every three commands that’s a good result.

And if they mishear, then they don’t go anywhere too strange on those devices, but if they mishear a command in Prime Video, hoo boy, they take a good deal of rescuing to get back where you were.

@nst 

The Firestick/Alexa can get you to Now, but can it get you into Now?

And/or if it can, or if you get yourself into Now, can it control anything by voice when you are in there?

And I've dug out a Firestick to try this, but I can’t find the Now app it’s supposed to have these days. Or is it only the later generations that can have this?