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The Google Home Mini isn't exactly a massive departure or technological marvel. What it is, however, could be game-changing for Google Assistant and Google's foray into smart speakers. This is based on one thing and one thing alone: price. At $49, does the Google Home Mini measure up? Here's our first impressions after a couple days.
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[Music]
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hey folks Robbie Payne with chrome
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unboxed and today we're gonna give some
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first impressions of our first few days
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spent with the Google home mini now I've
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had the Google home the regular sized
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version at home since it actually came
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out and so bringing this one back from
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the Google event and actually plugging
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it in and using it at the house I wanted
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to give you a few first impressions to
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let you know if you're deciding on
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buying one of these devices which one
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might be a better fit for you so first
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off one of the things you can tell about
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the Google home Mini is obviously it's
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much smaller and additionally it's a lot
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cheaper as well so $129 is what the
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Google home comes in and $49 is what the
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Google home Mini comes in so you can
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probably do the math pretty quickly and
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see you can get two and a half Google
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home minis for the price of one and so
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what that would allow you to do is
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actually have more Google homes
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throughout your home and take advantage
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of some of the other things that Google
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home can do there are a couple drawbacks
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though and probably need to talk about
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those things because with that price cut
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comes a few feature cuts as well
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now what Google did here in what's
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really kind of cool is that they created
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a specific fabric for this device that
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allows you to see the LEDs through the
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top it also allows you to interact with
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it on a touch basis and so some of those
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cool things that Google home did this
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device can do also and so you don't
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really lose out anything there but its
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diminutive size means that the speakers
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inside of it are actually smaller and
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while Google stood on stage and touted
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the excellent sound quality of it and
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don't get me wrong it's it's loud and
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you can hear it just fine it's not going
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to replace a dedicated speaker in your
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home it's loud enough to hear the
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commands and interact with but playing
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music over it is a dicey affair
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especially when compared with the Google
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home the regular version of the Google
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home the Google home doesn't have the
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most pristine sound quality but it can
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suffice as a standalone speaker and has
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pretty rich tones to it if not for a
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little bit of a muddled high-end this
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device has the mini has a great high-end
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but the
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literally is no base response on it
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whatsoever so if you're listening to
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most music you're gonna miss out on
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quite a bit of the experience there now
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that being said because it works with
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chromecast Audio you can actually pair
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this thing up into an audio group and be
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playing through multiple speakers at
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once and enhance the sound overall but
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by itself do know that if you're buying
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this for a speaker and you're wanting to
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actually listen to music on it it's not
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going to be the best experience ever but
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pushing that aside you really don't lose
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out on any of the features that Google
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home offers so you can tap the top of it
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in order to play in Paul's music you can
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speak to it obviously with your voice to
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wake it up it has LEDs on the top that
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let you know when you're communicating
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with it when it's thinking and all those
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kind of things though they don't spin
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around in a circle in the cool way that
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the Google home does but it's enough to
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let you know that the thing is thinking
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and it's you're interacting with it
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additionally you can tap on the left or
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right side to adjust your volume and so
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there's a ton of interaction that you
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get just like you would get with the
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standard Google home and that's pretty
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cool especially when it comes in at such
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a lower cost overall in general the
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cloth top works as Google I said it does
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it's very easy to see the LEDs through
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the speaker comes through it nice and
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loud and it's attractive and it's kind
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of unassuming if you want an idea of how
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large it is Google advertised this as
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well even at the event they were handing
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out Donuts because the thing is about
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the size of a doughnut so a general
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doughnut if you think about it in your
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hand that would be the size of this
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device and so it takes up a lot less
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real estate on your countertop than the
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original Google home does and so for a
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lot of people that's going to be a win
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all in itself it does have the kind of
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rubber feet on the bottom so it's not
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going to slide around and the port on
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the back that actually holds the charger
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is a micro USB and though some people
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have kind of given them a hard time for
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that I don't really see it being that
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big of a deal because in general you're
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gonna plug this thing in and it's gonna
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sit there the Google home has its own
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proprietary power jack so overall though
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the device is very simple very elegant
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looking and would basically blend into
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most two cores in any home and that
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again is saying something over the
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original google home which a lot of
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people compare to a Glade air freshener
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or something like that
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it wasn't ugly and isn't ugly but it
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doesn't blend into your decor quite as
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easily as this device will the one
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you're seeing here is in the gray it
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also comes in a dark charcoal almost a
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black color for the top piece and then
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also a coral kind of a reddish orange
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coral color as well so there'll be
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different colors it's not a swappable
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top like the bottom is on the Google
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home but you can kind of purchase one
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that might go better with your personal
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decor generally the device is going to
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become available on the 19th of October
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along with most of the other products
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that Google unveiled and again it's
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gonna be $49 and really to get into a
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device that's going to do all that this
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thing does all that the Google home at
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129 dollars does is pretty much a steal
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I would say most people that haven't
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gotten into a smart speaker setup yet
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and been holding out maybe they wanted
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Google home over Alexa or something like
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that maybe you've been holding out
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waiting for a good deal well the deal
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doesn't get much better than this thing
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and like I said if you're gonna spend
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even roughly around $100 for the
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original Google home you could have a
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couple of these and have them paired up
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and you can use them as alarm clocks and
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all sorts of things throughout your home
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and they can be set up as audio groups
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and some of the new things that Google
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is talking about with broadcast you can
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be able to send messages to the entire
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household and set alarms and all those
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kind of things because it to be honest
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even as you're watching this if you're
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three or four weeks out from the time
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that we film this likely Google home is
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going to have all sorts of new skills
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that it can do that it can't do right
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now and so it's it's worthwhile to keep
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note that this device will be able to do
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all the things that Google home can do
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so it's not some sort of gimped version
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of it it's full-on Google home full-on
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google assistant it's just the speaker's
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not quite as good and you can't swap out
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the basis
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but other than that so far so good it's
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been really great in our home and we
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look forward to spending a little bit
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more time and maybe giving you guys a
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full-on review as some time goes by and
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we can say definitively this is a great
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device to have in your home but I can
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say right now after a few days of using
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I think most of you will be happy if
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you're considering Google home as your
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smart speaker of choice before we wrap
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up I do want to mention the t-shirt that
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I'm wearing right now we had
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few of these printed and we wanted to
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get y'all's feedback and we wanted to
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see if this is something that you all
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would like him would be interested in
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and so you can hit us up in the comments
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hit us up on on the website additionally
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we are actually going to put up a forum
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on the site in the coming days where you
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can actually pre-order and we need to
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get to a certain number of pre-orders
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obviously before we go printing a shirt
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and so we may do something like just
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taking in names of people to say yeah I
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would like a shirt and if we can get to
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100 or so we'll go ahead and get a run
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of these things printed and actually put
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them up for sale so like I said hit us
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up in the comments hit us up on social
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media or on the website and let us know
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if you'd be interested in getting a
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shirt like this they're really high
7:19
quality and and we're kind of proud of
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them they turned out really good so I'll
7:23
let us know on that guys if you liked
7:24
this video give it a thumbs up hit the
7:26
subscribe button below and until next
7:28
time we'll see
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[Music]
#Audio Equipment
#Product Reviews & Price Comparisons
#Home Automation