A kitchen smart speaker out to beat our Google Home Max. The Max nails the countertop form factor and gets plenty loud, but fakes its bass with DSP that overdrives tiny woofers and leans on harmonic tricks to fool the ear — and it all collapses once you push the volume.

Building a sub for my vintage B&W DM4s reminded me there's a whole universe of sound below 70 Hz I'd been missing — so I turned a critical ear on the kitchen. My answer: a similar shallow countertop enclosure (36×22×18 cm vs the Max's 30×20×16), genuinely balanced low end at real volume with minimal DSP smoke-and-mirrors, a sensible build cost, and Google Assistant still on board. Build underway — will report back.