Apple Announces Revamped Full-Size HomePod Two Years After Discontinuing Original (theverge.com) 35
Apple has announced a new $299 HomePod smart speaker with a similar form factor to the original HomePod released in 2018. From a report: It will be sold alongside the HomePod Mini, the smaller version of the speaker introduced in 2020, and features support for the new smart home standard Matter, allowing it to control compatible accessories. The new HomePod is available to order starting today, and will begin shipping February 3rd. The original HomePod had an unusually rocky lifespan for an Apple product. Originally announced in 2017 with a December ship date, the $349 smart speaker was subsequently delayed to February 2018. When it was eventually released, the HomePod's voice assistant Siri fared poorly against Alexa and Google Assistant, and reviewers criticized how locked into Apple's ecosystem the smart speaker was. Despite getting a $50 price cut in 2019, the HomePod was eventually discontinued in 2021.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Have you tried drinking from the firehose recently? It's so full of crap that perhaps the scraps of Apple start to seem quite good.
Re: (Score:2)
Can Slashdot cover Apple stories just a little more sanely?
Either msmash is trying to meet a quota, or Apple paid for slashvertisement. Either way, the answer to your question is no.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I agree that the posts yesterday should've been condensed, given that they were made as part of the same non-announcement by Apple and were basically about the same computer in two different form factors. The news about the new HomePod came a day later (i.e. today), however, so it would have been difficult to condense it into the previous post, what with the fact that the information wasn't available at the time.
As for whether or not it's worth mentioning at all, I'd argue that it is. The HomePod is more no
Re: (Score:2)
Sony got a slashdot article announcing the release of two new Walkman models earlier this week. And, really, ARE they still a "major computer manufacturer?" Yeah, I know (now) that Viao laptops are still a thing. But I had to google to confirm that. And I don't even remember when the last time was that I actually saw a Viao in person.
But yeah... a consolidated: "This is what Apple just released." article would be preferable to the piecemeal way the editors usually release the news. OTOH, so long as msm
Re: (Score:2)
I can't imagine a Sony smart speaker getting its own announcement here.
If Sony or anyone else produced a smart speaker of value, with features and developments that is actually worthy of being talked about then they absolutely would get talked about here. I mean only the other day we ran a story on a new Sony Walkman, very much something somewhat unique in this modern world of throw every function on a phone.
But as it stands Sony (as well as every company other than Google, Amazon, Apple or Sonos) produce "smart speakers" which are little more than normal bluetooth speakers wi
Only $300 ?! (Score:1, Flamebait)
Only $300 ?
That means Apple fanboys are only playing about $200 for the shiny Apple logo on it.
They won't like that.
I hope Apple are bringing out a $500 stand for it, so the maggots can waste their boss's money on a truly gratuitously overpriced bauble.
Re: (Score:3)
Siri control has taken steps backwards but honestly I'm just talking pure speaker here. They are truly great devices, and the fact the 'smart' stuff got shoved in last minute is obvious.
Re: (Score:2)
Have you heard of the original HomePod?
Not until today!
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
I concur with the other post - I have an original HomePod and a Mini.
The original HomePod sounds incredible. I wish there were a wireless (battery powered) and outdoor edition as I'd put them all over the house and yard were they more compatible with weather and untethered.
Even Apple can't get the smartspeaker right (Score:2)
Usually, Apple is famous for taking existing tech products that are struggling to grab a foothold (like tablets and smartphones) and releasing an improved version that's easier to use.
In this case, though, it seems that their AI isn't any better than what Google and Amazon are offering. Their connected home offerings aren't as robust as Google or Amazon as well.
Re: (Score:1)
Usually, Apple is famous for taking existing tech products [...] and releasing an improved version that's easier to use.
In this case, though, it seems that their AI isn't any better than what Google and Amazon are offering.
That's because this is fundamentally different from those markets where they succeeded, which didn't require any more technology, only better UI. The Macintosh line was a purely graphical computer with no graphics acceleration until the '040 era. Everything before then just had a dumb frame buffer, and a slow one at that. Even in Windows 3.1 days you had "windows accelerators" which had hardware onboard to speed up drawing primitives and text, and which did bitblits for smooth drags. (There was an accelerat
Re: (Score:2)
Don't forget that Apple makes their own processors now, so we're now back to the bad old days of Apple saying that their systems are "Up to twice as fast" as Intel or AMD PC's... in some obscure benchmark that Apple probably optimized the hell out of.
Re: (Score:2)
Apple processors are that fast in some synthetic (third party) benchmarks, and not in others, so I'm inclined to take them at their word, kind of. Their reputation for thermal throttling is well-established.
Re: (Score:2)
AMD even had Apple's SoC listed on one of their slides in their CES keynote because th
Re: (Score:2)
Windows Vista was better than OS X? Are you kidding it’s why I switched and never looked back.
Re: (Score:2)
I mean, Apple's voice assistant was better than what Google and Amazon were offering at the time that it originally launched...in 2010. When he announced Siri, Steve Jobs famously said that they had a four year head start on the competition. His claim proved to be correct. Alexa was the first big competition and it didn't arrive until 2014 (Google Assistant wasn't until 2016), but Apple squandered their head start and went nowhere with the technology in that time. Almost immediately the competition was runn
Spy-Box (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
A spybox, just like Amazon's.
Millions of people spout this nonsense every day. Yet the thousands of expert security researchers and ambulance chasing lawyers have not been able to prove it. It would be a billion dollar pay day for them if this was true. Know why that lawsuit hasn't happened. It's not true.
Re: (Score:1)
Apple is part of PRISM, so it's only safe to assume that every word you speak to your smart speaker is being logged by the feds, just like every phone call that goes through a telco's long distance system, or every email that gets sent through a backbone, or any of the other unconstitutional citizen spying that we know about because we heard about it from whistleblowers — and then the government verified it by going after them.
Re: (Score:3)
It's very easy to check. Talk around your speaker and you'll notice exactly zero bytes of data being transmitted to Apple. Now, says "Hey Siri" and everything immediately after is transmitted on the network. When Siri is done, nothing gets out of the device again.
If zero bytes get transmitted, I fail to see what could possibly be recorded on the server side.
Re: (Score:1)
If zero bytes get transmitted, I fail to see what could possibly be recorded on the server side.
Wow. I mean, seriously, wow. This is just, wow. You're actually pretending like computer systems can't store information for later transmission? Or do you actually believe that? I just can't, like, even with you right now.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not saying it's impossible, I'm saying it doesn't happen with the HomePod. I have a HomePod mini and there is zero transmissions ever unless we use Siri. And then it's a 32kbps (or 24, I don't remember) stream that gets uploaded to the server. Nothing else. Since we never use Siri, it doesn't transmit anything except to the connected device actually playing the music.
Now please tell me how it can record audio and send it to Apple without actually transmitting anything outside of my LAN.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not saying it's impossible, I'm saying it doesn't happen with the HomePod. I have a HomePod mini and there is zero transmissions ever unless we use Siri. And then it's a 32kbps (or 24, I don't remember) stream that gets uploaded to the server. Nothing else.
So you've got the sources, and you've analyzed them?
Now please tell me how it can record audio and send it to Apple without actually transmitting anything outside of my LAN.
It can do recognition on-device and then use headers, side messages, timing, or even steganography to hide data in the audio. And it can be done with OSS tools, they don't even have to write it.
This is why I'm asking if you're new. Apple is well-known to be part of unconstitutional citizen spying programs [techcrunch.com]. All data coming from the homepod is encrypted [apple.com], so you haven't examined its contents. You haven't the first clue about what is being transmitted, you're
I love me some tech, but... (Score:3)
Smart phone perpetually within reach, tracking every move I make. Smart speaker that's never fully off. Smart television tracking everything I watch or even think about watching. Door bell camera logging every person, car, dog and squirrel that comes within a hundred yards of my door (and probably available to the cops with or without my permission). This is my personal version of hell.
If there was any chance of having these things and enjoying even a wispy shred of personal privacy, I might feel differently, but somehow when it comes to amassing and selling a fat dossier on every human being in the developed world, the scumbags always win.
I treasure my old plasma TV, and will mourn its passing. And I have friends who value my land line, which is still the most robust basic communications platform there is.
Overpriced mediocrity. (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Title says it all.
It sounds like you have not heard the original HomePod. Apple has warts, but the sound quality of these things is quite amazing. Bose only competes because they're wireless but they do not sound "better".
Upgrade? (Score:1)
Obligatory (Score:2)
"Company launches/updates product" (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
Sound vs. HomePod Minis? (Score:2)
Last year, I bought a pair of HomePod Minis to replace an aging and increasingly noisy pair of AppleDesign speakers (from 1994; I got my money's worth out of them.) I think they sound great, but they're under my monitor, so up close, and I haven't tried to push the volume very far. To me, though, there's a qualitative difference between spending $200 and spending $600.
I'm looking forward, though, to getting the chance to hear a pair in action.
Re:Sound vs. HomePod Mini (Score:2)
I brought a pair of OG HomePods on Black Friday 2020 and they sound amazing. So much so I brought another pair in the clearance sale a few months later.
At just under 400 for a pair they make a lot of sense, but the case is harder to make at 600 for most people.