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Apple

HomePod With Screen 'Most Significant New Apple Product' of 2025, Says Gurman 72

Posted by BeauHD from the tough-sell dept.
In his latest Power On! newsletter, Apple analyst Mark Gurman called the company's new smart device "Apple's most significant release of the year because it's the first step toward a bigger role in the smart home." The device in question is rumored to be a new smart hub that could look like a HomePod with a seven-inch screen. Digital Trends reports: Gurman calls the new smart device a "smaller and cheaper iPad that lets users control appliances, conduct FaceTime chats and handle other tasks." It doesn't sound like the new hub will stand alone, though; Gurman goes on to say that it "should be followed by a higher-end version in a few years." That version should be able to pan and tilt to keep users in-frame during video calls, or just to keep the display visible as someone moves around the home.

[...] Other details are still known, like whether the device will use an original operating system. The overall plan is to make the new smart device the center of an Apple-based smart home and open the doors to a more conversational Siri.

HomePod With Screen 'Most Significant New Apple Product' of 2025, Says Gurman More | Reply

HomePod With Screen 'Most Significant New Apple Product' of 2025, Says Gurman

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  • lets users control appliances, Why ? Nope ! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by bsdetector101 ( 6345122 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2025 @05:45AM (#65124427)
    Sorry, BUT I only buy "dumb" appliances" ! They don't need to be connected to the internet to do their job. Next thing you know, you will need a monthly subscription to use them. Use no use for this HomePod.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by dfghjk ( 711126 )

      You sound really informed on Apple Home!

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by e3m4n ( 947977 )

      Did you ever read Ubik by Philip K Dick? At one point, the guy gets trapped in his own apartment because he didn’t have coins to feed the door so that it would open.

    • Good for you that you don't have smart appliances. Now what does that have to do with not having a use for the HomePod? It's almost like you didn't read or bother to understand what this device is, does, or can do for you and simply shut off your brain because you read the words smart appliance.

      Don't do that. Use that mushy grey matter between your ears.

      • Good for you G. I'm glad you showed up with your "I accept my overlords" speech again. I'll be honest, I think you often make good points, and we need to have varied viewpoints otherwise we are just an echo chamber. BUT. This is typical Apple "Announcement" garbage. Nothing to see here.

        "Smart" appliances are just to monitor you at this point. Most of the time, these things are harder to use than any percieved value they bring, so enjoy working for The Man.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AvitarX ( 172628 )

      Good for you.

      I like being able to control my lights from what's essentially my living room desk clock, and also add switched where I see fit.

      I also like that I can check and adjust the thermostat on same said couch or my bedroom.

      I also find it far easier to wake up with the fake sunrise, and turn off and control my TV without having to find the remote.

      These aren't like "oh wow, my life is magically better" things, but they do make each and every day a little bit better (waking up easier, even in the winter

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dgatwood ( 11270 )

        These are indeed all useful things, but I can do pretty much all of that stuff from my phone without having an always-listening glorified speaker. What I don't get is what benefit you get from having a device that probably isn't in whatever room you're in anyway when you probably have your phone right there. :-)

        And most of the time, I don't want to control appliances anyway—just monitor them and alert me if something goes horribly wrong.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by AvitarX ( 172628 )

          "hey Google, where's my phone" is probably my most uttered voice command.

          But aside from finding my actual phone you're correct. My lights (the most quality of life part of my smart home) don't even require an internet connection.

    • Ah, the unix philosophy - do one thing and do it well. I agree with this for home appliances. I still use in-wall timers for some lighting but other than that I simply don't want the complexity, expense, and questionable reliability of having everything inter-connected. Note: I didn't even mention security.
  • Nothing actually new, just double dipping iPad users.

  • Innovation (Score:4, Insightful)

    by rlwinm ( 6158720 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2025 @06:26AM (#65124453)
    Apple has not innovated in a long time. They have been coasting for the past decade or on being a fashion item rather than a technology company.
    • The chips the their Mac Pros are quite the innovation. Starting with the M1 line a few years back.

      • The chips the their Mac Pros are quite the innovation. Starting with the M1 line a few years back.

        Nope. They are evolution - they are only the continuance of an existing trend. Apple did not invent the performant ARM SOC. They are only a little ahead of other similar ARM SOCs. They are also still well behind amd64 in performance, and only a little ahead in efficiency. Compare to AMD's latest mobile processors.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by cusco ( 717999 )

      Apple's main innovations throughout their history have always been in marketing. Gotta hand it to them, they've managed to convince a huge amount of people that the best computer is one with crippled hardware, an operating system unable to run 90% of the programs out there, and which costs three times the price of a far more capable machine.

  • End times (Score:3)

    by bleedingobvious ( 6265230 ) on Tuesday January 28, 2025 @07:05AM (#65124483)

    Apple analyst

    If this is a factual job description, the species is dooooooomed.

    Grief.

  • After continuous unmitigated disaster that is IoT, there are still people out there that say "we want more of that in our lives"?
    • IMO this is just evidence of a lack of agility in Apple. This kind of thing went sour over the past three years, but the product was already in the works. Some manager gave in to the sunk cost fallacy and let it go to market. Meanwhile an overly risk-averse management team fails to innovate for the twelveth year in a row, justifying their paychecks not by whether they've taken good risks but by showing they haven't "wasted" the stockholders money.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by TWX ( 665546 )

      After continuous unmitigated disaster that is IoT, there are still people out there that say "we want more of that in our lives"?

      I've worked with supporting commercial-grade embedded systems that would now fall under the 'IoT' banner now, predominantly things like HVAC controls and other energy management stuff.

      I categorically would not use something from Apple in my house, simply because my appliances are on a much longer lifecycle than anything Apple produces or supports. I'm not going to put in a system that Apple might provide all of five years of support and updates for to interface with systems that have a reasonable service-l

      • After continuous unmitigated disaster that is IoT, there are still people out there that say "we want more of that in our lives"?

        I've worked with supporting commercial-grade embedded systems that would now fall under the 'IoT' banner now, predominantly things like HVAC controls and other energy management stuff.

        I categorically would not use something from Apple in my house, simply because my appliances are on a much longer lifecycle than anything Apple produces or supports. I'm not going to put in a system that Apple might provide all of five years of support and updates for to interface with systems that have a reasonable service-life of 20 years.

        It's already problematic enough with many commercial-grade control systems falling behind the curve on things like WiFi protocol, don't get me started on the number of new products that are still only 802.11b/g/n compatible, but at least most of those devices also still support twisted-pair Ethernet. I would be astounded if Apple or Android products intended as embedded IoT systems even do Ethernet anymore.

        Compared with the Lifespan of an Enterprise-Level Building Control Protocol/Ecosystem, something like Echelon's LON, Apple's Foundational commitment and contributions to the fledgling Matter Protocol and Thread Radio MESH, bodes well for this new Consumer HA Standard. With over 697 Industry Commitments, and new, Cross-Platform-Compatible Peripherals being added every day, take it from someone who's been playing with this since the late 1970s, Matter has the feel of a Standard with some Staying-Power. Closer

  • ment is that voice control is toast. Screens are actually a lot more efficient and easier to use than the vagueness of speech.
    • As described it is just a Google Nest Hub, which does also use voice controls. I doubt they'll be able to get a lot of market penetration, anyone interested in a device like this has had many black friday sales to acquire a Google or Amazon equivalent to be ... whelmed by, and there's not much room for improvement not on the appliance side of the interactions.

    • The most significant part of this announcement is THERE IS NO ANNOUNCEMENT. This is an unsourced rumor padded out to article length.

      • Thank you very much. I used to make fun of Apple being "announcements all the way down"... but wtf? Now we're breathing the fumes of rumours only?
        Also, thank you for not making me read the "article" :-)

    • I'll remember that the next time my hands are covered in something I'm cooking and the only way to control the device is the 7" touchscreen I'm about to cover in raw meat.

      There are legit reasons for voice control, they just aren't nearly as wide as the industry thinks they should be.

  • If that's the most significant, I'd hate to see the least significant.

  • Get OSX server back, throw it on the M4 mini.
    Use this as a media hub, "Home" hub,Time machine backups, etc etc etc etc.
    Get your iPods , ATVs etc so they can form a wireless mesh system
    Get "home" to directly support zigbee

    And cut the "thin crap", I have bought based on utility etc, NEVER on how thin a device is. I want battery life.

  • I can't imagine buying this even as an Apple household until siri 'works'. Siri is by a good margin, the most irritating 'smart' home assistant.

    I'm perceiving Apple in decline. The 'just works' isn't just working, Siri feels like a 10 year out of date tool, and new products aren't really solving things.

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