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> Buy $299 or something that has artificial stupidity like Siri? Well, in fairness, it’s designed first as a music device, the Siri seems like almost an aftert

> Buy $299 or something that has artificial stupidity like Siri? Well, in fairness, it’s designed first as a music device, the Siri seems like almost an afterthought. That said, Spend $299 on a wireless speaker where the stereo pairing often fails, has random Wi-Fi connection issues (that no other Apple device has), and is otherwise hindered by issues? Nah, fooled me on the first gen, fooled me again on the HomePod minis, think I’ll pass this time.

perardi 4y ago
That what confuses me about the market fit here. It’s not an amazing voice assistant. It’s OK as a wireless speaker, but Sonos is almost assuredly better, and similar aesthetics and ease of use. So this is targeting…uh?
- IOT_Apprentice 4y ago
  It is targeting Apple customers, who use the ecosystem.
- astrange 4y ago
  HomePods sound better than Sonos One. (But also cost more.) https://www.rtings.com/speaker/tools/compare/apple-homepod-vs-sonos-one-gen-2/1719/7232 https://www.rtings.com/speaker/tools/compare/apple-homepod-v...
  - secabeen 4y ago
    Yeah, the equivalent Sonos product was the 3, but it's EOL and there is currently a hole in the Sonos line there. Not sure if they'll bring something back, maybe now that Apple has Homepod 2 they will, or the medium-sized bi-directional speaker we saw go through the FCC last month.
dkonofalski 4y ago
I used to have Wi-Fi connection issues that magically went away when I swapped my Linksys Velop network for an eero Pro system. HomeKit works every time now, there are never any unresponsive devices, and all my HomePods work great. I'm not sure this is a HomePod issue based on how immediately the router switch helped.
- jsjohnst 4y ago
  It’s not an AP related issue in my case and AirPlay as well as all other Bonjour / mDNS based things work great. It’s something specifically broken with HomePod stereo pairs that’s a known issue to the team (details of which my source won’t share).
philjohn 4y ago
This is why I still run all my Sonos on Sonosnet (lucky to live in a brick walled detached house, so 2.4 GHz noisy channels aren't a show-stopper). Never had any sync or pairing issues.
72deluxe 4y ago
I avoided all this smart speaker stuff by going for a Marshall Acton II in the kitchen (music via Bluetooth). My wife uses Amazon or Apple music and I use Subtracks on Android to play to it. I run a Pi4 running a Navidrome instance after spending a long time ripping all my thousands of CDs. The Pi goes via a USB audio interface (better than the audio output on the Pi) and an EQ (Behringer DCX2496) to a set of Yamaha HS8s. I am pretty sure that works out cheaper than buying a pair of Apple speakers. You can use Mopidy to get it to play audio on the Pi over the speakers (as in, use Mopidy mobile to tell the Pi to play from its local library of mp3s, out to its connected speakers). I use this for playing guitar along to songs without having to look at a computer screen. Alternatively the Pi also acts as an Airplay receiver so you can play from your iPhone to it, either from your Apple/Amazon music subscription or via a Sonic API compatible app. From Windows you can pipe your audio remotely to it using palink to stream your local audio to the Pi (it runs a pulseaudio player via SSH if I recall correctly). I actually use that to run Studio One on a PC in a room upstairs but sit on a Linux laptop in the sunshine, RDPing to the PC but listening to the audio over palink (better quality audio than RDP). Adding a Wireguard server to the Pi (and pihole) and putting the VPN on my phone and I can stream my music whilst out and about and also get all adverts/home dialling blocked. I also gave my brother VPN access but to the specific IP instead of routing all traffic over it so he can enjoy my music too. Best of all worlds and no vendor lock-in.

perardi 4y ago

That what confuses me about the market fit here. It’s not an amazing voice assistant. It’s OK as a wireless speaker, but Sonos is almost assuredly better, and similar aesthetics and ease of use. So this is targeting…uh?

IOT_Apprentice 4y ago
It is targeting Apple customers, who use the ecosystem.
astrange 4y ago
HomePods sound better than Sonos One. (But also cost more.) https://www.rtings.com/speaker/tools/compare/apple-homepod-vs-sonos-one-gen-2/1719/7232 https://www.rtings.com/speaker/tools/compare/apple-homepod-v...
- secabeen 4y ago
  Yeah, the equivalent Sonos product was the 3, but it's EOL and there is currently a hole in the Sonos line there. Not sure if they'll bring something back, maybe now that Apple has Homepod 2 they will, or the medium-sized bi-directional speaker we saw go through the FCC last month.

dkonofalski 4y ago

I used to have Wi-Fi connection issues that magically went away when I swapped my Linksys Velop network for an eero Pro system. HomeKit works every time now, there are never any unresponsive devices, and all my HomePods work great. I'm not sure this is a HomePod issue based on how immediately the router switch helped.

jsjohnst 4y ago
It’s not an AP related issue in my case and AirPlay as well as all other Bonjour / mDNS based things work great. It’s something specifically broken with HomePod stereo pairs that’s a known issue to the team (details of which my source won’t share).

philjohn 4y ago

This is why I still run all my Sonos on Sonosnet (lucky to live in a brick walled detached house, so 2.4 GHz noisy channels aren't a show-stopper). Never had any sync or pairing issues.

72deluxe 4y ago

I avoided all this smart speaker stuff by going for a Marshall Acton II in the kitchen (music via Bluetooth). My wife uses Amazon or Apple music and I use Subtracks on Android to play to it. I run a Pi4 running a Navidrome instance after spending a long time ripping all my thousands of CDs. The Pi goes via a USB audio interface (better than the audio output on the Pi) and an EQ (Behringer DCX2496) to a set of Yamaha HS8s. I am pretty sure that works out cheaper than buying a pair of Apple speakers. You can use Mopidy to get it to play audio on the Pi over the speakers (as in, use Mopidy mobile to tell the Pi to play from its local library of mp3s, out to its connected speakers). I use this for playing guitar along to songs without having to look at a computer screen. Alternatively the Pi also acts as an Airplay receiver so you can play from your iPhone to it, either from your Apple/Amazon music subscription or via a Sonic API compatible app. From Windows you can pipe your audio remotely to it using palink to stream your local audio to the Pi (it runs a pulseaudio player via SSH if I recall correctly). I actually use that to run Studio One on a PC in a room upstairs but sit on a Linux laptop in the sunshine, RDPing to the PC but listening to the audio over palink (better quality audio than RDP). Adding a Wireguard server to the Pi (and pihole) and putting the VPN on my phone and I can stream my music whilst out and about and also get all adverts/home dialling blocked. I also gave my brother VPN access but to the specific IP instead of routing all traffic over it so he can enjoy my music too. Best of all worlds and no vendor lock-in.