2023 HomePod Coming Soon to Apple's Refurbished Store for $249

[HobeSoundDarryl]

I was replying to OP who is trying to use it with their AppleTV for visual entertainment. Their gen 1 HP was crackling and they were thinking about replacing it presumably for the same use. You decided to jump in and challenge my suggestion to at least consider other speakers for that purpose. There's nothing at all wrong with consumers considering alternatives to anything.

Many other compact standalone devices such as the Sonos line can replicate the "decent sound", be quickly placed in any room and play pretty much unlimited amounts of music in any genre via voice command... including from many sources OUTSIDE of the walled garden. They can go on vacation with us just as easily and connect elsewhere just as easily. All of our Apple Music wants/needs work on those just as easily too, as does Airplay. We already have ALL of the HP smarts built into the other Apple tech we commonly carry with us. "Hey Siri, play blues" can be heard by iDevices, AppleTV and Mac... which can then play those blues on all kinds of speakers beyond only HPs.

HPs are NOT the only option in town- just Apple's only option. Chum or not, overblown or not, OPs post describes an apparently-defective HP after only up to about 4 years that has him thinking about replacing it. Whether that's rare or not (and it's not- do searches for others sharing similar problems and you can find plenty), that's OPs problem with HP.

My advice is the same as it would be with anything that should have MANY years of useful life but falls short: consider shopping alternative sources to perhaps find a better option that will deliver on the promise of MANY years of useful life. Buying the same again may yield the same issue again. There's plenty of this kind of fish in the sea.

 

[burgman]

We? Unless you have a mouse in your pocket, you might consider using "I" instead.

One of the eternal questions, a royal or editorial we. If the latter, thanks we do appreciate him speaking for us😂

 

[burgman]

I couldn't agree more! Adding surround sound functionality to the new HomePods when paired with Apple TV would be so amazing. I'm happy with my OG HomePods too, but this would be a dream come true. I think that the original HomePods are still fantastic speakers and provide great sound quality, but the surround sound functionality would give a whole new level of immersion. Hopefully, Apple will continue to innovate and provide more ways for us to enjoy our media with top-tier sound quality.

Define surround sound please, since Spatial Audio with Dolby Atmos for music and video is supported.

 

[burgman]

Hundreds of alternative speaker choices.

Our iDevices or AppleTV can handle all of the "smarts" stuff within HPs, whether near the speakers or far from them.

All Sonos speakers will allow a person to command their iDevice to play their music on them. There's a dozen speakers from that one source. I'm not telling the Sonos speakers to play something (though I could as they can work with their own voice command, Alexa and Google too), I'm telling my iDevice (or Mac) Siri and it does it just like it works with HPs. I do this all the time for the speakers I own I consider most like HomePod. They can also work just as well with countless other sources of audio because they are much more open.

However, in my main entertainment area, I have (not Sonos) dumb speakers- no smarts at all (and thus no smarts to be made obsolete in a few years). Once again, I can tell my iDevices or Mac to play anything I want on them and it will wake the Receiver that powers those (in seconds too) and play ANYTHING- be that Apple Music, my own CD collection ripped into the Apple Music app on my Mac, my own custom playlists, anything I want to stream (FROM ANY SOURCE), etc. It's as easy as HPs. The action is the same EXCEPT I'm using the "Hey Siri" smarts(?) always with me.

My best speakers and the Sonos line up are also Airplay 2 compatible, so anything I want to Airplay to HPs, I can airplay to those too. No difference.

My entertainment system is full surround- real surround- not limited to stereo. I'm not waiting & hoping Apple will someday develop some support for surround sound, I already have it and have since roughly 199X because that capability has been around for well over 20+ years. Unfortunately HPs just don't support it... nor are there ANY rumors that Apple might be working towards that. Instead of stereo MAX, I have a dedicated center channel speaker for much clearer voices of whatever I'm watching. Instead of HPs impressive bass, I have a dedicated Subwoofer which can- if desired- rattle the walls and windows should I desire "more bass" than HPs can generate. If the movie I'm watching wants to cast the illusion of sounds behind me, sounds are actually coming from BEHIND me. And this speaker setup NEVER spontaneously disconnects from my AppleTV.

Because the receiver can take inputs from anything, I'm not limited to only Apple "walled garden" options, so I can also use the same system with cable/satt, blu ray, game boxes, free over the air television, camcorder video, etc. If someone comes over with video they've shot on something that can't Airplay and they want to "hook in" and show it to me, it hooks in and we can watch AND listen to whatever they've shot IMMEDIATELY... as opposed to simply NOT being able to watch & listen because HPs offer no way unless a link can be made in narrow, Apple-chosen ways. These speakers will play ANYTHING vs. only what I'm able to feed it with AppleTV, iDevice or Mac and/or airplay. No walled garden at all, though everything inside the Wall plays just fine on them too.

All that offered, I think HPs sound fantastic and if one can:

• happily live within the very tight constraints of walled garden and
• rationalize replacing them more often than the 10-20+ years good speakers should last and
• be satisfied with the maximum of stereo-only audio playback even for visual entertainment...

...they are terrific. I can easily see applications for them and at least consider them whenever I add speakers to various rooms of my own home. Price for them is attractive vs. a full surround setup with receiver but that's stereo at best vs. full surround sound and a "works with anything" receiver.

For me though (a generally Apple-everything guy) they are much too locked down, much too limited in speaker application and I want more value for my money than say- buying gen 1 and not even being able to stereo sync it with gen 2 barely 4 or so years later. No AUX in locks out all kinds of speaker uses should the smarts be made obsolete.

OP says his gen 1 is crackling after only a few years. I expect my speakers to still sound as good as they do now for at least 10 and probably 20 years- no recurring, replacement purchases required. The other Apple tech I already replace regularly will bring every bit of the same "smarts" as that advances.

Short version, you don’t like them 😂

 

[Allen_Wentz]

Yes, every product in the refurb store is a product that flopped.

Pure nonsense. I have purchased good-selling mainstream products refurbished.

 

[Allen_Wentz]

I prefer Amazon devices

Lots of folks do. Mostly those who care little about sound quality.

 

[Allen_Wentz]

I was replying to OP who is trying to use it with their AppleTV for visual entertainment. Their gen 1 HP was crackling and they were thinking about replacing it presumably for the same use. You decided to jump in and challenge my suggestion to at least consider other speakers for that purpose. There's nothing at all wrong with consumers considering alternatives to anything.

Many other compact standalone devices such as the Sonos line can replicate the "decent sound", be quickly placed in any room and play pretty much unlimited amounts of music in any genre via voice command... including from many sources OUTSIDE of the walled garden. They can go on vacation with us just as easily and connect elsewhere just as easily. All of our Apple Music wants/needs work on those just as easily too, as does Airplay. We already have ALL of the HP smarts built into the other Apple tech we commonly carry with us. "Hey Siri, play blues" can be heard by iDevices, AppleTV and Mac... which can then play those blues on all kinds of speakers beyond only HPs.

HPs are NOT the only option in town- just Apple's only option. Chum or not, overblown or not, OPs post describes an apparently-defective HP after only up to about 4 years that has him thinking about replacing it. Whether that's rare or not (and it's not- do searches for others sharing similar problems and you can find plenty), that's OPs problem with HP.

My advice is the same as it would be with anything that should have e a pair intoMANY years of useful life but falls short: consider shopping alternative sources to perhaps find a better option that will deliver on the promise of MANY years of useful life. Buying the same again may yield the same issue again. There's plenty of this kind of fish in the sea.

Actually, the HP's ability to auto-balance a pair into an acoustically difficult small-medium sized space is unique. Your advice: "There's plenty of this kind of fish in the sea" is poorly informed.

 

[ignatius345]

This brings the cost for a pair down to $500, which is a nice discount. I recently added a second HomePod to my setup and it's a pretty huge difference for both sound quality and volume. We use them as the output for Apple TV and generally for music, so we're getting quite a bit of mileage out of them.

 

[ignatius345]

Either they've had a massive amount of returns or there have been quality issues resulting in a glut of warranty replacements.

Yeah that must be it. Just like all the other products they sell refurbished

 

[ignatius345]

The products in the refurb store are customer returned items or products that failed quality check and could not be sold as new.

You have absolutely no idea what you're talking about. But don't let that stop you!

 

[GMShadow]

Pure nonsense. I have purchased good-selling mainstream products refurbished.

I think you missed the sarcasm in my reply there.

 

[JapanApple]

Lots of folks do. Mostly those who care little about sound quality.

Sarcasm. fit needs of users without defects and breakdowns if haven’t used you understand

 

[ignatius345]

A speaker is a bit of tech that can easily last 10+ years. Many people could chime in saying their good speakers are 20+ years old. 10 to 20 is "normal" life for good speakers.

I agree, but I'm using a pair of HomePods anyway. For a long time I did wireless streaming by connecting an Apple TV to my receiver and driving a set of bookshelf speakers. It was fine, and I'm sure the speakers (like the ancient Bose 301s I used to have) would have lasted decades. But in the end I streamlined everything and have just two of these HomePods plugged into one power strip, and nothing else. And frankly at the volume I can actually listen to music most of the time, it's absolutely great.

So yeah, ideally it's a good old amp + passive speaker setup, but what I'm doing skips all the wires and jibes a lot more with the reality of things: I'm streaming all my music. I hate it in principal but I love it in practice ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[iSayuSay]

Yes, every product in the refurb store is a product that flopped.

Have you ever found the newest, shiniest iPhone model landed in refurb only after a month or two? Nope...

Not every refurb is a flop, but the new HomePod is barely 2 months old and already landed in the refurb? Meaning it has a high return rate, and people don't want it for some reason.

Have you ever found the newest iPhone model landed in refurb only after a month or two? Nope...

 

[GMShadow]

Have you ever found the newest, shiniest iPhone model landed in refurb only after a month or two? Nope...

Not every refurb is a flop, but the new HomePod is barely 2 months old and already landed in the refurb? Meaning it has a high return rate, and people don't want it for some reason.

Have you ever found the newest iPhone model landed in refurb only after a month or two? Nope...

Because they don't put iPhone refurbs in the store until the new model drops. That's established procedure.

 

[AL2TEACH]

HomePod failures are overblown.

My original pair are still dandy. HomePods are not the problem, Apple's software for them is the problem.

 

[pp_amorim]

Won't spend a dime on that unless they improve Siri.

 

[anselpela]

Rubbish. The Era 300 (which you’re referring to) costs £449 compared to the £299 HomePod.
Furthermore what extra features are you alluding to? Like Siri or not, at least the Homepod works with HomeKit.

The Sonos One beats the crap out of HomePod for $200, and all its missing is Siri.

 

[DevNull0]

We can safely say it flopped like the previous model. Unsurprisingly.

Even the $250 price is way too high. For a lot less, you can get a nice pair of bookshelf speakers and an amp with bluetooth. That setup will be a major step up in sound quality and connectivity from homepod.

And I get that not everyone wants a bookshelf setup, the point is that if that costs a fraction of the price of homepod, then homepod is grossly overpriced for a single miniature powered speaker with a little apple software.

 

[Solver]

Looking forward to the $199 Black Friday sale at Best Buy, again.

 

[ghanwani]

My gen 1 Siri is behaving weirder by the day.

 

[ghanwani]

Yup. Just as predicted, it’s on track to being discontinued by Fall.

That would be the clearance store, not refurbed.

 

[RyanXM]

Did they fix the capacitor thing or whatever it was that made the first one more prone to fail, or is that the same?

Yes. This issue was the result of a bad batch of capacitors that Apple never resolved for the end user. It has since been resolved (at least currently) according to the teardown performed by Nic's Fix on YouTube.

 

[RyanXM]

Has anyone seen this come in stock yet?

 

[ghanwani]

By the way, is the furniture staining with the white one still a problem? Is it a one off problem or do you have to be wary of it throughout ownership? If the latter it means you’d want to place it on a mat.