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I agree but do you ever notice that some days HomePod just seems almost deaf? I've had it hear me whisper across the room for many months straight and then for just one day, I have to speak loudly right next to HomePod in order for Siri to hear me. Then the next day it's fine again. Sometimes I reset the power on it and that fixes it but it's annoying.

I had the issue once (it was acting up in a bunch of ways) and I unplugged and plugged back in and I haven't had the issue since. They have been really solid for me.
 
Erm, they do thanks. They may not have all the same fancy technology, but they hear me from different rooms when my music is on.
Which models you have because even my brand new dot can’t hear me over a load tv or music playing from itself
 
Too bad it only works with music. I have a lot of iTunes movies. I wish it was possible that getting two of these connected to Apple TV would sound really good but I saw a Youtube video that shows very poor sound.
I have a stereo pair connected to Apple TV and it sounds great.

I can even issue command to Siri to pause and play the movie without reaching for the remote.
 
And yet my iPhone and iPad, when playing audio at lower to medium volume, doesn't respond to "Hey Siri" from a few feet away most of the time and when it does, it starts by transcribing what is being said in the audio! Even raise to speak on my Series 4 Apple Watch has some problems recognizing my voice to initialize Siri when I'm talking into it from a few inches away in a completely silent room. Maybe try fixing that before putting all this fancy tech into this trashcan 2.0 that hardly anyone is buying? All I'm saying is Apple is selling maybe a couple million HomePods per year and hundreds of millions of iPhones, iPads, and Apple Watches combined. Keep your eye on the ball, Apple.
 
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I'd rather use my own speakers, Google Home Minis, and Chromecast Audio. Better sound, integration, and more useful/accurate assistant.
 
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Sounds physically impossible what You say. Only possible when they filter the output of the voice frequencies from the music. Even then how should it hear You from far away when there’s loud music?
But then it is an inferior speaker, all very strange info around HomePod,from You fanboys
Read the article. There are examples at the end that are absolutely impressing. Filtering out the voice giving commands to Siri that is absolutely not detectable in between loud music, and completely removing other voices.
 
Personally I love my HomePods and use them just about everyday to listen to music and many times a day for HomeKit commands. Most people not buying them is fine by me. Grabbed a couple more on Black Friday for nice discounts.

edit: The only real thing I would like is a separate volume option for Siri than music. Hate listening to my music at a decent volume during the day only to have Siri yell at me later "Goodnight enabled". I do like that Amazon has a soft little ding option to acknowledge that she heard and performed the command.
 
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This is great and all but when I'm trying to use "hey siri" with my phone and the homepod takes the command instead, I get pretty pissed.
 



In a new entry in its Machine Learning Journal, Apple has detailed how Siri on the HomePod is designed to work in challenging usage scenarios, such as during loud music playback, when the user is far away from the HomePod, or when there are other active sound sources in a room, such as a TV or household appliances.

homepod-siri.jpg

An overview of the task:To accomplish this, Apple says its audio software engineering and Siri speech teams developed a multichannel signal processing system for the HomePod that uses machine learning algorithms to remove echo and background noise and to separate simultaneous sound sources to eliminate interfering speech.

Apple says the system uses the HomePod's six microphones and is powered continuously by its Apple A8 chip, including when the HomePod is run in its lowest power state to save energy. The multichannel filtering constantly adapts to changing noise conditions and moving talkers, according to the journal entry.

Apple goes on to provide a very technical overview of how the HomePod mitigates echo, reverberation, and noise, which we've put into layman's terms:Echo Cancellation: Since the speakers are close to the microphones on the HomePod, music playback can be significantly louder than a user's "Hey Siri" voice command at the microphone positions, especially when the user is far away from the HomePod. To combat the resulting echo, Siri on HomePod implements a multichannel echo cancellation algorithm.
Reverberation Removal: As the user saying "Hey Siri" moves further away from the HomePod, multiple reflections from the room create reverberation tails that decrease the quality and intelligibility of the voice command. To combat this, Siri on the HomePod continuously monitors the room characteristics and removes the late reverberation while preserving the direct and early reflection components in the microphone signals.
Noise Reduction: Far-field speech is typically contaminated by noise from home appliances, HVAC systems, outdoor sounds entering through windows, and so forth. To combat this, the HomePod uses state-of-the-art speech enhancement methods that create a fixed filter for every utterance.
Apple says it tested the HomePod's multichannel signal processing system in several acoustic conditions, including music and podcast playback at different levels, continuous background noise such as conversation and rain, and noises from household appliances such as a vacuum cleaner, hairdryer, and microwave.

During its testing, Apple varied the locations of the HomePod and its test subjects to cover different use cases. For example, in living room or kitchen environments, the HomePod was placed against the wall and in the middle of the room.

Apple's article concludes with a summary of Siri performance metrics on the HomePod, with graphs showing that Apple's multichannel signal processing system led to improved accuracy and fewer errors. Those interested in learning more can read the full entry on Apple's Machine Learning Journal.

Article Link: Apple Details How HomePod Can Detect 'Hey Siri' From Across a Room, Even With Loud Music Playing
[doublepost=1543865529][/doublepost]Awesome! Too bad they can’t figure out how to include a Siri Sleep Timer! Come on Apple.
 



In a new entry in its Machine Learning Journal, Apple has detailed how Siri on the HomePod is designed to work in challenging usage scenarios, such as during loud music playback, when the user is far away from the HomePod, or when there are other active sound sources in a room, such as a TV or household appliances.

homepod-siri.jpg

An overview of the task:To accomplish this, Apple says its audio software engineering and Siri speech teams developed a multichannel signal processing system for the HomePod that uses machine learning algorithms to remove echo and background noise and to separate simultaneous sound sources to eliminate interfering speech.

Apple says the system uses the HomePod's six microphones and is powered continuously by its Apple A8 chip, including when the HomePod is run in its lowest power state to save energy. The multichannel filtering constantly adapts to changing noise conditions and moving talkers, according to the journal entry.

Apple goes on to provide a very technical overview of how the HomePod mitigates echo, reverberation, and noise, which we've put into layman's terms:Echo Cancellation: Since the speakers are close to the microphones on the HomePod, music playback can be significantly louder than a user's "Hey Siri" voice command at the microphone positions, especially when the user is far away from the HomePod. To combat the resulting echo, Siri on HomePod implements a multichannel echo cancellation algorithm.
Reverberation Removal: As the user saying "Hey Siri" moves further away from the HomePod, multiple reflections from the room create reverberation tails that decrease the quality and intelligibility of the voice command. To combat this, Siri on the HomePod continuously monitors the room characteristics and removes the late reverberation while preserving the direct and early reflection components in the microphone signals.
Noise Reduction: Far-field speech is typically contaminated by noise from home appliances, HVAC systems, outdoor sounds entering through windows, and so forth. To combat this, the HomePod uses state-of-the-art speech enhancement methods that create a fixed filter for every utterance.
Apple says it tested the HomePod's multichannel signal processing system in several acoustic conditions, including music and podcast playback at different levels, continuous background noise such as conversation and rain, and noises from household appliances such as a vacuum cleaner, hairdryer, and microwave.

During its testing, Apple varied the locations of the HomePod and its test subjects to cover different use cases. For example, in living room or kitchen environments, the HomePod was placed against the wall and in the middle of the room.

Apple's article concludes with a summary of Siri performance metrics on the HomePod, with graphs showing that Apple's multichannel signal processing system led to improved accuracy and fewer errors. Those interested in learning more can read the full entry on Apple's Machine Learning Journal.

Article Link: Apple Details How HomePod Can Detect 'Hey Siri' From Across a Room, Even With Loud Music Playing
[doublepost=1543865771][/doublepost]Can one use the HomePod as a speaker for the iMac for YouTube’s, for music or speech from CNN news, from other websites? Or is there gonna be delays as I’ve experienced?
 
Confirms it's a dedicated snooping device with no physical mute switch. They need more of these in embassies.
 
Hey Apple, just do me a favour and fix "Hey Siri" on iPhones. Works 1 out of 10 times.
While I haven't used the other services assistants and, like most things, can always be improved but, Siri works for me most of the time and I find it quite effective.
[doublepost=1543866254][/doublepost]
Works like 99 out of 100 times for me. Maybe try setting it up again.
It works for me most of the time as well, and I find it quite effective
 
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This might be one of the most impressive aspects of the HomePod, much better than my Echo's ever were. I can be almost anywhere in my house (2,400 square feet) and either my upstairs or downstairs HomePod will hear me perfectly.

This is a really good engineering feat. I bow down to Apple engineers on their technical accomplishment! I heard one and was really impressed (i'm not a audiophile or anything)

Still not impressed with it's limited functionality, no audio in, only be used with airplay (OSX or iOS), and can't directly work with good play or spotify (unless through airplay). Really drops the utility for me.

God forbid someone comes over and wants to play something or show you a song!.
 
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No they aren't.
[doublepost=1543860020][/doublepost]

The Alexa app lets you monitor and control every request being uploaded to Amazon.

HomePod will give out your personal information from your phone to anyone that asks, and won't even let you know it happened.

It’s funny you know you can do that with the Alexa app, but don’t know you can do the same for the HomePod.
 
This might be one of the most impressive aspects of the HomePod, much better than my Echo's ever were. I can be almost anywhere in my house (2,400 square feet) and either my upstairs or downstairs HomePod will hear me perfectly.

It's very good how far away it hears you.

What's NOT good is how sometimes Siri will say NOTHING when I tell her to turn off a light or turn on a light etc (but the light still turns off or on etc), or she'll say "OK, THERE YOU GO!" or some other acknowledgment. Or sometimes she'll just make a "DONG" sound and do it. Like... what? Consistency, please, Apple.

Second, I've found her responsiveness when loud music is playing to be AWFUL. When the room is quiet, works great - from even across the room. With music playing? Nothing, unless I yell.
 
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While I haven't used the other services assistants and, like most things, can always be improved but, Siri works for me most of the time and I find it quite effective.
[doublepost=1543866254][/doublepost]
It works for me most of the time as well, and I find it quite effective

Then you guys must be lucky with the microphones in your iPhones as it’s never been reliable for me and it’s quite a well known issue with Siri along with it getting what you’re saying wrong and not being as smart as other Assistants terms of skills and answers.
 
Hey Apple, just do me a favour and fix "Hey Siri" on iPhones. Works 1 out of 10 times.
It’s starting to get ridiculous.
Turn on Hue 3. Siri replied: you want me to call a hooker?
Turn on the dressoir. Siri: can’t find that speaker. Dressoir are 2 Hue lights in group.
Siri on TV is better. But we don’t have that yet.
No HomePod. We do have Pay.
 
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