I completely agree with you on almost everything you say. Of course, unless the product is faultless (which barely any product is), I do expect negative points in literally every review. And of course, every review is biased in the sense that it is not (literally) scientific.
But the most important metric (call it "overall impression", "aggregate score", or even "bang-for-your-back measure") determines in my opinion whether a review is favourable or not. This type of conclusion is given in every review I've read so far.
Hmmmm, perhaps another way to address your question/issue is to encourage you to go look for reviews for OTHER speakers. In general, nearly ALL speakers are going to get generally positive reviews. HP is no exception in this. There are not a lot of speakers that are going to get a 0 on a 10-point scale (10 being perfection), especially once the pricing gets above a few hundred dollars. In general, the differences from some kind of worst to best of this group might range from about 6 to about 9, which generally translates all to "good" to "very good." That's the game.
For example, try this: let go of HP for an experiment and decide that you are interested in Google Home or Sonos 1. Go look for reviews for those as if THEY were Apple's speaker. What you'll find in general are pretty favorable reviews, mixing lots of pros with some cons and generally concluding good-to-great speaker. That's (practically) normal. Key here is pretending that they are Apple's speaker instead, so you can see them through the very same lens that you can see an HP, thus you won't be heavily noticing their cons as one might be heavily noticing HP's pros in other reviews.
There are fresh head-to-head tests out now. One writer invited to the recent Apple demo redid the very same demo on his own... and expected the outcome to come out just like the apparent "reviews" resulting from Apple pre-release demos. But he did this crazy, crazy thing:
he put the speakers behind a curtain so that the reviewers could not tell which was which, different than Apple apparently lighting up an area around the very visible speaker playing at the time. He also made sure that all were getting fed audio the same way, not one getting inferior bluetooth while the favorite was getting a superior stream. Etc. It's all in his article- a very, VERY interesting read.
Another comes from a source that I personally tend to trust very much:
Consumer Reports. They don't even sell advertising so that their reviews can avoid even a whiff of "payola."
Jettison ANY bias at all for a moment and go read those two in full as if you were in the market for any smart speaker instead of only a single smart speaker made by only a single company. Minimally, those have to make an objective mind think.
None of that- nor any of my posts- are meant to tell someone to buy or not buy- that's fully "ears of the beholder" and "it's your money" type stuff. I simply don't swallow the opinions of the extremists at either end of the debate and encourage those able to be objective
to actually be objective in making such a choice. Speakers are not phones- they tend to be a product that one might use for 10-15+ years. Thus, IMO, they need even more care & consideration in making a purchase than a phone that might cost 2-3+ times more that one will be replacing 2-4 years from now.
Am I saying people should only trust those 2 reviews that don't conclude with "HP is perfection- buy now"? No, I'm simply pointing out that there are a LOT of choices for this kind of thing and that any ONE option is not actually the only right option for all. There's easy access to seemingly a dozen very favorable reviews building upon pre-release demos and/or by members of the "friends of Apple" press given pre-release versions of HP to be first out with reviews. We are just now starting to get real third party reviews
from entities that had to WAIT until they could buy a HP to get to put it through some paces.
Should we just cherry-pick reviews that don't conclude with "Buy HP now" recommendations? No- that's the same issue the other way. A generally good approach is to look at a bundle of reviews- ideally all objective sources (that had to BUY an HP instead of being given one) and carefully read for both pros & cons. Notice BOTH pros & cons. If one sees appeal, gather up your own favorite music and head for a store where you can play that music on a HP and see how it sounds to your own ears. If you do that at a store other than Apple, you might even be able to do a little head-to-head listening with some competitors too. Then, make the best decision for you... which certainly could be HP... or it could be lots of other options.
Disclaimer: I own a TON of Apple hardware myself. I make my living with Apple hardware, using it all day every day as key tools to doing what I do. However, the ability to be objective and see both pros & cons is what I consider the definition of "think different." Noticing some faults is not the same as being a "hater"- just being a
consumer trying to evaluate a potential purchase.
