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Consumer Reports: Google Home Max and Sonos One Sound Better Than HomePod
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I wonder about the Google Max part. I agree with everything else you conveyed, as it's actually valid with my B&O A1, which is circular and designed to play audio in 360 degrees (vertically filling the room if laid flat). Not sure how applicable that would be with HomePod though because the only things that would lose power is the woofer that's pointed upwards, and sounds directed at the rear ... but the vocals are directed away from walls.
But the shape of Google Max, leads me to believe that there's no need for it to be sensing behind itself, or bouncing sounds off the rear. I could be mistaken though.
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Interesting, so if something "can be objectively and scientifically tested and proved to be false" yet you had "a preference" towards something to the contrary would you you throw your hands up and say "I've been proved wrong and I bow down to my scientific overloads as they are right and I am wrong (please forgive my miss-conjecture)?
Technical specifications for both products tell everything i need to know. Specifications are objective. Sonos Play:1/One physically can't sound better.
For Sonos you plug it in, go to the Sonos app and select “add a player”, and push the sync button on the speaker.
I’m sure some of you will discount this with a post count of 1, however felt it was worth registering an account to try and help those on the fence about Homepod.
I have a Sonos Playbase and Sonos Sub attached to my living room TV. I had a Play:3 in my bedroom and a Play:1 in my bathroom before I ordered and received my first Homepods (ordered 2 initially - I am an early adopter and prefer to try things myself instead of deciphering the epeen contests on the internet (and in newsgroups before that for those of you old enough).
Now that I’ve heard Homepod in “my” environments, there is a Homepod in my bathroom and one in my bedroom, linked to Apple TV. Two more will arrive tomorrow and I will prepare to create a stereo pair in my bedroom via Apple TV. I will place one in my living room near the archway to the dining room.
The Sonos Playbase and Sub are going nowhere - great for home theater, terrible for music (hence the Homepod on the living room).
The Sonos Play:1 and Play:3 will be passed down to daughters now in their own homes.
Regardless of what CR reports hearing in their room of speakers, I know how things sound in my house FROM LISTENING TO THEM.
And you are correct, I have not listened to Echo or Google Home - nor will I as I value my privacy and prefer not to be tracked.
All of these sites really need some way to verify actual owners of products being praised/criticized. Hearing it in stores, specialized listening rooms, etc., is NO comparison to hearing it in your own environments.
I have a Sonos Playbase and Sonos Sub attached to my living room TV. I had a Play:3 in my bedroom and a Play:1 in my bathroom before I ordered and received my first Homepods (ordered 2 initially - I am an early adopter and prefer to try things myself instead of deciphering the epeen contests on the internet (and in newsgroups before that for those of you old enough).
Now that I’ve heard Homepod in “my” environments, there is a Homepod in my bathroom and one in my bedroom, linked to Apple TV. Two more will arrive tomorrow and I will prepare to create a stereo pair in my bedroom via Apple TV. I will place one in my living room near the archway to the dining room.
The Sonos Playbase and Sub are going nowhere - great for home theater, terrible for music (hence the Homepod on the living room).
The Sonos Play:1 and Play:3 will be passed down to daughters now in their own homes.
Regardless of what CR reports hearing in their room of speakers, I know how things sound in my house FROM LISTENING TO THEM.
And you are correct, I have not listened to Echo or Google Home - nor will I as I value my privacy and prefer not to be tracked.
All of these sites really need some way to verify actual owners of products being praised/criticized. Hearing it in stores, specialized listening rooms, etc., is NO comparison to hearing it in your own environments.
Well it's more than that actually. It starts with that after you pick the wifi which has to be 2.4 Ghz compatible or it will not work (app doesn't say that) then you walk like a moron waving your phone around the room while it's tuning and failing multiple times because flooring is made of wood.
you plug in the sonos open the app choose new device and push the button on the unit. choose the location/name and your pretty much done. it also now ask you to setup the room with your phone. both are easy. setting up the app will take a little work to login to all of your services and such.
Call me old-fashioned but I prefer those acoustic appendages that nature has planted either side of my brain as opposed to buying something because a "stat" on a web-site is "higher".
If a truly thorough study isn't done. I hope the negative subjective tests will cause Apple to state the optimal positions, aka something like, "for the best experience HomePod should be at least 1 foot away from the center of a wall, but no more than 2 feet."
Some people just want a more complete picture.
Some people just want a more complete picture.
Yea that’s Trueplay tuning. I’ve done it in all of my zones in my home with hardwood floors without the issue you’re describing.
That's why it's best to consider blind results only. I'm guessing it has been covered in this thread already, but I like David Pogue's honesty about expecting the Home Pod to win in a shootout based on Apple's demos and all the tech journalist hysteria.
"Of course, I knew what the results would be. I’d heard them myself in the Apple demo; I’d read the other reviews; and I’d done the dress rehearsal the night before. Every time, the HomePod won the match easily.
At the end of my own listening test, then, I handed out signs that said “A,” “B,” “C,” and “D,” and asked the panelists to hold up their winners’ signs on the count of three. I knew what they would say: “B,” “B,” “B,” “B,” and “B” (that was the HomePod’s letter).
That’s not what happened.
They held up their signs. Two of them ranked the Google Home Max (“D”) as the best. Three of them ranked the Sonos One (“A”) the best.
Nobody ranked the HomePod the best."
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/head-head-apple-homepod-really-sound-best-160346138.html
It's amazing how different our perceptions are when we remove bias - both for and against.
Maybe yours doesn't make any sound while you walk, but mine does and it kept telling me to reduce noise which i can't without injecting spider venom and starting crawling on the ceiling.
Yes but this is an initial impression, not the final review. They did what you or I would do, plug it in and listen then compare purely on what they heard.
As has been said in comments before me....Consumer Reports hates Apple!
Besides their anti-Apple bias, I could never understand why people took their word on anything. They test a subset of items in a category and then declare one the best.
#fakenews
Besides their anti-Apple bias, I could never understand why people took their word on anything. They test a subset of items in a category and then declare one the best.
#fakenews
Only visual bias was removed, perhaps even conscious bias, but that test was not unbiased nor unskewed.
ya so thats a problem?
some people never put effort forth for good sound.
I have seen stories saying the HomePod is the best thing since sliced bread and posts that say sliced bread sounds better than the HomePod (it is unarguably tastier though). Neither particularly are useful to me as a consumer because the truth when it comes to which is best is completely up to the individual user.
Something that sounds fantastic to me might sound terrible to someone else. Some are audiophiles and some are audionoobs.
Your best bet is to either go to the store and listen for yourself or find a friend who has already made the jump.
Something that sounds fantastic to me might sound terrible to someone else. Some are audiophiles and some are audionoobs.
Your best bet is to either go to the store and listen for yourself or find a friend who has already made the jump.
The point i was trying to make that setup for Sonos is ancient compared to HomePod and reviews on sonos.com say setup is easy (technically it's true), but then how can you describe HomePod setup if sonos is easy?ya so thats a problem?
I think when I read the forum I subconsciously filtered out the number of people discrediting CR due to an imagined or real personal grudge against Apple, or them doing it for the clicks. But the more I see it, the more I hope CR's upcoming thorough test results will put such perspectives to bed, even if they only do it thoroughly for the clicks, lol.