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HomePod Mini Launches in Belgium, Netherlands, and Switzerland

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Apple today started taking orders for the HomePod mini in Belgium, the Netherlands, and Switzerland for the first time, as spotted by iCulture.

homepod-mini-colors.jpeg

Apple said earlier this month that it would make the HomePod mini available to order in the above countries by the end of March, but never gave a specific release date. The speaker also gained support for languages spoken in those countries as part of a software update released in December.

Customers in Belgium, the Netherlands, and Switzerland can now order the speakers from Apple's regional online stores, although delivery times vary from one business day to up to five days, so anyone wanting to pick one up sooner is better off visiting one of Apple's retail stores.

As in other countries, the HomePod mini is available in five colors, including white, space gray, yellow, orange, and blue. The small Siri-enabled speaker has a woven power cable and comes with a 20W USB-C power adapter in the box.

HomePod mini first launched in October 2020 in the United States, and the speaker is also available in Australia, Canada, China, Hong Kong, Japan, Taiwan, Austria, France, Germany, India, Ireland, Italy, Spain, and the United Kingdom. The speaker is also expected to launch in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Finland later this year.

Article Link: HomePod Mini Launches in Belgium, Netherlands, and Switzerland
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2022/03/25/homepod-mini-belgium-netherlands-switzerland/
Is Apple even trying to compete any more in this sector? Sure, the Apple faithful in these countries will still buy, but I think most other people who want a smart speaker will have bought one a long time ago. The rate at which Apple roles out its products globally seems leisurely, almost as if it thinks it's doing international customers a favour. I realise that there are sometimes things that need localising first, such as Siri, but given it's over 3 months since that was done then I don't really understand Apple's lack of drive.
 
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Why does it take so long for Apple to make the HomePod mini available in other countries? Is Siri on HomePod so much different than Siri on iPhone that they have to update it for every new language (here: Dutch for the Netherlands and Belgium)?

Siri doesn't even speak/understand Swiss German, it only is trained to understand what Swiss Germans speak when they (try to) speak standard German (ie, German with an accent and a very slightly different vocabulary). And the differences between Swiss Italian and standard Italian are less than between some regional varieties of Italian within Italy and said standard Italian. Ditto for Swiss French. It mostly is just a limited set of different vocabulary (eg, septante vs soixante-dix).
 
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manu chao said:
Siri doesn't even speak/understand Swiss German, it only is trained to understand what Swiss Germans speak when they (try to) speak standard German (ie, German with an accent and a very slightly different vocabulary). And the differences between Swiss Italian and standard Italian are less than between some regional varieties of Italian within Italy and said standard Italian. Ditto for Swiss French. It mostly is just a limited set of different vocabulary (eg, septante vs soixante-dix).
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Mol, mis verstods scho :)
 
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BigMac? said:
It would be great if Apple could give us some HomePod medium around the size of Sonos one.
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A medium would be ok, but I Siri-ously hope Apple brings back an OG Homepod replacement of some sort (or is that what you meant?). These minis are great for Hey Siri anywhere in the home, and the integration with the Apple ecosystem is so convenient, but the sound quality of the OG speakers make them one of my favorite Apple products. They quite possibly bring me the most smiles.

I just hope the ones I have last a good long while. I hope they aren’t ever rendered useless by future software updates, even if its just via a hack that can make them into dumb speakers when they eventually lose software support.
 
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Let me know when the HomePod uses Amazon Alexa instead of Siri, and I’ll buy one. It also must support the entire ecosystem of Amazon Alexa smart plugs, Amazon Alexa smart outlets, and Amazon Alexa smart accessories. Oh, never mind, I’ll just buy an Alexa device.
 
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scotty321 said:
Let me know when the HomePod uses Amazon Alexa instead of Siri, and I’ll buy one. It also must support the entire ecosystem of Amazon Alexa smart plugs, Amazon Alexa smart outlets, and Amazon Alexa smart accessories. Oh, never mind, I’ll just buy an Alexa device.
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In time all smart accessories should work with all platforms
 
As Marques Brownlee mentioned this week - 'Why don't Apple get on make speakers' - serious speakers! Decent, neutral, nearfield monitors would be start and maybe something to really fill a large space. Given the aspiration to raise the audio quality it would seem to be a natural step.
 
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scotty321 said:
Let me know when the HomePod uses Amazon Alexa instead of Siri, and I’ll buy one. It also must support the entire ecosystem of Amazon Alexa smart plugs, Amazon Alexa smart outlets, and Amazon Alexa smart accessories. Oh, never mind, I’ll just buy an Alexa device.
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I use both. They both have strengths.
 
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Finally, the snail arrived. Too bad the best snail died before arrival. And that the snails still don't understand much about my language (Dutch). Trying to play music by "Arab Strap" (first in my library) *LOL*.
 
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scotty321 said:
Let me know when the HomePod uses Amazon Alexa instead of Siri, and I’ll buy one. It also must support the entire ecosystem of Amazon Alexa smart plugs, Amazon Alexa smart outlets, and Amazon Alexa smart accessories. Oh, never mind, I’ll just buy an Alexa device.
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The accessories should be supported soonish with the major players converging on comms standards, but alexa as a voice assistant on homepods is unlikely to happen I would think. I prefer Siri personally, it may be more limited but it protects my data better, even with Apple's occasional missteps there. Amazon has enough of my data already, I don't need to give them the ability to listen to my house too.
 
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hanske68 said:
Finally, the snail arrived. Too bad the best snail died before arrival. And that the snails still don't understand much about my language (Dutch). Trying to play music by "Arab Strap" (first in my library) *LOL*.
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I have always wondered how Siri could understand all the band/musician’s names that often enough aren’t dictionary words and are not part of a sentence structure where grammar rules make it easier to pick which of the five same-sounding words was meant by the speaker. Add to that that a lot of music, song titles as well as band names, are in a different language than that of the user and thus will be pronounced a bit differently from country to country.

Since the main job of the HomePod is most likely playing music, I guess refining that part of the speech recognition individually for every country requires additional work than ‘just’ supporting Siri on iPhone.
 
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It is obviously new for apple to be selling them directly in these markets, but somewhat strangely, I bought my HomePod mini from a major electronics retailers in Switzerland last year...
 
manu chao said:
Why does it take so long for Apple to make the HomePod mini available in other countries? Is Siri on HomePod so much different than Siri on iPhone that they have to update it for every new language (here: Dutch for the Netherlands and Belgium)?

Siri doesn't even speak/understand Swiss German, it only is trained to understand what Swiss Germans speak when they (try to) speak standard German (ie, German with an accent and a very slightly different vocabulary). And the differences between Swiss Italian and standard Italian are less than between some regional varieties of Italian within Italy and said standard Italian. Ditto for Swiss French. It mostly is just a limited set of different vocabulary (eg, septante vs soixante-dix).
Click to expand...
Siri on homepod is sorta useless. For example, I have yet to get her to turn off all of the TVs in my house at once. And in fact, ever since buying a 2nd smart TV, I'm not sure that she's managed to ever turn either TV off.

On the phone, for whatever reason, it works better.
 
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And unfortunately listening to the radio with Homepod mini (or Apple Music) does not work in Switzerland.
I can listen to Swiss radio stations in any other country, but not in Switzerland.
I thought that would be corrected with the launch of the Homepod mini in Switzerland!
 
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I ended up selling, or plan to sell, my Homepod minis, and now live in a Sonos household.

Apple seriously needs to get more than a toe in the water here; their efforts here have always felt half-hearted.

Example: look at Sonos and their ability to allow multiple services. It's second to none. I've looked and there is no other company that does third party integration so well. You can't even get BBC radio on HomePods without using airplay, a huge miss.
 
Hasn’t this been on the market long enough now? Time to deprecate!
 
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