HomePod Mini Likely Nearing Launch in Five More Countries

[phrehdd]

Find it rather strange that one of the best selling points (accurate or not) is the notion of Apple's eco system. Yet, this product should be so much more and far more flexible. Apple is losing out on the potential of this device and well, once again Apple got stubborn. Meanwhile, counterparts are doing great and have far greater flexibility. I would like this device if it worked a bit better and had WiFi6.

It is a pity Apple didn't consider working with a company known for routers and make homepod serve also as units in a mesh network.

 

[NewUsername]

Is it like some identity stuff like if Cantonese is a dialect of Chinese etc.?

Not really. In Flanders (=Dutch-speaking Belgium) the language is always called Dutch. In Wallonia (=French-speaking Belgium) it is officially also referred to as Dutch, but in practice many people there call it Flemish (“flamand”), which has a disdainful connotation many Flemish people find very annoying (though to be fair, most Flemish people are not really sensitive to it).

 

[Morgenland]

Find it rather strange that one of the best selling points (accurate or not) is the notion of Apple's eco system. Yet, this product should be so much more and far more flexible. Apple is losing out on the potential of this device and well, once again Apple got stubborn. Meanwhile, counterparts are doing great and have far greater flexibility. I would like this device if it worked a bit better and had WiFi6.

It is a pity Apple didn't consider working with a company known for routers and make homepod serve also as units in a mesh network.

I look at the Home screen of the Home app on my iPhone, see how wonderfully all my heating controls, the AppleTV and my number of HomePods are networked with each other (the new homepod minis and the AppleTV are active control centers), and all this works quite passabbly on its own without a proprietary mesh router needed.
And I experience all this on my computer (macOS instead of iOS) with the same precision.

Therefore such comment is really quite strange to me.
It seems to me that your hereditary accusation against Apple is not provable in real world.

And don't worry: I know how other network systems are designed and operate. And I've never been able to see a compelling advantage to it so far, other than being tied 'flexibly' to other eco systems that you might prefer.

 

[AppleFan735]

I am personally not interested in the HomePod BUT I really want to have Dutch in the iOS integrated translation. I do hope that we get Dutch to iOS translation when HomePod comes to BE/NL.

This. As an expat living in Netherlands I cannot wait for Apple to finally add Dutch in the Translate app and system translations.

Apple services work well if you live in the US or even better in California but Google (especially with Translate and Maps) is infinitely better at scaling and rolling their services and features out worldwide. Apple is still unfortunately stuck in the mindset of providing “the best hand-crafted” experience as if they were an Italian leather shoe maker. Things like Apple Maps monuments and Apple Music curated playlists are a good example of this type of thinking. While Google thinks more along the lines of ”what technical vectors will allow us to scale and roll this out across the globe”.

 

[fredrik9]

1. Sweden is Europe, not third world
2. In fact, multi-language requirement is always a big problem. I am curious when Siri will actually be able to operate multilingually. Currently, even M-processing power is not yet sufficient for this, because this is a very very complex topic from a purely technical point of view. And if someone is able to do it on device, it will definitely be Apple, because Android currently only has weak language recognition on board capabilities and a strangely outdated processor architecture.

Google Home works great between Swedish and English. Wonder why Siri doesn’t. I still can’t ask Siri to play a song with an English title.

 

[JustSomebody12]

I think it’s safe to say that smart speakers as a product category hasn’t exactly taken off, and allowing other smart assistants isn’t going to boost sales either.

Amazon’s Alexa Stalled With Users as Interest Faded, Documents Show

Internal memos detail the company’s efforts to keep customers engaged with its Echo smart speakers.

www.bloomberg.com

Based on this Bloomberg article, only a small number of amazon echo users use Alexa, much less use it for anything meaningful (the primary uses are playing music, setting timers and turning on lights, which the HomePod is optimised for).

People are buying it simply because it’s a cheap speaker (amazon apparently loses money or barely breaks even on each sale). They don’t really care what brand of smart assistant comes bundled with it, and if I am going to buy one to use with my iphone, I would rather it be Siri (this way, at least all my recorded conversations go through just one company), rather than having them all in my house (Siri, google assistant, Alexa).

I still have no idea why Apple even entered the smart speaker market to begin with. It clearly not the new computing paradigm the tech press was hyping it up to be (the tech world was clearly so desperate for something to leapfrog the iphone that they latched onto anything that Apple wasn’t doing), most of its functionality is already subsumed under the Apple Watch, and Apple is clearly not going to be able to subsidise the price the way its competitors have.

Maybe that’s the only intention. Offer people a privacy-focused alternative to these smart speakers so users have the option of having only Siri in their house?

they released the HomePod because it's mainly tech from other devices: the chips come from the iPhones or Apple Watches, Siri is available on every other Apple device.

i think the objective is to improve Siri and to have an installed base, in the long term.

 

[JustSomebody12]

But why would you want it then? just get a much cheaper Alexa device

Because the HomePod sounds better.

 

[MacRazySwe]

This still doesn’t work with Spotify, right?

 

[Powerbooky]

Ask Siri to play İbrahim Tatlıses – Bir Kulunu Çok Sevdim or Üsküdar'a Gider İkenusing or Девочка танцуй with english language setting.
Good luck!

So Apple prepares all devices in painstaking work that Siri firmware hopefully understands everything. The legal regulations (manuals, etc.) must also be complied with for country approvals.

This takes time and is enormously resource-intensive.

Indeed, its quite a challenge. I've kept the mini's on the English language setting because most music titles my family plays have English titles. I've tried the new Dutch setting for about a day, awful really. Besides not understanding English song titles anymore, I found that it has a real hard time understanding almost everything, even in a quiet room. Not recognising commands or doing the wrong action and so on. In the English setting Siri can easy understand everything, loud or whispering, even with lots of noise and others talking in the background.

On-topic: I'm already waiting more than a month to place an order for the coloured Homepod minis. In France and Germany the Apple Store still reports a 2-3 week delivery time, so I'm guessing that I'll have to wait at least till next month.

 

[k1121j]

don't know what apple did but after the last update my home pods only control things in the room they are in its super annoying and there went my home Control. Yes i have reset them all many time same result.." sorry that device can't be found in the kitchen" and so on.

 

[BootsWalking]

Apple has been testing Swedish language support for Siri on the HomePod mini for at least two months

Here's the person Apple hired to train the Swedish Siri algorithm:

 

[Satch111]

Have you used one? They work great for the intended purpose, which is to play music, tell you the weather, the time, adding to your calendar etc.

Any HomePod product will suffer of operating only through Siri, which is not always the best smart Assistant.

If Apple wished to help the HomePods sell, they should enable 3rd-party Assistants on them, but we all know Siri is more important to Apple than the HomePod.


They may release a refresh, but I think they are pursuing a cheap-product policy here, since Siri doesn't simply work.

 

[citysnaps]

Have you used one? They work great for the intended purpose, which is to play music, tell you the weather, the time, adding to your calendar etc.

That's my experience as well. Personally, I don't need a lot of extra features. HomePods + Siri meet my needs, many times per day, which is playing music (via Apple Music). I think Apple hit the sweet spot on that combination.

 

[oriz]

I am in Switzerland. I have two HomePod Minis (bought in Munich, Germany). I bought them some time ago. They work great. Since 15.2 they are set to German (Switzerland) and personal requests work for me and my girlfriend. What is missing for us is TuneIn support to listen to Radio. Local radio stations are also not present in Apple Music. Currently I have solved this with the Shortcuts app.

I have no idea what takes Apple so long to release this stuff faster in more countries. Especially if the language (in my case German) has already be solved. Austria for example had also to wait for Homepod Mini.

I hope they release a HomePod 2 in the future.

 

[EntropyQ3]

Apple needs to realise that there are millions of people who don't live in an English speaking country, but speak and understand English (or other majority languages) just fine.

Seems silly that we have to wait for them to translate everything into the region's main language before we're allowed to even buy a HomePod Mini.

While we're at it, let me sign up for Apple Fitness+ - I promise I won't sit there looking at the screen like a confused caveman trying to work out what "ok now do a jumping jack" means.

Children. They exist in many families. Speaking English with my speakers, weird as conversing with furniture would be, would be no problem for me, but it wouldn’t have worked for my kids.

Siri in general, though mostly functional in our language, just isn’t used in my society anyway.

 

[Minato1990]

How about you bring back the original homepods APPLE!

 

[twinlight]

When they do add language support for the Homepod does that mean they add the artists, albums and song names in that language? I use english Siri in Norway and want to ask for english or swedish songs. Never works..

On my Apple TV I have set it to english and Siri isn’t available since my account is norwegian..

 

[Morgenland]

Google Home works great between Swedish and English. Wonder why Siri doesn’t. I still can’t ask Siri to play a song with an English title.

Dear Fredik, it is easier to implement communication with an open system where everyone can listen. Apple does not do this and has a closed system where only external links are connected. There are people in Sweden who have understood the difference, partly under great personal problems.
Have fun with Google, I do without it wherever possible.

 

[Morgenland]

When they do add language support for the Homepod does that mean they add the artists, albums and song names in that language? I use english Siri in Norway and want to ask for english or swedish songs. Never works..

On my Apple TV I have set it to english and Siri isn’t available since my account is norwegian..

Yes, that's exactly how it works: If you enable your local language, you can use Siri to call up local language music AND English tracks. If you have multiple HomePods in your home linked to one account, they will all automatically switch to the same language setting.

How to change Siri's voice and language on HomePod

Want to change the HomePod language used or Siri’s voice on your smart speaker? This tutorial shows you how to change them both.

www.idownloadblog.com

From the English language setting, country-specific titles usually do not work.

 

[bluespark]

Siri is less smart than Alexa or Google, and these things are double the price of their competition (or, during Amazon/Google sales, triple the price). Siri Shortcuts are cool and there are some privacy advantages, but these don't seem like a compelling purchase for most people.

 

[hagar]

Apple lists it as Flemish. I updated the story to clarify this.

View attachment 1941016

That’s weird. On my HomePod it’s listed as Dutch (Belgium).

However, since iOS 15 there is no specific voice for Belgium anymore. They replaced it with the Dutch voice from the Netherlands.

I’m not sure what we did wrong to get punished like that.

 

[hagar]

1. Sweden is Europe, not third world
2. In fact, multi-language requirement is always a big problem. I am curious when Siri will actually be able to operate multilingually. Currently, even M-processing power is not yet sufficient for this, because this is a very very complex topic from a purely technical point of view. And if someone is able to do it on device, it will definitely be Apple, because Android currently only has weak language recognition on board capabilities and a strangely outdated processor architecture.

They could easily add multi lingual support for messaging. iOS already knows what language a message is in as it switches keyboards automatically when switching threads. (Or it should because I don’t feel like it’s working reliably).

So when Siri is reading out a message she could switch to the correct language without the need for analysing the language first. And not butcher the message.

 

[Morgenland]

Indeed, its quite a challenge. I've kept the mini's on the English language setting because most music titles my family plays have English titles. I've tried the new Dutch setting for about a day, awful really. Besides not understanding English song titles anymore, I found that it has a real hard time understanding almost everything, even in a quiet room. Not recognising commands or doing the wrong action and so on. In the English setting Siri can easy understand everything, loud or whispering, even with lots of noise and others talking in the background.

On-topic: I'm already waiting more than a month to place an order for the coloured Homepod minis. In France and Germany the Apple Store still reports a 2-3 week delivery time, so I'm guessing that I'll have to wait at least till next month.

Thank you for your feedback. I know from other countries in Europe that there the national language AND English are always recognized at the same time. There is still work to be done in the Dutch setting.

I wish you much anticipation for the minis, they are really great. However, if you have a slow internal WIFI network AND are using a stereo pair, you may need to disable the lossless option due to its significantly increased bandwidth requirements. Atmos is always on the side.

 

[Morgenland]

They could easily add multi lingual support for messaging. iOS already knows what language a message is in as it switches keyboards automatically when switching threads. (Or it should because I don’t feel like it’s working reliably).

So when Siri is reading out a message she could switch to the correct language without the need for analysing the language first. And not butcher the message.

If this works for Turkish and Swedish, for example, that would be new information for me. English prefers to pair with another language, especially for music selection.

 

[Morgenland]

That’s weird. On my HomePod it’s listed as Dutch (Belgium).

However, since iOS 15 there is no specific voice for Belgium anymore. They replaced it with the Dutch voice from the Netherlands.

I’m not sure what we did wrong to get punished like that.
View attachment 1941559

--100-- Yes, Europe is an important and complex market for Apple with many attentive customers.

Thank you! Please report this issue to Apple. The guys in Cupertino rarely read MacRumors.