HomePod Mini Likely Nearing Launch in Five More Countries

[Powerbooky]

I heard these speakers cannot behave like normal bluetooth speakers. I ended up going with the Nest Audio. Way more bang for the buck.

Any regular bluetooth speaker always needs a phone or computer. Its usually connected to just one device and switching isn't always as seamless. A wifi speaker, like the Homepod, can operate on its own (except on first installation) and switching to other devices/users works faster.

The only plus that a bluetooth speaker has... it doesn't necessarily need internet. Some even have SD card slots. But with +1000 songs playlists become kind of mandatory. I have both cheap and expensive bluetooth speakers, like JBL's... but the Homepod mini works better for us at home. On the move however... a bluetooth bluetooth is a bit easier.

I feel like the development of Siri has stagnated years ago. Therefore rendering this product basically useless. With all that power Siri is not smart and very slow.

I wouldn't say useless, rather a bit limited at this moment. Even competitors hardly do much better when it comes to voice response. No doubt that Apple is on it, but sure takes time. Until then I'm waiting for that "One more thing..." moment to show off a new Siri that is truly multi-lingual and is more context aware.

 

[Powerbooky]

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definitely be Apple, because Android currently only has weak language recognition on board capabilities and a strangely outdated processor architecture.

It's all about the money. Outdated processors are cheaper, sell easier and any big processing power comes from server farms anyway. Servers which are already there for datamining purposes, which again makes more money.
If Apple's M processor line really takes off, maybe in a couple of years it would be possible to have a full voice response system in one chip.

 

[Steve121178]

Cool to hear "<long silence> This is taking longer than expected." in so many languages.

...and it won't be worth the wait. Anything that relies primarily on Siri is not fit for purpose.

 

[hoodafoo]

Any regular bluetooth speaker always needs a phone or computer. Its usually connected to just one device and switching isn't always as seamless. A wifi speaker, like the Homepod, can operate on its own (except on first installation) and switching to other devices/users works faster.

The only plus that a bluetooth speaker has... it doesn't necessarily need internet. Some even have SD card slots. But with +1000 songs playlists become kind of mandatory. I have both cheap and expensive bluetooth speakers, like JBL's... but the Homepod mini works better for us at home. On the move however... a bluetooth bluetooth is a bit easier.

Great that it uses wifi to maximize bandwidth, but it should also be able to "dumb down" and act like simple bluetooth speaker for versatility sake

 

[Powerbooky]

Great that it uses wifi to maximize bandwidth, but it should also be able to "dumb down" and act like simple bluetooth speaker for versatility sake

Yeah... it probably didn't meet Apple's user experience standards, I guess.

JBL has a couple of speakers that have both wifi and bluetooth on board, but their firmware is buggy and not so user friendly. I have a JBL Link Portable (battery powered), really good sound for a portable speaker I must say. Switching between wifi (airplay2) and bluetooth doesn't work as advertised though. Turns out that the Google Home app is mandatory to enable bluetooth pairing.

 

[Macbookprodude]

So let's hope, Apple can add Ukrainian one day!

They wont', Russia and Apple have agreement sadly. Ukraine to them is Russia.. cook has no concept, and Americans don't either.