I purchased the Pebble V3 a couple of months ago and they have been nothing but fantastic. I am still surprised with the quality and all of the connectivity options for only $40! I'm using the USB-C connection for my Mac and utilize Bluetooth for my iOS devices. Great purchase that I highly recommend to anyone looking for a new pair of computer speakers.
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How to Use Two HomePods With a Mac for Stereo Audio Output
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With the arrival of macOS Big Sur 11.3, it is now possible to use a HomePod stereo pair as your Mac's system audio output. This article explains how to set up two HomePod speakers as a stereo pair and then connect them to your Mac.
Dedicated stereo speakers are always going to provide a better listening experience
"Bold" statement! Now I can use those $3 speakers.
This is not a true "audio" system for your Mac.. this is just basically the same as Airplaying content to the speakers from a Mac.. it's laggy and it's slow to begin the handshake/streaming process. Do not confuse this with a live feed of audio in a traditional audio system. It works fine for the Apple TV (movies/tv shows) because it's a stream of data. You'll still want a USB or Analog setup on your Mac/PC..
I paired two with my Apple TV. Sounded AMAZING but they just didn't work. They came unpaired often, and dear god don't talk to Siri whilst they are paired. Had two others that I "Stereo Paired" in my office, for iPad and iPhone listening. Same thing. They cannot work together. Sent them all back.
This has been my experience with real-time audio/video output to the HomePod (single or a stereo pair) from macOS (including macOS 11.3) as well. But how come several people in this thread, including one developer, claim that their Mac can stream to the HomePod perfectly with no lag? Are these people confusing the pre-recorded audio/video stream with the live stream / real-time / interactive video/audio stream?
The lag people mention is pretty unavoidable due to airplay. Airplay apparently sacrifices latency for audio quality as it’s much slower but much better quality than bluetooth. Stereo homepods are better hooked up to a tv for this reason, since it’s easy to sync video audio for movie and tv playback. For no lag and best audio quality, wired is still the way to go and will be for awhile. I believe Bluetooth has manageable delay for those who want wireless and are ok sacrificing audio quality.
Thanks - I grabbed a pair of the older ones that have the sub but no bluetooth - also 40 bucks. Feels very 90s to do so, but after reading this thread, sounds like the hope of using HomePod minis is not going to work.
Very odd that they cant solve it...you would think at the very least the M1 macs would have some type of native support to do it right.
Can you send audio to the HomePod stereo pair from another source connected to your TV? What if you have an Xbox One connected to the same TV as the Apple TV? How would you send sound from the Xbox One to the HomePod stereo pair? Basically, if you are not a fan of Siri, buying Sonos bar is much more versatile, as you can stream to it via Airplay 2 or output any audio source that's connected to your TV.
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If Apple truly intends for these to be computer speakers or to be used as computer speakers as a secondary use case, the best idea would be for them to release a 2nd-gen version that also allows for 3.5mm audio output, which plugs into your computer.
Otherwise, these should only be used like an Amazon Echo-like device - wireless audio streaming from your phone or tablet and that is it.
I have the Pebble version 1 (same speakers as the ones used with the subwoofer but without the subwoofer). It appears that Creative improved the stereo speakers in version 3 pretty dramatically compared with version 1. I bought Pebble V2 on Amazon last year, but they had too much static noise (much more than version 1), so I returned Pebble V2. If you plug Pebble V3 in a 10W power source, you can activate 8 watt in acoustics power and 16 watt in peak power. I can't wait to try them with Bluetooth to see if they can function wirelessly without a lag. But, if they do have a lag, I will still have two other (wired) ways to connect to them.
The HomePods are dead to me now.
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Supposedly they work well with the Apple TV as well. The room where my TV is located is way too big for a pair of HomePod Minis.
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Does (or can someone w/ Windows/BC) this work with Windows (hopefully with an update to bootcamp)? This would be nice to apply/use this for my work machine. (I believe there is some 3rd party software that sorta does this; but not type of solution I'm looking for).
p.s. I'm asking for a friend
p.s. I'm asking for a friend
I was so excited to try this because I have had a really difficult time placing my HomePod minis - I thought this would eliminate my need for ”wired” speakers on my desktop setup but that lag is real. It cuts in and out. This is not a practical device for this setup and I have M1 MBA so there are no physical limitations at this point. So back the minis go to some random room in my house. I have so many Echo devices with even better sound quality in every room. Oh well, there are bigger problems in the world, I just had bigger hopes for the minis.
Oddly enough they managed to make this (low latency AirPlay to HomePods) work on the Apple TV 4K with Home Theater mode. System and game sounds work fine with no perceptible latency. I honestly figured it was impossible before then, but I don't see why they wouldn't be able to make it work on a Mac as well.
Read up on the Home Theater mode in the Apple TV. HomePod Minis and the third-party Airplay speakers are not supported.
the audio lag makes it impractical to use them as external mac speakers. Apple should work on this if it keeps happening.
Interesting, sounds like the improvements helped a lot with being able to use without a sub. I am good with the 2.1 setup as a crutch that is tough to go wrong with.
Replacing a 20+ year old 2.1 altec lansing set that was still rocking along, but was yellow and quite beat up looking at this point 😆.
I'll still hold out hopes Apple can figure this out...but sometimes physics and old tech are tough to improve on.
And they are also impractical with the Apple TV. Setting a pair of HomePod Minis as the default sound output (aka Home Theater Mode) in the Apple TV is not supported - only full-size HomePods (now discontinued) are supported as the default sound output with the Apple TV.
So, what’s the point of the HomePod Minis if they can’t be used as computer speakers, and they can’t be used as default Apple TV speakers? And the Home Theater Mode that people have been waiting for so long was only enabled last fall with the HomePods (full-size ones) being the only speakers supporting that mode. And now the HomePod has been discontinued. It’s like a complete mess in the Apple product development team where one group working on a software feature has no clue what another group working on the hardware is doing.
This isn’t the case. My ATV stereo homepods don’t even make system or game sounds, only movies etc. Are you sure your homepods do what you describe?
edit- I was wrong. See post #79.
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I heard/read this was possible, but I'm not sure if it is or not because I don't own an Apple TV.
tvOS 14.2 on Apple TV 4K supports wireless game audio with HomePods
And possibly other AirPlay 2 + HomeKit speakers
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I would be interested to hear from someone who can clarify this though, because if it's possible on AppleTV, it should be possible through MacOS.
It's also worth mentioning that the delay is not only present on MacOS but also on iOS devices too. Basically anything that buffers is good; anything immediate has the delay.
Except for one thing: when the HomePod Mini is used as a speakerphone for the iPhone, there is no delay with audio. How do they achieve that? Do they use Bluetooth for the speakerphone / calling from the HomePod, using the iPhone?I heard/read this was possible, but I'm not sure if it is or not because I don't own an Apple TV.
tvOS 14.2 on Apple TV 4K supports wireless game audio with HomePods
And possibly other AirPlay 2 + HomeKit speakers
I would be interested to hear from someone who can clarify this though, because if it's possible on AppleTV, it should be possible through MacOS.
It's also worth mentioning that the delay is not only present on MacOS but also on iOS devices too. Basically anything that buffers is good; anything immediate has the delay.
Yeah that’s why I’m curious to hear from ersan191, assuming he/she has homepods and is speaking from experience. If this is the case, it‘s complete news to me and quite baffling because one, as you said, anything immediate has delay (or should), and two, it certainly doesn’t work on my system.I heard/read this was possible, but I'm not sure if it is or not because I don't own an Apple TV.
tvOS 14.2 on Apple TV 4K supports wireless game audio with HomePods
And possibly other AirPlay 2 + HomeKit speakers
I would be interested to hear from someone who can clarify this though, because if it's possible on AppleTV, it should be possible through MacOS.
It's also worth mentioning that the delay is not only present on MacOS but also on iOS devices too. Basically anything that buffers is good; anything immediate has the delay.
edit- I was wrong. See post #79.
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