Speculative Report Claims 'Low-Priced' HomePod Will Fall Under Beats Brand

[Nikiaf]

Beats branding would be dangerous. A large proportion of the "audiophile" community they seem to like marketing the HomePod to will dismiss such a device instantly, potentially alienating a lot of prospective buyers.

But beyond that, I don't think $350 is unreasonable for a smart speaker, I just think it's unreasonable for a smart speaker that pales in comparison to far cheaper ones when it comes to the "smart" aspect. Based on how many terrible bluetooth speakers are sold every day, I don't think massively better audio quality alone is enough to sell units. If anything, take Siri out entirely and market this new one as a Sonos Play:1 competitor that can work as either a Wifi or bluetooth speaker and nothing else. For the value proposition, make it splashproof and double as a speakerphone. Done, it'll sell like hotcakes.

 

[oneMadRssn]

And it does everything they advertise it to do.

I never said it didn't.

Though, I think it fairly debatable whether it is "an intelligent home assistant, capable of handling everyday tasks." That's a bit of an overreach as there are quite a large number of everyday tasks it cannot handle and quite a few everyday scenarios where it is anything but intelligent.

 

[Michael Goff]

I never said it didn't.

Though, I think it fairly debatable whether it is "an intelligent home assistant, capable of handling everyday tasks." That's a bit of an overreach as there are quite a large number of everyday tasks it cannot handle and quite a few everyday scenarios where it is anything but intelligent.

None of the Assistants are actually intelligent, not even the Google one.

 

[spazzcat]

No, you can’t. People either honestly can’t hear a difference or the fact that the HomePod costs $300.00 more is too big of a hurdle for them to overlook. And that’s ignoring how poorly Siri works as a personal assistant in comparison to Alexa and Google Home. This should have been expected by Apple marketing and either some creative commercial strategy put in place to channel expectations or Apple should have released a product that was capable of being favorably reviewed when comparisons like this were made, because such comparisons were inevitable.

If $300 is the deal breaker for someone, then they are not in the market that Apple is targeting.

 

[x-evil-x]

I love my echo spot. I don’t need a good sounding speaker I have surround sound in every room of my place. And siri doesn’t work? Why would I want a HomePod again?
I’d like using HomeKit for everything because it is instant and amazon stuff lags but I’m not spending 300+ on sometning that I don’t see working or even fitting into my interior design choices.
I’d love a little clock with differen screens showing the weather like my spot but with Apple I don’t see that happening.

 

[oneMadRssn]

None of the Assistants are actually intelligent, not even the Google one.

Of course none of them are actually intelligent in the same way human beings are intelligent (though some might argue that new Google demo a few weeks ago beat the Turing test, albeit that is not a live feature yet and we all know that Google has a habit of announcing features that never actually make it live).

But we can compare them within the meaning and context of "artificial intelligence" as it exists today in consumer-level devices. There are objective ways to try to analyze this. It's been done; and it shows that the HP is last in the pack.

You know the joke - What do you call the guy who graduated med school ranked last in his class? You call him Doctor. I guess the same applies to the HP: last in its class but it's still a smart speaker.
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If $300 is the deal breaker for someone, then they are not in the market that Apple is targeting.

You're oversimplifying. Consumers usually don't think like that, and Apple should know it.

It's more like: I have set a budget of $5000 for myself on unnecessary consumer electronic gizmos this year. I want smart speakers, but I want other stuff too - I could use a new TV and this iPad is getting long in the tooth. How much of that budget am I willing to spend on smart speakers? It depends, but probably not too much on something frivolous like a dedicated IoT voice-assistant speaker...

I can get two Sonos Ones for $400
I can get one HomePod for $350
I can get two HomePods for $700
I can get two Google Home's and a Google Home Mini for $335
I can get two Amazon Echos and two Amazon Echo Dots for $300​

So... if I don't go for HomePods I can get a bigger TV!

 

[Soccertess]

Apple is so freakin lost it's not even funny anymore. You have a company too big to fail but making bad product decisions.

Tim needs to go. This is a perfect example of what is wrong with Apple. Their engineers can do amazing things, but with no leadership, the engineers are making products with their hands tied behind them.

No leadership on Siri, no leadership on home connectivity, and with a limited eco system, homepod was dead on arrive except those who only live in the Apple ecosystem and who don't care about the latest tech. For those who want the latest tech, the functionality of homepod is just not there because Apple keeps making poor strategic decisions on were their ecosystem is going.

 

[ipedro]

Siri wouldn't make sense on Beats. I expect an Airplay 2 Beats speaker for sure, and it can even be based on the work that went into developing the HomePod, but Siri, that's an Apple thing. Unless of course Apple is planning to license Siri to third parties, in which case Beats would be a good place to start the roll out.

 

[Braderunner]

After talking to Siri, it seems there will be a new HomePod. But, I don’t believe it will be branded as Beats.

 

[FelixDerKater]

Apple can’t lower its price for image reasons, but the Beats can drop.

 

[EdT]

If $300 is the deal breaker for someone, then they are not in the market that Apple is targeting.

Exactly what market are they targeting? Audiophiles? I don't know an audiophile who thinks streaming music from any of the popular sites like Spotify or Amazon or Apple to be anywhere near audiophile quality.

Here are a few sites to back up that statement:

• -https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/music-sites-audiophiles-need-lives/
• https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/is-using-streaming-services-worthy-of-an-audiophile
  
• https://www.slashgear.com/top-3-ways-to-stream-hi-res-music-2017-09477951/
  
• https://www.ludwig-van.com/toronto/...-high-end-audio-options-for-online-streaming/

These sites claim to be audiophile sites. You can find sites that rate streaming services and they mostly pick Spotify, for both cost and number of songs available. But for audiophiles, the bitrate matters. Spotify is 320 kbps. Google Music is also 320, and Apple Music is 255 kbs, making Apple the worst choice of the bunch. Tidal has a premium service with bit rates of 1,411, AND it uses a lossless format which neither Apple, Spotify, Google nor Amazon use. It's also $20 a month for a single user. But we're talking about people who say they care more about the sound than the price if you're talking about audiophiles.

Is this the market you think is going to buy a HomePod?

The HomePod isn't an audiophile device. Especially since it is mostly locked to Apple Music, without jumping through a hoop or two. Apple wants to be taken seriously as a music provider? Offer an upgraded tier where the bit rates are CD or better quality and compete price wise with the services that offer that kind of streaming service. Which is a lot more expensive than Spotify or any of the other services, but we are talking about high end music equipment and sources. Even if it is only because of the snob factor there is a group of people who will pay extra to get that level of performance even if 99 out of 100 people really and honestly can't hear the difference between Tidal, Deezer (this service is tied to Sonos only) or other CD quality bitrate streaming sites and Spotify/Apple.

The problem with the HomePod for this group of people is that the speaker isn't expensive enough, and the streaming source isn't CD quality or better.

 

[robbyx]

Main reason is the voice assistant - Siri which doesn't seem to quite as good as Alexa or Google... that's why Apple would have had a better chance of getting people to buy the Homepod with a cheaper price point - that if someone really wanted Apple product over Amazon or Google.
Apple might be working on Siri improvements but if it's going to take another year or two and they wanted to get a foothold in the smart-speaker category otherwise risk conceding it to Amazon and Google during that time, their better option would have been offering a lower price to make it attractive for customers.

I still don’t follow your logic. Why would anyone choose a less capable voice assistant just to buy Apple? If the speaker was cheap and had an Apple logo, it wouldn’t matter that Siri was less capable? I think it matters a lot. It’s everything. There aren’t that many people out there who so dislike Amazon or Google that they’d willingly choose a worse assistant. That’s the domain of tech geeks, not consumers.

You buy a speaker first and foremost for sound. Apple did a good job there. But there are plenty of other good speakers. Apple has no real advantage when it comes to sound. So that leaves tech and so far that aspect is a disappointment.

When Apple got into MP3 players, they showed us a better way. Same with routers. Configuring an airport router was so much easier and more pleasant that any other router at the time. They improved upon smart watches and showed us the retro scifi dream of a wrist computer was alive and well. But with HomePod they did nothing special. They released a half-baked product with key features missing and a less capable assistant.

I don’t think they’d sell well at $100 less, not until they offer something truly better than countless other products out there.

 

[CarpalMac]

Why?

Other than better audio quality, a $50 dot is more useful in every way imaginable. And a $100 pair of amplified stereo speakers plugged into the dot can easily match the audio quality of a HP.

Apple needs to learn that there is more to competition than brand and price tiers. In these IoT segments, people will cross-shop vastly different price ranges and types of products.

Am almost tempted to register some new accounts on MR just so I can like your post, lots.

 

[fairuz]

I don't know if anything cheapens the HomePod more than referring to it as the HP. That name is synonymous with low quality plastic crap, of lesser value than already terrible brands such as Dell and Lenovo.

Anyways, on the topic of brand, slapping a Beats logo on a speaker makes it an instant no-buy for me (and tying both together - didn't HP and Beats used to partner together for promotions?)

Every year I turn Siri on for a few minutes on my iPhone. Every year I find she's just as brain dead and useless as she was in 2011 and I turn her back off. It's quite amazing how in seven years, Apple hasn't made any progress on this front despite regularly promoting her.

There were the HP Beats by Dr Dre laptops, the worst PCs I could ever imagine buying.
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Why?

Other than better audio quality, a $50 dot is more useful in every way imaginable. And a $100 pair of amplified stereo speakers plugged into the dot can easily match the audio quality of a HP.

Apple needs to learn that there is more to competition than brand and price tiers. In these IoT segments, people will cross-shop vastly different price ranges and types of products.

Too bad you can no longer get a (new) AirPort Express to provide AirPlay for that Dot... whatever a Dot is... haven't heard of it cause I don't plan on buying smart speakers.

 

[bluecoast]

I’ve got to admit, I just don’t get this smart speaker thing, full stop.

Are people really so time poor that they can’t use a remote or go to the Amazon app etc?

Not to mention, having something listening into everything going on in your house.

When we have AI that genuinely is smart - I get that (although the ‘listening to everything going on’ thing will be even creepier).

But at the moment, it feels like paying to test an early alpha product.

Sure, that’s always been the way of tech enthusiasts and I get it that it’s only with big datasets that these products can improve ie so that’s why companies are marketing these things to ‘regular people’.

In that regard, the Dot kinda makes sense as it’s not too much money to make you feel a little sci-fi. And Alexa improves every few weeks.

Whereas Apple is asking you to pay lots for a good (mono!) speaker when there are loads of better systems out there for the same or less and to use a virtual assistant that

a) doesn’t work very well
b) you have no idea as to when it’ll be updated.

I can see how a beats product would work here, but again, if you have $200 and you value good sound, why wouldn’t you just spend it on the best wi-fi speakers and ditch the virtual assistant.

What would Siri be adding here?

 

[gaanee]

Apple fans would surely consider Homepod just because it's Apple and therefore could better integrate with iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Music... even if not from day one but with future updates.
It's likely that Apple realized Siri is not ready for prime time competing against Alexa and Google but they couldn't have afforded waiting for 2 more years for Siri to improve and then release Homepod because by that time the market would have been dominated by Alexa and Google and not much developer support for Siri. So Apple needed a smart-speaker maybe just as a placeholder for now and they can always improve Siri which is mostly on the server side and release software updates in the future

Why would anyone choose a less capable voice assistant just to buy Apple?

 

[EdT]

I can see how a beats product would work here, but again, if you have $200 and you value good sound, why wouldn’t you just spend it on the best wi-fi speakers and ditch the virtual assistant.

What would Siri be adding here?

The crux of the problem is that Apple is touting sound quality while offering the lowest bit rate streaming service, which right now directly ties to sound quality, AND has an assistant that is not as capable as the ones their competitors have. Yes, I get that having an always listening mic can and probably is being abused, but look at any thread anywhere that talks about speakers with smart assistants and people don’t care about being spied upon. When confronted by someone who points out that privacy is being ignored they usually say that they don’t care. That’s not just on MacRumors that’s on any smart speaker site. They. Don’t. Care.

They do care about price, and they care if the smart assistant usually works. That’s about it.

Most don’t care about sound either. You CAN’T get as good of sound out of a cheap speaker. So arguing about how much better the HomePod sounds, and how it is therefore worth 150-300 dollars more isn’t going to change their minds there either.

And this is where I think that Apple is lying to customers. If you could play Spotify thru the HomePod the exact same way you can play Apple Music AND you are a critical listener then the HomePod would sound better with Spotify because there is more music data per second than with Apple Music. And both of them are far far below CD quality. CD quality streaming sites exist, but they aren’t terribly popular. They cost more per month and people don’t want to pay the difference to get better sound. But Apple preening about sound quality while not having decent bit rates is hypocritical. Yes you have a better quality speaker but that is limited by the service you’ve tied it to. But most people don’t care about sound quality so I don’t think it’s economicaly important to have a better sounding speaker. So if Apple wants HomePod to be a resounding success make Siri the undisputed smart assistant champion. They will sell a lot more devices that way than harping about sound.

 

[oneMadRssn]

Too bad you can no longer get a (new) AirPort Express to provide AirPlay for that Dot... whatever a Dot is... haven't heard of it cause I don't plan on buying smart speakers.

I agree. Apple does a lot of stuff well, but one thing they do quite poorly is adapting their products to how customers use them. I don't think they ever intended the Airport Express to become a mini wireless amp used to power stereo speakers - yet that is how many people ended up using it. Rather than embracing it and adapting the product to how it was being used, they killed it off. Front Row is another example of this, Apple didn't embrace how users were using it and instead turned it into something completely different.
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The crux of the problem is that Apple is touting sound quality while offering the lowest bit rate streaming service, which right now directly ties to sound quality, AND has an assistant that is not as capable as the ones their competitors have. Yes, I get that having an always listening mic can and probably is being abused, but look at any thread anywhere that talks about speakers with smart assistants and people don’t care about being spied upon. When confronted by someone who points out that privacy is being ignored they usually say that they don’t care. That’s not just on MacRumors that’s on any smart speaker site. They. Don’t. Care.

I don't think that is entirely true. Sure the bitrate is lower, but AAC is the best compression out there today. I can't find it now, but there was a blind study that showed listeners found 256kbps AAC to sound better than 320kbps OGG. Honestly I agree with the study. Spotify on maximum quality sounds meh compared to Apple Music. I am still a Spotify subscriber, but I do wish they used AAC. Yes, lossless would be better, but if comparing compressed audio, the encoder matters more than the bitrate.

And this is where I think that Apple is lying to customers. If you could play Spotify thru the HomePod the exact same way you can play Apple Music AND you are a critical listener then the HomePod would sound better with Spotify because there is more music data per second than with Apple Music. And both of them are far far below CD quality. CD quality streaming sites exist, but they aren’t terribly popular. They cost more per month and people don’t want to pay the difference to get better sound. But Apple preening about sound quality while not having decent bit rates is hypocritical. Yes you have a better quality speaker but that is limited by the service you’ve tied it to. But most people don’t care about sound quality so I don’t think it’s economicaly important to have a better sounding speaker. So if Apple wants HomePod to be a resounding success make Siri the undisputed smart assistant champion. They will sell a lot more devices that way than harping about sound.

I don't think it is correct to blame the consumer here. The music companies came up with this entirely fictional distinction - low quality sound for low cost and high quality sound for high cost. It isn't cheaper to record, produce, and release low quality sound than high quality sound. They're purposefully degrading the quality as a means of getting consumers to pay more.

Imagine if Coke suddenly started watering down Coca-Cola to be 75% normal Coca-Cola and 25% water, calling it "Coca-Cola," and introduced a new full-strength soda for double the price which is 100% Coca-Cola called "Coca-Cola Premium." People would be angry. That's essentially what the music companies are doing though...

 

[sracer]

You are not in Apples HomePod market.

According to their description of what the HomePod does, I am. It just doesn't do it well IMO.

Are you saying that the product speaks for itself in that if I'm satisfied with the HomePod as-is, then I am in Apple's HomePod market, but if I find any deficiencies in their product, then I'm not?

 

[spazzcat]

According to their description of what the HomePod does, I am. It just doesn't do it well IMO.

Are you saying that the product speaks for itself in that if I'm satisfied with the HomePod as-is, then I am in Apple's HomePod market, but if I find any deficiencies in their product, then I'm not?

People that are stating that $300 is too much for a quilty speaker that sounds great is who I am talking about. People will always find fault in what Apple produces. We don't know where Apple will take the product in the future. But in IMO this is just the start, just like the iPhone and Apple Watch. The difference in the HomePod is they didn't skimp on the hardware for a first gen.

 

[sracer]

People that are stating that $300 is too much for a quilty speaker that sounds great is who I am talking about. People will always find fault in what Apple produces. We don't know where Apple will take the product in the future. But in IMO this is just the start, just like the iPhone and Apple Watch. The difference in the HomePod is they didn't skimp on the hardware for a first gen.

You claimed that I'm not in Apple's HomePod market. I didn't say or imply that $300 was too much for a quality speaker. But it *IS* for a quality speaker that is restricted in how it can be used. $300 for an open-standard speaker of the HomePod's sound quality? I'd be all over it.

So when you say that I'm not in Apple's HomePod market, then a reasonable conclusion to draw is that Apple's HomePod market is for people who want a proprietary quality speaker that is restricted to Apple's ecosystem. In that respect, you are correct, I'm not in Apple's HomePod market.

 

[oneMadRssn]

People that are stating that $300 is too much for a quilty speaker that sounds great is who I am talking about. People will always find fault in what Apple produces. We don't know where Apple will take the product in the future. But in IMO this is just the start, just like the iPhone and Apple Watch. The difference in the HomePod is they didn't skimp on the hardware for a first gen.

Nobody is stating $300 is too much for a quality speaker that sounds great. Nobody looks at things in isolation like that. $300 is too much for a quality speaker that sounds great when compared to every other quality speaker that sounds great on the market right now. $300 can buy you two speakers of equal quality with much more utility. This isn't like the old Mac vs PC days, where PCs were technically more useful but Macs were more expensive but higher quality.

Look I love Apple - I don't see myself switching away from using an iPhone and Macbook and AppleTV anytime soon. But Apple does screw up. For every home run they hit recently (AirPods), they release some duds (HomePod). Good news for you is usually the duds become collectibles and highly sought-after (Newton, 20th Anniversary Macintosh, Cube, Pippin, HiFi).

Maybe the HomePod won't be a dud - it has the hardware to be a huge success but the software is totally lacking and underwhelming compares to what else is out there. Apple is just very very late to this market, and no amount of money or resources can get them caught up within a year. (you know the saying, nine women can't make one baby in one month).

No synced multiroom audio (yet)
No stereo pairing (yet)
No support for third-party streaming services (yet)
No app integration (yet)
Automation options are extremely limited and lacking in support (for now)

All of this can be fixed - but will Apple fix it faster than the competition can keep improving? I hope so, but I also doubt it.

 

[EdT]

I agree. Apple does a lot of stuff well, but one thing they do quite poorly is adapting their products to how customers use them. I don't think they ever intended the Airport Express to become a mini wireless amp used to power stereo speakers - yet that is how many people ended up using it. Rather than embracing it and adapting the product to how it was being used, they killed it off. Front Row is another example of this, Apple didn't embrace how users were using it and instead turned it into something completely different.
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I don't think that is entirely true. Sure the bitrate is lower, but AAC is the best compression out there today. I can't find it now, but there was a blind study that showed listeners found 256kbps AAC to sound better than 320kbps OGG. Honestly I agree with the study. Spotify on maximum quality sounds meh compared to Apple Music. I am still a Spotify subscriber, but I do wish they used AAC. Yes, lossless would be better, but if comparing compressed audio, the encoder matters more than the bitrate.


I don't think it is correct to blame the consumer here. The music companies came up with this entirely fictional distinction - low quality sound for low cost and high quality sound for high cost. It isn't cheaper to record, produce, and release low quality sound than high quality sound. They're purposefully degrading the quality as a means of getting consumers to pay more.

Imagine if Coke suddenly started watering down Coca-Cola to be 75% normal Coca-Cola and 25% water, calling it "Coca-Cola," and introduced a new full-strength soda for double the price which is 100% Coca-Cola called "Coca-Cola Premium." People would be angry. That's essentially what the music companies are doing though...

The claim that AAC is comparable at 256 mbs to 320 mbs is debatable but I think it’s ultimately pointless as far as HomePod sales and popularity goes. I don’t think better sound appeals to very many people, and certainly not when it’s hundreds of dollars more. Yes there are people who do care about sound quality. Just not a high percentage of them. If HomePod was $20-50 more you might sway some people. But even then most people who comment on any of these speaker threads always point out that Siri isn’t as good as Amazon/Google voice assistants. The HomePod is going to be compared to other speakers AND the personal assistants used by them and if people perceive that those assistants are easier or more versatile than Siri then it won’t matter how much better HomePod sounds. Most consumers don’t care. Apple needs to get in front of assistant AI if they want HomePod-and ultimately Apple TV, CarPlay and Siri on MacBooks and iMacs - to be a market leader. More devices are becoming voice controlled and Apple needs at a very minimum to be as good as their competition.

There is and has been a market for high end sound, with whatever name you want to put on it. It’s always been an expensive niche market without a lot of sales. People don’t believe expensive sound is worth it because a lot of people really can’t hear a difference. Trying to position your product solely on sound quality is a way to be relegated to the margins. People will pay a little bit more if experts agree that something sounds better but a little bit isn’t hundreds of dollars. And they won’t spend more at all if some convenience feature is available for less money on a competitors product.

 

[oneMadRssn]

The claim that AAC is comparable at 256 mbs to 320 mbs is debatable but I think it’s ultimately pointless as far as HomePod sales and popularity goes. I don’t think better sound appeals to very many people, and certainly not when it’s hundreds of dollars more. Yes there are people who do care about sound quality. Just not a high percentage of them. If HomePod was $20-50 more you might sway some people. But even then most people who comment on any of these speaker threads always point out that Siri isn’t as good as Amazon/Google voice assistants. The HomePod is going to be compared to other speakers AND the personal assistants used by them and if people perceive that those assistants are easier or more versatile then Siri then it won’t matter how much better HomePod sounds. Most consumers don’t care. Apple needs to get in front of assistant AI if they want HomePod-and ultimately Apple TV, CarPlay and Siri on MacBooks and iMacs - to be a market leader. More devices are becoming voice controlled and Apple needs at a very minimum to be as good as their competition.

There is and has been a market for high end sound, with whatever name you want to put on it. It’s always been an expensive niche market without a lot of sales. People don’t believe expensive sound is worth it because a lot of people really can’t hear a difference. Trying to position your product solely on sound quality is a way to be relegated to the margins. People will pay a little bit more if experts agree that something sounds better but a little bit isn’t hundreds of dollars. And they won’t spend more at all if some convenience feature is available for less money on a competitors product.

I agree, 100%. Especially the bolded parts above. My concern is that Apply is simply too late to the market. Even if Google and Amazon stopped improving their voice assistants, Apple wouldn't catch up for at least a year. But at the pace at which Google and Amazon are improving, I don't see how Apple can ever catch up organically.

The one niche Apple has that is extremely valuable is privacy. I'm honestly surprised they aren't more aggressive about this in their marketing. I wonder if they don't want to go all-in on privacy just in case they decide to change directions later. - sort of preserving options.

But imagine if they were as aggressive with privacy marketing as they were in those old I'm a Mac, I'm a PC ads - directly calling out the flaws of their competitors:

"Hi I'm Siri, you can trust me because nothing you say to me ever leaves this room."
"And I'm Alexa, I share things you ask me with all my friends at Amazon, including things you said before your question."
"Alexa, that's kind of creepy. A voice assistant should be powerful enough to answer questions all on their own." "Powerful enough? I don't understand."
Privacy.​

 

[robbyx]

Apple fans would surely consider Homepod just because it's Apple and therefore could better integrate with iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Music... even if not from day one but with future updates.
It's likely that Apple realized Siri is not ready for prime time competing against Alexa and Google but they couldn't have afforded waiting for 2 more years for Siri to improve and then release Homepod because by that time the market would have been dominated by Alexa and Google and not much developer support for Siri. So Apple needed a smart-speaker maybe just as a placeholder for now and they can always improve Siri which is mostly on the server side and release software updates in the future

I can’t really argue with your logic. I just think you probably grossly overestimate the number of “Apple fans” who want this. If such demand existed, the current HomePod would be selling much better. After all, Apple fans aren’t exactly the most price conscious to begin with. I just don’t buy the argument that price really matters here. It’s about utility and HomePod simply doesn’t measure up.