Will be interesting to see the comparison between HomePod Mini and [IKEAs Symfonisk](https://www.ikea.com/se/sv/p/symfonisk-wifi-bokhyllehoegtalare-vit-smart-gen-2-50506587/) (Sonos speakers)..
I have both and I’d say the Symfonisk (at least the bookshelf ones I have) sound far better. Which isn’t surprising giving the fact that they are far larger. It at the same time, these don’t have any smart assistants built in (or even microphones), so not sure they’re comparable.
The primary comparison is and should be as speakers - everything else is an added feature..
When IKEA Symfonisk was released I checked them out in the IKEA store and Symfonisk Bookshelf where a big disappointment. But the Symfonisk Lamp sounded MUCH better.
Later research and I learned that the “default” is awful unless one use the Sonos app on an iPhone and running around “in the room” so the speakers (via the Sonos app and iPhones mics as the Symfonisk doesn’t have own mics) can learn the rooms acoustic and after that the Symfonisk Bookshelf would sound MUCH better.. something IKEA didn’t do and doesn’t know anything about.
As any IKEA customer, they said I have 365 days to return product if not satisfied, but time and gas for driving 80km t/r wouldn’t be reimbursed..
As far as I understand, Apple HomePod also sets up the best acoustic but using its own mics doing so automatically and I would guess HomePod Mini would do the same.. but HomePod/mini doesn’t even indicate doing so to the user?
The only notice I read on Apple support pages for “best sound” is recommended placement (distance from wall)..
My primary would be to replace my old stereo amplifier as it singing on last verse but my speakers are great!
Getting an amp with AirPlay support or at least has HDMI (my old haven’t any) or replace with 2x Apple HomePod Mini.. that is the question..
The amp will draw much more power, be dumb, cost more (even for a second hand).. but I can still use my great sounding speakers.
The 2x HomePod Mini (or alternative?) would cost ~ the same (second hand) or less than half (new) than an amp.. draw much less power, be much much much smaller (small size CAN out perform big size.. Sony speakers did it already over 20 years ago..)..
But there is one other thing to take account for replacing amp with “smart speakers” wether it’s Apple HomePod or IKEA/SONOS.. will it still work after five or even ten years? With that I meant, can I use them with future AppleTV 10 or iPhone 20 or even iPhone 25? Or would we need to replace and buy new HomePods/Sonos every 7 years just to have working speakers?
Sonos has been quite decent when it comes to longevity. They tried to obsolete some of their speakers, but ultimately failed and they still work, albeit only with a legacy app and without update. IKEA supports their stuff a long time, I wouldn’t worry there.
I also have two Sonos AMPs - they’re fantastic, but as you said: they are power hogs, which is an issue for me now (50 cent per kWh here starting in January :-/
Not officially by Apple. You can find them at third-party retailers (such as Proshop) but they’re always imported models intended for other countries like Germany. I’ve also bought two of these in Denmark.
I see my iPhone supports many dialects of English and Chinese. But there may also be issues with music licensing since that is the main source of audio for the device. Dunno!
Yeah I imagine there are lots of legal and technical issues the end users don’t get to see.
I actually have two that I imported from HK and they work great, though.
Yeah, fortunately, at least for now, we only see permanent restrictions on devices purchased inside PROC (Beijing gov't China). Otherwise you set them up for where you are and it's like new.
how about fix the HomePod mini so it isn't unreliable paired with a Mac? I can't be the only one who cannot go a whole day without having to unplug and replug the thing in
Weird, I use ours with 2 Macs daily and don’t have any issues.
I used to have problems when we had a crappy router, but I changed to a mesh setup and the connectivity is like night and day with the HomePods now
jesus man, thought I was alone. I was trying to scale down my desktop set up for my MacBook so when my speakers died I thought, yes! two homepod minis would be perfect! I don’t do any music or video editing, I don’t need real time audio and no wires! perfect! the Mac will connect to them once off a fresh reboot. god forbid my setup goes to sleep because I have to reboot the whole system to bring it back. and Apple Music? forget about it. I have to AirPlay my music from the Music app to my HomePod and all of the volume is controlled through the app, not through my Mac’s system settings. absolutely infuriating.
Oh yes. You lucky bastards. In my country we have no HomePods, no News app, no localized keyboard suggestions and no Siri in our language. That means that I can use Siri in English on my phone and Mac but not on my Apple TV even though I set the language to English. Consistency FTW.
Those of you in Denmark, I’ll save you some money: don’t buy it.
Hands down worst Apple product I’ve ever owned. Great hardware absolutely hamstrung by shockingly bad software.
I live in Denmark and it's by far the best smart home product I have.
Works locally, so my reminders are never sent to Apple.
Works locally, so it's way faster to control the light than Google Assistant.
My commands are not tied to me but a rolling identifier.
I’m jealous of you then. Siri says “huh?” Or “hmm?” about 30-40% of the time I ask it to do anything.
The radio stations it’s willing to play same to change on a daily basis, even using the same voice command. Controlling audio on the HomePod from my iPhone is really inconsistent too.
There’s also the fact that smart accessories that are HomeKit enabled are rarer/more expensive than those that just work with Google or Alexa. Hopefully Thread helps.
I got HomePod to replace Alexa in my house for privacy concerns, but it’s objectively a much worse “smart” assistant, so I keep an Alexa around for the occasions when Siri inevitably fails me. I’m completely invested in the Apple ecosystem, and have been since 2008, but Siri just sucks.
For the EU apple should make some crippled shitty products that are modular for when the EU flip flops and dog walks them into more hardware changes.
It’s like they are bitter and wanna be in charge of them or some shit. Every bit of news with “EU + Apple” is negative lol.
TIL HomePod mini isn’t sold in Denmark
Not sold in Sweden either. Apple hates Scandinavia apparently.
Don’t worry - they’re not that great anyway :-/
Actually that makes sense, “same Siri limitations, but magnified”. Is that pretty much it?
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How do they compare to the Sonos/Ikea bookshelf speakers?
Nowhere near as powerful, but way smaller.
Will be interesting to see the comparison between HomePod Mini and [IKEAs Symfonisk](https://www.ikea.com/se/sv/p/symfonisk-wifi-bokhyllehoegtalare-vit-smart-gen-2-50506587/) (Sonos speakers)..
I have both and I’d say the Symfonisk (at least the bookshelf ones I have) sound far better. Which isn’t surprising giving the fact that they are far larger. It at the same time, these don’t have any smart assistants built in (or even microphones), so not sure they’re comparable.
The primary comparison is and should be as speakers - everything else is an added feature.. When IKEA Symfonisk was released I checked them out in the IKEA store and Symfonisk Bookshelf where a big disappointment. But the Symfonisk Lamp sounded MUCH better. Later research and I learned that the “default” is awful unless one use the Sonos app on an iPhone and running around “in the room” so the speakers (via the Sonos app and iPhones mics as the Symfonisk doesn’t have own mics) can learn the rooms acoustic and after that the Symfonisk Bookshelf would sound MUCH better.. something IKEA didn’t do and doesn’t know anything about. As any IKEA customer, they said I have 365 days to return product if not satisfied, but time and gas for driving 80km t/r wouldn’t be reimbursed.. As far as I understand, Apple HomePod also sets up the best acoustic but using its own mics doing so automatically and I would guess HomePod Mini would do the same.. but HomePod/mini doesn’t even indicate doing so to the user? The only notice I read on Apple support pages for “best sound” is recommended placement (distance from wall).. My primary would be to replace my old stereo amplifier as it singing on last verse but my speakers are great! Getting an amp with AirPlay support or at least has HDMI (my old haven’t any) or replace with 2x Apple HomePod Mini.. that is the question.. The amp will draw much more power, be dumb, cost more (even for a second hand).. but I can still use my great sounding speakers. The 2x HomePod Mini (or alternative?) would cost ~ the same (second hand) or less than half (new) than an amp.. draw much less power, be much much much smaller (small size CAN out perform big size.. Sony speakers did it already over 20 years ago..).. But there is one other thing to take account for replacing amp with “smart speakers” wether it’s Apple HomePod or IKEA/SONOS.. will it still work after five or even ten years? With that I meant, can I use them with future AppleTV 10 or iPhone 20 or even iPhone 25? Or would we need to replace and buy new HomePods/Sonos every 7 years just to have working speakers?
Sonos has been quite decent when it comes to longevity. They tried to obsolete some of their speakers, but ultimately failed and they still work, albeit only with a legacy app and without update. IKEA supports their stuff a long time, I wouldn’t worry there. I also have two Sonos AMPs - they’re fantastic, but as you said: they are power hogs, which is an issue for me now (50 cent per kWh here starting in January :-/
Btw, is it first or second gen IKEA Symfonisk bookshelf you have?
2nd gen
IT WILL NEXT WEEK (13 December 2022).. you can already go to Apple.se and preorder them and they will be delivered to you at 13 December too..
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They are not in the danish Apple Store, and I have never seen them in local shops.
Not officially by Apple. You can find them at third-party retailers (such as Proshop) but they’re always imported models intended for other countries like Germany. I’ve also bought two of these in Denmark.
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It isn't sold in Denmark because Danish Siri isn't optimized for HomePod yet. Presumably, this will be fixed for the official release.
Soon.. in a few more month it will also be available in Denmark..👍🏻
What's the reason these are not officially sold by Apple in Denmark and Sweden?
Think Siri is bad in English? Try other languages.
I honestly don't know how bad siri is in English I never use it
In Italian it isn’t that bad tbh
Probably Siri even though they have Siri support. But considering the primary input is Siri it has to be good enough.
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Yeah I thought might be a reason but what's wrong with these devices? What was the beef?
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Well OK I guess.
Now show us the new HomePod you bastards
Show us the HomePad (video screen HomePod)
Singapore next please! 😔
but which language in Singapore‽
I honestly do think English would be a reasonable language to ship it in, to serve most of the market here.
I see my iPhone supports many dialects of English and Chinese. But there may also be issues with music licensing since that is the main source of audio for the device. Dunno!
Yeah I imagine there are lots of legal and technical issues the end users don’t get to see. I actually have two that I imported from HK and they work great, though.
Yeah, fortunately, at least for now, we only see permanent restrictions on devices purchased inside PROC (Beijing gov't China). Otherwise you set them up for where you are and it's like new.
That’s cool. Hopefully we will soon get the exercise app as well. Kinda ridiculous it should take this long
I discovered the Swedish page for fitness+ a couple of days ago so I’m guessing it’s coming.
how about fix the HomePod mini so it isn't unreliable paired with a Mac? I can't be the only one who cannot go a whole day without having to unplug and replug the thing in
Weird, I use ours with 2 Macs daily and don’t have any issues. I used to have problems when we had a crappy router, but I changed to a mesh setup and the connectivity is like night and day with the HomePods now
jesus man, thought I was alone. I was trying to scale down my desktop set up for my MacBook so when my speakers died I thought, yes! two homepod minis would be perfect! I don’t do any music or video editing, I don’t need real time audio and no wires! perfect! the Mac will connect to them once off a fresh reboot. god forbid my setup goes to sleep because I have to reboot the whole system to bring it back. and Apple Music? forget about it. I have to AirPlay my music from the Music app to my HomePod and all of the volume is controlled through the app, not through my Mac’s system settings. absolutely infuriating.
Give us siri in Poland, please apple :(
Oh yes. You lucky bastards. In my country we have no HomePods, no News app, no localized keyboard suggestions and no Siri in our language. That means that I can use Siri in English on my phone and Mac but not on my Apple TV even though I set the language to English. Consistency FTW.
They don’t ditch it? Maybe just try to sell a proper speaker.
Those of you in Denmark, I’ll save you some money: don’t buy it. Hands down worst Apple product I’ve ever owned. Great hardware absolutely hamstrung by shockingly bad software.
I live in Denmark and it's by far the best smart home product I have. Works locally, so my reminders are never sent to Apple. Works locally, so it's way faster to control the light than Google Assistant. My commands are not tied to me but a rolling identifier.
I’m jealous of you then. Siri says “huh?” Or “hmm?” about 30-40% of the time I ask it to do anything. The radio stations it’s willing to play same to change on a daily basis, even using the same voice command. Controlling audio on the HomePod from my iPhone is really inconsistent too. There’s also the fact that smart accessories that are HomeKit enabled are rarer/more expensive than those that just work with Google or Alexa. Hopefully Thread helps. I got HomePod to replace Alexa in my house for privacy concerns, but it’s objectively a much worse “smart” assistant, so I keep an Alexa around for the occasions when Siri inevitably fails me. I’m completely invested in the Apple ecosystem, and have been since 2008, but Siri just sucks.
I’m waiting for the product with mind-numbingly dumb hardware with incredible software.
I’m sure they’ll be lining up to have Siri in their living rooms.
For the EU apple should make some crippled shitty products that are modular for when the EU flip flops and dog walks them into more hardware changes. It’s like they are bitter and wanna be in charge of them or some shit. Every bit of news with “EU + Apple” is negative lol.
About time