Professional grade acoustic tests appear to confirm that the HomePod is indeed the real deal as far as speakers go.
Apple has been talking up its smart adaptive speaker and high-end audio processing algorithms since the HomePod was first shown off at last year’s WWDC event. According to Apple, the HomePod can adapt its sound to fill any room it’s put in. It seems it wasn’t kidding!
Carried out by Fast Company with the aid of acoustics testing company NTi Audio AG, the test involved placing the HomePod on a 30-inch high table next to a wall, and setting it to play a white noise test sound which produces an equal amount of decibels throughout the frequency spectrum.
The resulting sound was then recorded from four different locations in the room across the full frequency spectrum (6.3Hz through 20,000Hz) to see how the sound profile changed according to location. The conclusion? It doesn’t change very much at all, with an average variance for all audible frequency bands being less than a decibel. For those keeping track at home, this variance is virtually inaudible to the human ear.
As Fast Company notes:
“The developers have done an excellent job of having the HomePod adjust to the room; (it has) Impressive consistency in overall level and frequency response,” said NTi’s MacMillan. “The HomePod automates spatial compensation that previously required a real audiophile’s expertise, tools and time,” he said.
The HomePod’s impressive sound quality
So far, just about every reviewer (including our own one) has mentioned the high quality sound produced by Apple’s $350 HomePod smart speaker. The only exception has been Consumer Reports, although they focused more on the sound of songs, rather than the HomePod’s impressive patented technology for filling the space.
We’re a bit more concerned about the device’s less-than-smart Siri AI assistant, although that’s a different story!!
What do you make of HomePod’s room-filling adaptive tech? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.
Source: Fast Company
Luke Dormehl is a U.K.-based journalist and author, with a background working in documentary film for Channel 4 and the BBC. He is the author of The Apple Revolution and The Formula: How Algorithms Solve All Our Problems … and Create More, both published by Penguin/Random House. His tech writing has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, Techmeme and other publications.
3 responses to “Pro-grade acoustic tests find HomePod delivers on its promises”
Amazing sound, as long as you are paying Apple for a subscription or want to use a relatively new IOS device as an ‘iPod’.
No mac support (!!!), no applet Tv support (!!), no multi-room (!), no bluetooth support (no surprise it is Apple), no ability to play sound from the TV or home theatre…
I’m in the market for a home speaker, and unfortunately Apple have pushed me elsewhere. Can I actually buy a Samsung product (R5 on crazy special) – I doubt it, but at this stage the Apple ecosystem is getting closer to being dropped here.
You can cast any sound from your iDevice or Mac computer by using airplay.
(Including Spotify or Google Music or whatever service you use). You might not be able to control it with Siri fully, but personally I don’t like using Siri.
I don’t love the idea of only being able to use airplay, but on the other hand it never lets me down. Compared to other solutions, Airplay (wifi) is amazing, and always work. Bluetooth is awful for reliability and distance.
Regarding Apple TV, I hope they will figure out how to play from it to the HomePod, and frankly I’ll be surprised if they don’t work it out soon.
Multiroom will work with Airplay2.
‘From your Mac’ – where do you get this from? I was told twice from different support / sales staff this will only come with airplay 2 and no details of what macs will have access to airplay 2.
It launches as an iOS speaker