Boasting superior sound quality and a high-quality finish that ditches metal and plastic for distressed leather and fabrics, Cavalier Maverick is one of the best smart speakers we’ve tried.
It’s a third-party Amazon Alexa, offering the same functionality as an Echo, but in a far more premium package. And with a pretty neat mobile twist, too.
Google is planning to take on Amazon with its own screen-equipped smart speaker, a new report claims.
Amazon introduced its Amazon Echo Show in June 2017, followed by the smaller, cuter Amazon Echo Spot alarm clock a few months later in September 2017.
Apple’s HomePod speaker sales might be weaker than previously estimated by analysts. The latest quarterly research report from Strategy Analytics claims that HomePod sales numbers only totaled 700,000 units.
Along with its newest smartphone, Samsung just unveiled two more products designed to take on some of Apple’s. The Galaxy Watch isn’t the Korean company’s first Apple Watch competitor, but this is the first time it’s unveiled a HomePod rival.
Apple dominates smartwatch sales, so Samsung faces an uphill battle. Amazon has the lead in smartspeakers though, and Apple has shown it’s not an easy market to break into.
Sonos shares made moderate gains today during the company’s first day of trading on the Nasdaq. Investors don’t seem too worried that the smart speaker maker faces tough competition from the likes of Apple and Google.
The smart speaker contest may be a two-horse race between the Amazon Echo and Google Home, but Apple’s HomePod is starting to carve out a share as well.
According to new research from Consumer Intelligence Research Partners, the total smart speaker market has now reached 50 million units in the United States. Among the installed base of U.S. devices, Amazon has 70 percent, Google has 24 percent and Apple has 6 percent.
Apple and DJ Khaled made a commercial of true cross-promotion genius. Khaled gets to plug his latest single No Brainer by plugging Apple Music. Siri, HomePod and iPhone X also each get a turn to shine.
But stealing the minute-and-half show was Khaled’s toddler son, Asahd, who, with help from the voice of comedian Kevin Hart, is caught with an iPhone X in a highchair nagging his attorney to aggressively negotiate for more money.
HomePod’s rumored voice calling feature has been all but confirmed in iOS 12 beta 5.
A new “Personal Requests” setup screen now displays an additional icon where the Phone app will sit, and reads “make phone calls” in its list of abilities. It indicates HomePod users will be able to initiate calls for the first time when iOS 12 makes its public debut this fall.
This week on The CultCast: Apple has issued a patch that significantly increases performance for all 2018 MacBook Pros, but there’s one glaring problem it doesn’t fix…. We talk benchmarks and real-world performance. Plus, we take a peek at the new HomePod features from iOS 12 beta, and we wrap up with your emails!
Our thanks to Squarespace for supporting this episode. It’s simple to accept Apple Pay and sell your wares with your very own Squarespace website. Enter offer code CultCast at checkout to get 10% off your first hosting plan or domain.
The HomePod is a new product and Apple wants to be sure owners of this smartspeaker are getting all the benefits. That’s why the company scheduled a live chat with HomePod specialists for later this week. It’s open to anyone with questions.
A lot of people get tech support on their electronics from friends, but the $349 HomePod is struggling to compete against the much cheaper Amazon Echo, so many users probably don’t know someone else with this device.
HomePod is expected to get even smarter this fall when Apple rolls out a big software update.
A new report claims the $349 device will be able to handle phone calls, retrieve your voicemail, and run multiple timers. It could also give you the ability to search for songs by using their lyrics, and to translate languages.
Craig Federighi is no longer in charge of Siri. Responsibility for Apple’s troubled voice assistant has been given to John Giannandrea, who is now in charge of all Apple’s artificial intelligence efforts.
Siri is seen as poor competition for Amazon Alexa, Microsoft Cortana, and Google Assistant. Its weakness is hurting sales of Apple products, including the HomePod.
The smart speaker install base will approach 100 million units by the end of 2018 — but Apple will make up only a tiny piece of the market.
At least, that’s according to analysts at Canalys, who forecast how things are shaping up for the various Amazon Echo, Google Home, and Apple HomePod devices currently winding their way into kitchens and living rooms around the world. Their take home message? That, unless something big changes, Apple is kinda screwed!
This week on The CultCast: Apple plans new, improved AirPods, HomePod and over-ear headphones; Apple finally acknowledges its new MacBook keyboards suck, and they’re going to make it right; a top Apple analyst drops a bunch of details on Apple’s 2018 product pipeline; and how Apple is trying to solve a fascinating issue their autonomous car.
Our thanks to Squarespace for supporting this episode. It’s simple to accept Apple Pay and sell your wares with your very own Squarespace website. Enter offer code CultCast at checkout to get 10% off your first hosting plan or domain.
Most people would agree that Siri is way behind its competitors. But Apple recently made moves that indicate it’s working to improve this voice assistant.
A British survey discovered what smartspeaker owners actually use them for. This could help Apple decide what new features to add to Siri, as well as the ones that need shoring up.
2018 is only halfway over, and already we’re excited about what 2019 has in store! According to a new report, Apple is set to release new, improved AirPods, a new HomePod, and a set of new studio quality over-ear headphones.
In this week’s Cult of Mac Magazine: HomePods went on sale in Europe this week, and I ordered one. It arrived the very next day. I tried it out, and then sent it back to Apple the day after that. Why? Because it’s a half-finished product. Siri is just as glitchy and annoying on HomePod as elsewhere. It doesn’t work properly with a Mac.
You’ll find that story and more in this issue. Get your free subscription to Cult of Mac Magazine from iTunes. Or read on for this week’s top stories.
A Grand Prix in the Cannes Entertainment awards went to “Welcome Home,” a long-form ad for the HomePod created by Spike Jonze. The goal of the “Lions” is to reward education or advertising excellent enough to qualify as art..
Watch the brilliant 5-minute ad below:
HomePods went on sale in Europe this week, and I ordered one. It arrived the very next day. I tried it out, and then sent it back to Apple the day after that. Why? Because it’s a half-finished product. Siri is just as glitchy and annoying on HomePod as elsewhere. It doesn’t work properly with a Mac. And it’s not even a very good speaker.
Siri on HomePod is acceptable for quickly playing an album or a playlist, or even for adding a track to the existing up-next queue. But what if you want to switch the order of some songs in that queue, or delete tracks? Or maybe just use your iPhone to skip tracks, or control the volume of your HomePod without having to talk to the damn thing all the time?
Today we shall find out how.
You can now get your hands on a HomePod without it costing an arm and a leg.
BestBuy has refurbished models in Space Gray or White for $259, which is about $90 off the original HomePod price.
Apple’s HomePod speaker has launched in three new countries, including Canada, France, and Germany.
Users can speak to HomePod in French and German, with French-Canadian language support set to be added later this year. Ahead of the release, HomePod also added support for local news outlets in these countries, allowing users to get flash news briefs from closer-to-home news sources.
Apple’s brilliantly creative HomePod ad, directed by Being John Malkovich helmer Spike Jonze, has won a top prize at the Association of Independent Commercial Producers Show at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.
The awards were handed out on Thursday night. Apple shared the “Advertising Excellence/Single Commercial category” top spot with the absolutely hilarious “It’s a Tide Ad” Super Bowl series of ads for Tide. If you haven’t seen Apple’s excellent HomePod ad before, you can check it out below.
Sonos is making a power play to take over your living room with its latest smart speaker called Sonos Beam.
Beam is a new sound bar that is smaller than Sonos’ Playbar and Playbase, but it also packs some new features like a five-microphone array and it plays well with Google Assistant, Amazon’s Alexa and of course, Siri.
Watch out HomePod, this thing looks amazing:
In this week’s Cult of Mac Magazine: Imagine if your Apple Watch could tell you which days were best for you to do a workout, and what kind of workout you should do. Well it can, sort of, thanks to a hidden feature that few people have yet discovered or know how to use.
You’ll find that story and more in this issue. Get your free subscription to Cult of Mac Magazine from iTunes. Or read on for this week’s top stories.