Thinking about HomePod

Hi all,

At the moment at home I am using Siri via iPhone (my wife also via Apple Watch) bit of course it is not that comfortable because you always need to have iPhone with you. HomePod would be the perfect solution. Without of course knowing any API available (I do not think there will be any) with the current situation of HomeKit/HomeBridge would it be possible to control via voice the whole house.
A pity that I already have an (old) Sonos Play:1 to play music. It means then I will have two separate devices to play music around the house

I'm really looking forward to HomePod, even though I have a whole house audio solution. Partly because the one place audio isn't quite what I want is also an excellent place for an always-on Siri.

But I think I'm really close to whole-house HomePod for now, and of course for not knowing exactly what HomePod will do. Much to my surprise, my old iPad Mini 1 running iOS 9 still interacts with HomeKit even though it can't run the Home app, so I have room-level voice rec in our great room. My wife and I pretty much *always* carry our iPhones and we both have Apple Watches, so we can voice control most anywhere--though my wife essentially never does this.

Hopefully AirPlay II will play nicely with AirFoil! I've only been using AirFoil for about 10 days, but it has made a big difference in the reliability and expandability of my system. Where before I would have had to put a dedicated AirPort Express in order to have reliable audio, I can now repurpose any of 3-4 old iOS devices as audio sources. (Though my experience with Fire tablets as Android clients, or any Android client on any device for that matter, has been very poor.)

I haven't tried Sonos with AirFoil because I don't have one, but if you can cast to it or AirPlay to it, it should integrate.

You can’t airplay to Sonos directly, but if you run Airsonos on your Mac, it’ll make all your Sonos devices available on airplay.

http://airsonos.stephenwan.net

Terry


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

with the current situation of HomeKit/HomeBridge would it be possible to control via voice the whole house.

Yes, and that is why I want it. I started my voice system with spare iPhones and iPads and it worked pretty well, then I got the Echo's only because the microphone was more sensitive than the iOS devices, I didn't want to NOT use Siri. The Echos do really well, but I still prefer Siri most of the time - even though she can be slow. My home will be a mix of both Alexa and Siri. I was SO looking forward to getting the HomePod this Christmas and SO upset when it didn't launch but I'll be getting one on launch day.

I am also thinking to sell my Sonos Play:1 (old gen), but I am not sure if I should by a HomePod or a new Sonos One

Will I be able with Sonos One (via Alexa) to control my devices? Apart from that Alexa does not speak Italian yet
Or shall I wait for HomePod?

So, who ordered HomePod?

Ordering as soon as sales go live.

I have to wait till it will be sold in EU

Ordered!

Ordered!

Ditto.

Tritto!

I have to wait till it will be sold in EU

If you're willing to pay for in-person delivery, I could make quite a deal for you My passport is ready to go!

I have to wait till it will be sold in EU

It is sold now in the UK although some may argue that's not the EU anymore.

It is too expensive IMHO.

I almost ordered one and then stopped myself doing it.

I would need six of them to do what an Amazon Echo (Dot) currently gives me for home automation control at vastly cheaper price.
It is totally tied to Apple Music AFAICS, I am a Spotify user.

I would need six of them to do what an Amazon Echo (Dot) currently gives me for home automation control at vastly cheaper price.

Absolutely! I ordered one to see how it will work overall and since I don't have a Sonos then if I like this I'll end up buying more but I'll still use my Echo's around the house in my "less critical" areas. I liken this to right now I can "Hey Siri" my devices and it work 95% of the time, I can use the HomeKit app (whichever one) and it works 99% of the time, I can use Echo and it works 60% of the time (between repeating commands and it timing out or needing rebooted because the Internet died, whatever). For me it's a numbers game, the HomePod will go in my main living space, while the various Echo's in areas where I want or need home automation the least (i.e., my office).