mjtomlin

indiekiduk said:

Taghkanic said:

Confused... Will I be able to Airplay from my laptop to multiple Apple TVs and HomePods? What if I want to AirPlay my laptop or Mac Mini screen to a TV, and have the audio reflected on other devices (HomePod, AppleTV-connected receiver) around my home?

The Mac has always been able to Airplay to multiple speakers, it's iOS which has always had the fake limit of single speaker.

Haha. It's not a "fake" limit. The audio subsystem in iOS has always been different than macOS. It was a design decision due to very different use cases of each product. iOS was designed as a single user personal device. Only a single out and single in was needed for its purpose. AirPlay 2 includes a complete rewrite of the iOS audio subsystem to allow multiple outs. (...And I hope they included multiple ins as well?) It is a foundational change to iOS which is why it has taken so long, it's not a trivial update.

While the Core OS is basically the same across all devices, there are differences in the way the OS interacts with hardware across different classes of devices. For instance, iOS does not support Virtual Memory, so there is a real memory limit, unlike in macOS where there is no such limit because storage (and power efficiency) has never been a major resource concern. The same goes for unrestricted multi-tasking. These are all design decisions - not fake limitations.

Hmmm... Updated... Doesn’t boot... SSD no loner shows up. Unfortunately was part of Fusion drive. :-/

avon b7 said:

Last year Huawei was doing live demos of 3D sensing systems with ten times the resolution of FaceID. Huawei has been working with Finisar for years and have even collaborated on product development in the past.

The iPhone X is the only Apple phone with FaceID at present and demand for it will not sky rocket in the coming months. The units necessary for some Android destined 3D sensing equipment probably already exist.

There is the possibility of industry wide supply constraints but I imagine that some Android manufacturers should be able to get models out without too many problems.

The Huawei P20 series will be announced next week and will be a reference point. If it ships without the Point Cloud Depth setup, it will lend strength to this rumour. If it ships with it, some manufacturers may be covered while others are locked out for a time.

Just a few days to wait.

Making a few demo or reference units is not the same as being able to mass produce them. That is where bottlenecks usually show up. There are many, many technologies "still in the lab", because it is extremely hard to manufacture them at scale.

The one thing most companies don't have, that Apple has, is the money to throw at those issues, because they can demand a premium price for their products. Plus the cost to manufacture is minimal when you're selling a product at the scale Apple does.

k2kw said:

I've read that the HomePod sounds as good as a Sonos 1 or Sonos 3 .    I wonder how it matches up with the Sonos Play 5.   The HomePod like Sonos 1 doesn't have an auxiliary line in.   You can get that with a Sonos 5 (which is $500).   I wonder how you do the same with HomePod.   It's hard to tell if the HomePod is the first of multiple products or will be Apple's only home audio product.    I would be more interested in a HomePodPlus with line in and HomePodTheater sound bar.   

Also can HomePod play Hi-Res audio files?

After reading Serenity Caldwell's "write up", she found that sound reproduction and separation is better on the HomePod. Which would push it more towards the higher end of home audio. I also read the HomePod also has the ability to "see" where you are in the room and can optimize the direction of the sound in real-time. But Sonos:5 will definitely have a "bigger" (louder) sound because of its size and number of speakers.

It's a pure WiFi speaker and does not have a line-in. And it does play ALAC, AIFF, WAV, and FLAC all of which are capable of supporting Hi-Res Audio.

I would be inclined to guess that this will be Apple's only home audio product. 

rogifan_new said:

Where are the reviews?

They'll start coming out today. Here's two...

Digital Trends - Apple's HomePod delivers on brilliant sound, but Siri still has room to grow
Refinery29 - One Hour With Apple's New HomePod
Medium - Up close with Apple HomePod, Siri's expensive new Home