jbdragon

Personally, I could car less about 5G. Just like I can care less about a 4K TV. I know at least Verizon is charging another $10 a month just to have 5G support. Support that is very, very limited. 5G is not even really going to matter, connection wise for a number of years.

In the end, when you do have a 5G connection, so what! Not sure what I need a even faster internet connection on my phone now. What can't I do now that I need even faster speed? I have fast Internet at home, and other then downloading stuff faster, all I really end up doing is hitting my 1TB CAP that much faster. But I get the faster speed there as it's a shared home network. No one is sharing my phone internet connection. I'm not doing 2 or 3 Netflix streams at once. At this point I could care less about 5G.

On the other hand, my iPhone XS doesn't have as good of a cell connection as my iPhone 6 did. Both using T-Mobile. The 6 had a Qualcomm modem and the XS has Intel. Using my phone in the same places, on the same network, I can tell the difference, connection wise. Intel is just weaker. So to go back to a better 4G iPhone would be a plus for me.

Ya, at some point, Apple is going to release it's own Modem. Apple is just working down a list of things they would rather do on their own and have better control. It's just a matter of time.

I use Siri all the time.  I do have a echo dot and a google mini to play around with along with a couple HomePods.  Out of them all, my #1 go to device is my Apple Watch.  It’s everywhere I’m at.  It’s not locked into s room by a power cable.  It can be outside with me.   I have to say Siri works really well on it.   I think a big thing with these voice assistance is home control and I’m a HomeKit house.

Google and Amazon, I paid $30 for those devices.  Have never once ordered anything from them. I have a Ecobee 4 with Alexa built in and yet Siri is just easier to use with it.  I play with all 3 of them and they all have their own pros and cons.  The list of apps with Siri shortcut controls continue to grow.  So you don’t have to even use the shortcut app. I do think it’s a fantastic feature and needs some more advertising from Apple.  

Have you been to Alexa’s Skill store?  There’s a lot of then, but looking at the reviews of them, they’re lucky if they can get 3 stars.  A large percentage are not rated all that high.  It’s a ton of crap. You would think that Alexa wold just work on my Ecobee 4 as it’s built in.  Why not?  But no, you have to go to Amazon and activate the skill for it.  I’m also not a fan of having to ask or tell Alexa to do something and with what.  Siri and even Google are smarter in this area than Alexa who plays dumb.  For example, if I want to adjust the temp, with Siri I can just say "Hey Siri, or on Apple Watch, not even say that, Adjust temp to 68."  It’ll do it.  It knows what I’m talking about.  With Alexa, I have to say something like "Alexa, tell Ecobee to set temp to 68".  Again the tell it to do something and what device.  It gets worse when I have to say MySmartBlinds to control those.

MacPro said:

NY1822 said:

all of a sudden been having problems creating a stereo pair...the update did not fix the issue.
When in "stereo pair" I can only play my music but unable to control smart home controls. It will just say unable to connect. So I removed the stereo pair bc smart home controls are more important to me, and when speakers are separated I am still able to play music.

Not had that problem with my stereo pair.  Maybe best to remove all the setups and start over?

Ya, I have a stereo pair also and it works just fine. I can do home control with it also. Last night I had the HomePod turn off a outside light and it worked just fine. Last weekend I took one to work. Brought it back home and it was simple enough to connect it back to my Network. It asked it it was going to be a stereo pair and what side left or right, click on that and all was good once again. It was even easier than the first time I got my Homepod and had to figure out how to get a stereo pair.

As for price, I got mine for $249. You can find sales once in a while from B&H which is also tax free for most states, my last one I got at Target. Ordered it online and picked it up at the $249 price point. This is what I feel the Normal Price should be. I think they are worth $249. I think $299 is still a little to much.

It does get louder with 2 Homepods. You can clearly hear the stereo Separation. They really do sound great. I don't use them with my AppleTV. I have a much better Sound Bar in the bedroom and Surround Sound setup in my Family Room. But they are great for Music. The work great for Home control. They won't work for things like unlocking doors or in my case opening my garage. I think you can close, just can't open. Part of the security. you need a unlocked device. Like you can't do it on your iPhone from the lock screen, you would h ave to unlock your iPhone first. Well you don't want selling telling Siri though a Window to open the garage or unlock a door.

Make sure your Homepods are on the newest update.

Well I just got my new Apple Watch 4 44mm a few days ago to replace my Original. Actually I'm going to continue to use my Original for Sleep Tracking. I think it'll be fine for that. That allows me to just swap my watches on the charger.

Going from 42mm to 44mm, it's only 2mm difference, but looking at the screen, everything is so much larger. I didn't think it would really be that much of a difference. But really, a Apple Watch as High Fashion really didn't make a whole lot of sense to me. Not then and not now. All the things it can do make far more sense and that should be what is pushed. As they say, you spend hours of your computer, Minutes on your Smartphone and Seconds on your Smart Watch. The Watch gets me off of pulling out my phone for every little ding, etc as I can just look at my watch quickly. You know when you pull out your phone to see what that ding is, you end up doing a few other things, and before you know it, you've been on it for the last 15 minutes for something that really should have been a few seconds. With the watch, it's a glance and then you're done.

AppleExposed said:

Th problem is, when Apple invented iPhone and App Store, no one had a clue how big it would get. Now idiots want Apple to pay a penalty for success. The deal was done in 2007-2008. Don't like it? Don't use it.

What's worse, they are not just complaining about the 30% cut, they want customer Info, something Apple doesn't want to let out as they care about Customers Privacy. So F Spotify!!!!