BigDann

hblaschka said:

One should not forget about HomeKit - there are a lot of Smart Home Gateway Users eagerly waiting for being able to a) expose their connected devices to HomeKit and b) integrate HomeKit-Devices into their Gateway. A lot of work has been put into this area by 3rd party gateway developers lately and all of them are waiting for the Go of Apple (my vendor has it running in beta and it works as designed - one-directionally integrating Z-Wave/ZigBee and Enocean-Devices into HomeKit only so far).

HomeKit itself will without any doubt be more integrated into Voice services and hopefully into macOS (a dedicated Home app is still missing), while a lot of supported functionality is generally missing from the iOS Home App UI at the moment. I doubt that HomeKit will be exposed to 3rd party Voice systems, though.

A Home server is really needed! One that has deep security for the users protected content and a second location for the shared content like music, TV shows & movies. Then add to it the AI smarts of Siri so it can run more locally, add HomeKit server, and lastly HomePod type of devices server so the content it will serve up is more central and the ability of the device to discriminate the different users within the household.

We appear to be mixing things up here! To start with any information about you either posted or dictated by us needs to be secured! Security is important! 

BUT! Siri's major failings as well as Home Pods is not security! Its inaction & lack of vision!

Asking a simple question about something and not getting an answer that correct or just points me to a web URL which is not what I want. It's the lack of conversational flow, so if Siri pointed me to a URL I should be able just to tell Siri to read it or at least give me a synopsis. This has nothing to do with security! 

How about when I'm cooking breakfast and I ask Siri for a timer for my eggs and then ask for a second timer for my oatmeal can't do it!

The only security issue presently is Home Pod being locked to my iPhone so anyone can ask the HomePod to send a message as me. Now thats a security weakness which still hasn't been dealt with.

So stop finding reasons that Apple can't won't do this or that. Lets focus on what it should do that has nothing to do with security and when they fail to deal with something that does have to do with security lets get it fixed ASAP or at least limit the action until something can be done.

Basically, iPad's & Home Pods need to support multiple people and be able to discriminate in some fashion whom is the person is thats interacting with them! In the case of having multiple Home Pods, each one needs to discriminate the person nearest to them and if the person joins the other somehow the Home Pod needs to know what not to do!

Mike Wuerthele said:

bitmod said:

Hey Mike, 
I totally disagree with your analysis of the number of people upgrading RAM. I know for a fact that number is much much higher. 

Apple charges 3x the price for RAM upgrades. Your numbers make sense when you look at the data Apple has - which shows people are smart enough to not order ram from Apple. 
I think a better way to determine the true number is to ask a company like OWC how business is? Determine their market share, extrapolate sales / new machines sold etc... 

I've upgraded the RAM on my own for every Mac I've ever owned (40-50 computers). 
On top of that, I've upgraded all of my friends Mac's with ram (100+ computers).
On top of that, I upgrade all of my clients computers with RAM or direct them to OWC (300+ computers).

Thats about 450 computers with upgraded RAM that Apple, or anyone else, has zero data on... and I'm just 1 guy. 
I have many peers who do the same for their friends and clients. 
I could easily estimate over 3000+ computers. 

I would argue the type of people answering your poll here are 'unlikely' to be upgraders. 
If you ran the same poll on Barefeats - it would probably be close to 100% upgrade their RAM on their own. 

How much data do you think 22 service techs spanning 18 states and 15 years has? Way, way more than this. Regarding the polling of Apple store visitors from a few years back, that is as average Apple customer as you can literally get.

Your data isn't wrong, but like the Barefeats readers you speak of, it is skewed the wrong way from a polled population standpoint. It's like asking AppleInsider readers how many have done upgrades.

And, regarding Apple's data. They know exactly who upgrades and who doesn't. What do you think gets included in those crash reports?

Hi Mike,

Maybe you needed to look a bit further in the polling! One of the companies I service had six techs in their IT dept. around the globe that did nothing but hardware repairs and yes UPGRADES! Every system well over 1000 systems had HD upgrades, SSD upgrades and very often RAM upgrades.

This is an engineering firm that needed more than the highest model Apple offered storage & RAM. They stayed with the older Unibody systems as they could be serviced easily (very few retina models).

Sadly, Over a year ago they made the decision to move to HP systems as they had waited and waited hoping for a more serviceable MacBook Pro model. What broke the camels back was the loss of the USB-A ports and the loss of removable storage.

Because of what they do they needed onboard USB-A ports for security keys and no, dongles or external port unit wouldn't meet the requirement as they could be altered (man in the middle attack). In addition the inability to memorialize the storage as well as the risk of the information to still be present on disposed of systems with soldered in storage killed going forward with Apple.

Now we have fully rolled out HP systems both mobile and office. We now face more OS & software level issues and the loss of durability of the older MacBook Pro's.

So we all lost here!! Apple for the business, My customer as the costs of the wholesale change out and the added costs of maintaining the systems software. And me! As my hours where cut and then at the beginning of the year no longer needed as HP took over the repairs.

While this is only one large company that still was servicing their Mac systems and ended that. I know of others that too had & no longer doing in-house service with Windows systems as well.

True! Companies that didn't have a full service IT staff didn't upgrade their systems and many are leased systems so you couldn't alter them either. But they often bought or leased enhanced systems which often had different RAM or storage configs than what Apple offered at the start.

Yet, people independently are upgrading and servicing their own systems! Just look on IFIXIT. Your numbers don't line up!

While I'll agree Apple move to soldered RAM in the MacBooks and more difficult access to RAM & storage in the newer iMac systems will show the drop is likely 90% don't alter their RAM or storage thats understandable! But! many people ARE upgrading their removable SSD's in the Retina models! I would guess its around 30% now and growing!

If you look at the older MacBooks, MacBook Pro's & iMac's the reverse is true! 80% DO upgrade both RAM & storage.

Its all about perspective is the glass half full or half empty! Using the perspective of the age of the system is the point here. You missed that!

cgWerks said:

re: net neutrality - Apple now has enough money to pay their way. The bigger fear would be to be on the right ISP (that Apple is most in partnership with) or the impact on startups. But, I'm not expecting any huge change... we've had pseudo-Net Neutrality for what, 2 years? And, what the FCC had was flawed. I'm all for the principal of net neutrality, but it needs to be properly implemented and enforced to have any impact. What the USA most needs right now is competition.

Sorry guy we all end up paying for it ;-{ Apple will just add the cost to everything that uses it and pass the cost on to us.

Did you forget the name HomePod tells us its more than a fine speaker it's the center point within ones home (room). The problem here it has three major failings based on the current HomePod shown:
- It does not offer a base or a means to tie to a system to be the base other than your phone. We need the HomeBase element for managing all of the 'HomePod's within the home. This HomeBase would be the common brain (not dependent on your iPhone or iPad alone) as well as the storage of your content libraries, HomePod services ($$) and other HomeKit elements integrating your smart-home control.
- If you have more rooms that you want to use a HomePod in it does not follow you! You'll need to blast the sound across all of the HomePod's. I should be able to walk around and have my AppleWatch or iPhone tell the HomePod's where I'm located within the house and only turn on the speakers in the rooms I'm walking around in. In addition it should allow two or more people to have different things going on (upstairs and downstairs, or different closed off rooms) and not compete (bleed across)
- Size matters! I should be able to have HomePod devices in all my rooms! A small room does not need the fidelity of the current unit and then it doesn't fit cleanly on a night table without taking it over. While it's not going to be as powerful a unit the size of a UE Boom2 would be great!

I see the intro of the HomePod at WWDC was a placeholder to tease us. It was not fully developed as Apple feared (rightfully) Amazon and Google would take over. All of the voice systems fail right now as none have done the needed work to make them work cleanly and well!

To think Siri needs to be monetized by Apple directly I think is missing the point! Apple needs to dig deeper into Siri's abilities as what it offers will grow the market. Think how the discreet camera industry is shriveling up! Apple is a major cause of this! Every new phone has pushed the envelope with better cameras. Thats not a bad thing its were we are now. Apple doesn't make money on every picture you shoot but it does make money on the storage of your library of images. Siri is no different! Apple needs to do the same thing with Siri. The more power it has within our home the more hardware (Apple) and other Apple services we'll likely buy.

So to sum it up:

• Apple needs multiple HomePod devices with a range of power to match to the room it will be used in (size).
• HomePod devices need an intelligent base unit to host your stuff and serve as the App hub for HomePod services and HomeKit (i.e. HomeBase)
• Siri is VERY important! It needs to be conversational and not get tripped up with a much deeper lexicon and knowledge base. It needs to be the guardian & concierge of the home. Off loading tasks & protecting you and your family.