Now, the traditional solution would be to get a home theater setup with all the amplifiers
and speaker wires that come with it. No, that's too complicated, there's gotta be something that looks nice and fits within
my Apple lifestyle. Enter the new HomePod.
It's got everything you'd expect from a high-end smart speaker, stereo pairing, spatial audio
support with Dolby Atmos, and you can even wirelessly connect it to your Apple TV to
support a home theater setup. But at $600 for a pair, can we make a non-Apple setup that's even remotely comparable or
better while spending less? Given how widely praised the first-gen HomePods were, we expected this to be a challenge.
What we didn't expect were the results.
In many ways, the new HomePod is like its predecessor, a higher-priced, higher-quality option for
those wanting a series smart speaker. It has a few notable changes, though.
Apple has added a sensor to measure the speaker's internal conditions to optimize sound, and
a second sensor to measure room temperature and humidity.
They also updated the aging 2014 iPhone chip with something more appropriate, and cut the
launch price by $50. At the same time, though, that price cut does come with a bit of a compromise, namely two
less tweeters and mics, and slower Wi-Fi.
These might not be issues, though. Apple believes that the better sound processing should deliver a similar experience to the
first-gen HomePods, and slower Wi-Fi doesn't really matter on a smart speaker.
To get the HomePod up and running is pretty straightforward.
Take the speakers in, follow the setup prompts on your iPhone, and hey, they're ready!
Now if you want to use them for a home theater, you'll also need an Apple TV 4K from 2021
or later. That's the only way to get audio from inputs plugged into your TV through your HomePods.
All this will bring the total spend up to $730, assuming you don't already own one.
But when you consider how feature-rich this setup is, it is a fairly compelling value
proposition. You get airplay, prompts to move your music from your phone to the speakers, a full remote
and keyboard on your iOS device, and an intercom across your home.
It just works.
At least that's what I would say if it all just works.
Sadly though, it doesn't. Not quite. The first one to welcome surprise with these is that they don't sound as good as I was
expecting. They do fare better in certain scenarios, like movies.
When paired in stereo, they present a far wider soundstage than what you'd get from
most compact soundbars. This is great for action films like Rogue One, where that soundstage and remarkably
deep bass offer a more immersive experience than you might expect from anything this small.
Strangely, while Atmos is supported and works on most services, Netflix won't output in
greater than 5.1. It works equally well for video games, since EARC support allows you to hook up something
like a PS5 to your TV and get fully immersed in games like War Thunder.
Now music. Uh, that leaves more to be desired.
Atmos playback works here, but I don't know.
With my experience on the AirPods, Atmos makes things sound distant and echoey, and
the only way you're going to get the sounds of instruments floating around you is if you
stick your head right in between the homepods.
This is definitely an experience. Turning Atmos off, though, improves things.
Yep, that does sound better, though it doesn't fix everything.
But too often, music simply sounds like it's being played back incorrectly.
It's very opinionated, and songs just sound different.
Even some of the rough drafts I'm making in GarageBand sounded foreign.
This is surprising, as the first-gen homepod was well-regarded for its audio quality.
And so I was looking forward to this new one.
Now though, I'm just confused.
Other reviewers are saying that this sounds just as good as its predecessor, but I don't
agree, listening to a wide variety of songs.
This is just better. This frequency response is more even across the board, presenting a consistently balanced
playback in a way that the second-gen doesn't.
So they sound different, eh? Yeah, they do sound different.
Is that something you can test for us? Because it's kind of weird that they sound this way.
Yeah, sure, I can test it. While Sam is running those tests, let's focus back on the living room setup, because the
homepods aren't the only smart speaker option out there.
This is our Amazon home theater setup, with two Echo Studios and a Fire TV 4K Max.
They're high-stand options.
This isn't the setup I would initially choose.
The Fire TV interface is very busy, with ads sprinkled all over the place.
McDonald's ads? This remote feels flimsy, I don't trust Amazon, and the Apple Music app isn't available,
so playback is only through Alexa. Also I hate this Alexa app.
Look at this underscores. As for the speakers, they, like the homepods, support automatic room tunings, spatial audio,
and ARC audio from your TV through the Fire TV stick.
Unlike the homepods, they have physical buttons instead of capacitive, as well as inputs for
Bluetooth and a combo 3.5mm slash optical port.
They also lack airplay, but support Spotify Connect, bad for me, but maybe great for you.
However, they cost $460, $300 less than the homepods setup, and to see if I could hear
the price difference, I was subjected to a blind test the moment they all arrived.
Starting with movies, we played a clip from Wolf Walkers on Apple TV+, and it turns out
I prefer the homepods. We also did a music test with songs playing in plain old stereo.
With the tunes I selected, it was the Echo Studios that caught my ear.
So it appears that despite my misgivings of Amazon, the Echo Studios aren't that bad.
At the very least, the quality is more in line with their price point than the homepods
are with theirs. So why don't I like the homepods?
Let's see what Sam has to say.
So does it sound different? Yeah, it does sound different, and also measures different.
These are some rough measurements of the 2nd gen homepods compared to the 1st gen.
These are from our tests in admittedly not perfect conditions.
But even so, some of the differences are apparent.
This is what Sam found.
You want your frequency response to be smooth.
So when you have a bump and a dip like that, around 2-4kHz, that really can't be good.
And you don't have that in the 1st gen, you have it in the 2nd gen. They change the sound of the homepod depending on the program you're playing.
So if it's a podcast or a music, they change it and also test it that.
So I tested Pink Noise, which I did for testing, I tested music and also podcast.
And again, you're getting the same bump and dip with all of those programs.
So you think this 2-4kHz dip is more of a hardware thing?
I don't know what it is, but it is something that shows up in all of the measurements that
I did. It's consistent. And it really can't be good.
You can also see that the 2nd gen has an overemphasized high end, which can work for some music
and is generally a good thing for movies. But for certain songs, it can make the vocals border on shrill.
This combined with the surprisingly deep bass means parts of the mid-range can sound as
though they're relatively absent. So that does explain a little bit why we're kind of not bowled over by the sound.
Probably, yeah. Okay, fair enough. I mean, that's a reasonable explanation.
Huh, okay. Well at least I'm not going insane.
They do genuinely sound disappointing, especially compared to the better sounding 1st gen.
It's too bad, as I was really expecting more from these.
If you've already got an older model, nice.
But what if I don't need a smart speaker at all to have a smart home feeder?
The problem with these speakers is that they're relying on the computer glued inside.
So what about simply buying a dumb speaker and then plugging a smart solution into it?
These are the Edifier S2000 Mark IIIs.
They're sold in a stereo pair for $50 less than a pair of HomePods.
Like the HomePods, they're a simple 2-cable solution and don't require an external amp.
Yes, they're huge, very speaker looking and not white, but for that you'll get the loudest
and clearest speakers we've tried for this video.
Simply put, they're the only speakers which didn't make me feel as though I was missing parts of the music I love.
There's no clever audio tuning or software trickery here.
You gotta do that yourself because they come with 4 preset EQs.
We recommend starting with the dynamic one and a treble and bass knob on the back to
further dial in your sound. It also has two RCA inputs, one optical input and Bluetooth.
It'll pick up to any smartphone or TV without needing a streaming box.
However, there is no Wi-Fi, but don't worry because I have a solution for that.
You can make these smarter by using this, the Belkin Soundform Connect.
It's a $100 AirPlay 2 receiver.
With its 3.5mm or optical output, you can add any old speakers or amplifier to your
multi-room AirPlay setup. At this point, all you're really missing is Siri, which it appears is the only holdout
feature remaining for the HomePod. The only reason I can see why someone would elect to use a HomePod for their TV setup
is because they like the way they look and don't want obvious, boring, blocky speakers
cramping their interior style. Because if you don't care about appearances, you can get better quality, more flexibility
and longevity for less from other companies.
And if you just want a smart assistant, then the significantly cheaper HomePod Mini will
do everything that its larger sibling can too.
Much like the original HomePod, this tries to be the speaker that gets the average person
interested in better quality audio and in turn interested in handing more money over
to Apple. But this smart speaker has decided to focus more on the smart and less on the speaker,
while still repeating the same mistake as its predecessor.
In fact, its simplicity is sometimes limiting, as the only sound adjustment you have is a
reduced bass toggle. If you really want a Siri smart speaker and the Mini isn't bold enough for you, then
hey, you have an option. But otherwise, it's easy to recommend that you look elsewhere.