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184,279 attended CES 2017, an even with millions of views online it doesn't quite hit the 103,000,000 (US Only) viewers of the Superbowl. Google really need to sort their advertising out if they hope to truly compete in terms of 'native' device numbers.

and yes I have 3 GH devices + CC's.
 
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hmm.

Home max is more expensive but it's bigger (more internal volume for the speakers) and it has two of them vs the homepod's 1 - i'm not sure how it's very likely to sound worse?. The homeppod might have 7 tweeters but unless you sit that thing in the middle of a room then it's unlikely to make any real difference. Home Max has google assistant and access to multiple music services. Apple has what? siri and apple music?

of course sesevans made that comparison on purpose just to bolster his point, but if i'm comparing the $349 homepod against the $399 home max then it's the home max that looks a better product to me. And as for sesevans point, Apple need only bring out a cheaper version to compete with the standard Home, but then Apple isnt really aiming at the same demographics as Google. Google are all about the AI, Apple is focusing on the music side of things with siri on top. They're aimed at different users, really.
HomePod definitely sounds better than the Max in this comparison.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQF5Q3773uk
 
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Good try Broken Hope but your comparison does not hold a candle to the highly respected and widely followed Consumer Report verdict issued today. Their conclusion:

Google Home Max and Sonos One better than Apple HomePod.

https://www.consumerreports.org/smart-speakers/apple-homepod-early-test-results/

Having owned a Sonos Play 1 and now a HomePod, the HomePod knocks the Play 1 out of the park in terms of sound quality.

This is before they support stereo.

I haven't used my Google Home Mini once since getting it either as Siri has managed to do (so far) what I've asked of it.
 
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Having owned a Sonos Play 1 and now a HomePod, the HomePod knocks the Play 1 out of the park in terms of sound quality.

This is before they support stereo.

I haven't used my Google Home Mini once since getting it either as Siri has managed to do (so far) what I've asked of it.

Let me say at the start that I have not used Apple's HomePod and I appreciate your view (different to Consumer Report for example) that ranks the HomePod above the Sonos Play 1. However to compare the HomePod (£350) with your Google Home Mini (free from your Pixel purchase?) but retailing for £ 29 is hardly a fair comparison, particularly say for music listening.

But I have also read in places such as RFM (and you might not find this an issue yet) that Siri software fragmentation sets it apart from Google Assistant's implementation. Why does this fragmentation issue exist with Siri? Because Apple has chosen to run Siri locally on each device (ie it is a client side SDK) rather than, as Google does, locate the intelligence in the cloud. Siri is now on iPhone, Apple Watch, Apple TV, Mac, iPad and HomePod and each is slightly different and has a different skill set. For example, Siri on say Apple TV has a different skill set than on the iPhone, and the HomePad is incapable of doing some of the most basic things that you can do with Siri on the iPhone. And the third party skills are on a particular device so if you try to perform one such skill on say your iPhone and hope to finish it on say your HomePad (eg, you move location during the implementation) you are unable to do it. Clearly you have not found this to be a problem yet. But philosophically, I would not want such an implementation as it limits my flexibility.

Contrast this approach with Google Assistant, which resides as one version in the cloud, and which allows the user to access it uniformly and seamlessly from any enabled device. In fact GA now operates at such a high benchmark that if two devices are within voice range, it executes the request on the device which is best able to deliver the service.

I could easily see that Apple's approach with Siri could lead to a frustrating experience. If the consensus grows that the HomePod is an excellent speaker but poorer at implementing other digital requests, it will be seen to be competing on hardware alone which will allow hardware competition to catch up---eg Sonos (your view), JBL, Harmon Kardon, etc.

If Apple does not move Siri and Siri SDK to the cloud, I could see this becoming a more significant issue that limits its popularity.

Meanwhile I am awaiting the arrival on our shores of Google Home Max which Consumer Report ranks at the top.
 
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Let me say at the start that I have not used Apple's HomePod and I appreciate your view (different to Consumer Report for example) that ranks the HomePod above the Sonos Play 1. However to compare the HomePod (£350) with your Google Home Mini (free from your Pixel purchase?) but retailing for £ 29 is hardly a fair comparison, particularly say for music listening.

But I have also read in places such as RFM (and you might not find this an issue yet) that Siri software fragmentation sets it apart from Google Assistant's implementation. Why does this fragmentation issue exist with Siri? Because Apple has chosen to run Siri locally on each device (ie it is a client side SDK) rather than, as Google does, locate the intelligence in the cloud. Siri is now on iPhone, Apple Watch, Apple TV, Mac, iPad and HomePod and each is slightly different and has a different skill set. For example, Siri on say Apple TV has a different skill set than on the iPhone, and the HomePad is incapable of doing some of the most basic things that you can do with Siri on the iPhone. And the third party skills are on a particular device so if you try to perform one such skill on say your iPhone and hope to finish it on say your HomePad (eg, you move location during the implementation) you are unable to do it. Clearly you have not found this to be a problem yet. But philosophically, I would not want such an implementation as it limits my flexibility.

Contrast this approach with Google Assistant, which resides as one version in the cloud, and which allows the user to access it uniformly and seamlessly from any enabled device. In fact GA now operates at such a high benchmark that if two devices are within voice range, it executes the request on the device which is best able to deliver the service.

I could easily see that Apple's approach with Siri could lead to a frustrating experience. If the consensus grows that the HomePod is an excellent speaker but poorer at implementing other digital requests, it will be seen to be competing on hardware alone which will allow hardware competition to catch up---eg Sonos (your view), JBL, Harmon Kardon, etc.

If Apple does not move Siri and Siri SDK to the cloud, I could see this becoming a more significant issue that limits its popularity.

Meanwhile I am awaiting the arrival on our shores of Google Home Max which Consumer Report ranks at the top.

I didn't say that I was listening to music on my Google Mini? Just that Siri on the HomePod was doing everything I was asking of it. End of the day Apple has promoted the HomePod as speaker first and foremost, a target they have clearly achieved going off the many positive reviews.

I've still got my Pixel, it's currently my backup phone for work with my iPhone having taken it's place. The Google Mini came free with my nest purchase.
 
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I didn't say that I was listening to music on my Google Mini? Just that Siri on the HomePod was doing everything I was asking of it. End of the day Apple has promoted the HomePod as speaker first and foremost, a target they have clearly achieved going off the many positive reviews.

I've still got my Pixel, it's currently my backup phone for work with my iPhone having taken it's place. The Google Mini came free with my nest purchase.

I understand. Your description of the HomePod promotion is in line with what I suggested, namely a hardware device first and foremost. If they stay with their current Siri strategy, I believe it would give ample opportunity for hardware competitors to equal if not overtake HomePod in the near term, esp as the competitors also sport the cloud based Google Assistant.
 
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As much as I like my Google Home it can be damn frustrating at times!

A few days ago I wanted it to play 99 red balloons by Nena, so I said Hey Google, play 99 Red Balloons. It started playing 99 Red Balloons by Goldfinger. Fair enough, I didn't specify the artist. So I tried again and asked it to play 99 Red balloons by Nena, it started playing 99 Luftballoons by Nena, okay so the German original but that will do.

Today I tried exactly the same, remembering to specify the artist, and it played 99 Red Balloons by Goldfinger. So instead I asked it to play 99 Luftballoons by Nena, it responded by playing 99 Luftballoons by 48th St. Collective.... So tried again exactly the same, and it played 99 Luftballoons by Hayden Tee... who?

I mean really, I've given the title and artist, and it can obviously play this as it did a few days ago. This is using Play Music to which I have a subscription.
 
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As much as I like my Google Home it can be damn frustrating at times!

A few days ago I wanted it to play 99 red balloons by Nena, so I said Hey Google, play 99 Red Balloons. It started playing 99 Red Balloons by Goldfinger. Fair enough, I didn't specify the artist. So I tried again and asked it to play 99 Red balloons by Nena, it started playing 99 Luftballoons by Nena, okay so the German original but that will do.

Today I tried exactly the same, remembering to specify the artist, and it played 99 Red Balloons by Goldfinger. So instead I asked it to play 99 Luftballoons by Nena, it responded by playing 99 Luftballoons by 48th St. Collective.... So tried again exactly the same, and it played 99 Luftballoons by Hayden Tee... who?

I mean really, I've given the title and artist, and it can obviously play this as it did a few days ago. This is using Play Music to which I have a subscription.

Your description obviously is a frustrating experience but I hope you don't mind me saying, it reads like a comedy! I started laughing by the end of your post!

I have had mostly a very good music experience on GH but agree there are some fringe things that seem to happen out of the blue. Teething problems? Let's face it, machine learning/AI is hard!

As mentioned, Facebook is looking to jump into the smart device speaker market sometime later this year. And today I have heard we might expect a new name in hardware: Spotify. Seems that they are recruiting operations and project managers for new hardware. Will they develop a smart speaker to compete with GH, Amazon and now Apple and soon Facebook? Since they have no digital assistant of their own, perhaps they will use Google Assistant or Alexa? But both have a competing music streaming subscription service.
Furthermore, both GH and Amazon, unlike Apple on its HomePod, permit Spotify to be the default music service on their smart speakers. Also one could question whether Spotify knows much about making high quality speakers with complex microphone arrays.

Should be interesting to track the path Spotify follows here.
 
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Oh yeah I can see the funny side, I wasn't mad or anything its just really quite frustrating. It would be one thing if it simply didn't understand what I was saying (but I can see from 'my activity' that it does), or if it simply didn't have what I was looking for, but as it played the song a few days before it clearly does. Anyway, early days as you say.

I kinda hope we don't get to many different companies coming out with their own, competition is definitely good but it could be harder for other products to support so many different voice assistants.
 
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Not sure if they've done anything in the background recently, but I've been able to get my Home and the Minis in the house to play the album "10,000 Days" by Tool about 15 times now, and at the first time of asking... it's NEVER been able to do that until recently! It's an uploaded copy to my personal library as well, given that it's not on the Store for sale.

Could be worse though, we could be using Siri...
 
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Voice recognition definitely improves over time. When I first switched to GH over Alexa, my main concern was it could only understand me controlling my lights about 60% of the time, when Alexa had been about 90%. Now GH is probably closer to 95% correct.
 
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I am trying to get my Google Home setup properly. Sometimes if I play something from my phone (via Chromecast) it won't recognise something is playing when I try to pause it via voice.

Is this a common issue? And is it possible to fix? I have the Chromecast setup as the same room as the Google home.
 
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I am trying to get my Google Home setup properly. Sometimes if I play something from my phone (via Chromecast) it won't recognise something is playing when I try to pause it via voice.

Is this a common issue? And is it possible to fix? I have the Chromecast setup as the same room as the Google home.

I have my Chromecast in the same room as one of my GH's and have not had this problem as the GH overtakes the action automatically. Try contacting GH customer support if the problem persists. I have found them very helpful.
 
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I am trying to get my Google Home setup properly. Sometimes if I play something from my phone (via Chromecast) it won't recognise something is playing when I try to pause it via voice.

Is this a common issue? And is it possible to fix? I have the Chromecast setup as the same room as the Google home.
I didn't realise it was supposed to work that way. It hasn't for me when I've tried it... If I play music from my phone I assumed you can't really control that with your voice :confused:
 
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