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What's up guys and girls?
This is Brian Tong here and we recently found out that Apple has officially announced that the HomePod is coming out on February the ninth.
So what this really is is everything that you need to know.
Things that we've learned before the actual preview and that 's gonna take place on January the 26th it will be available in the US, the UK, and Australia And they haven't officially give the time.
But we can presume that it will start at 12 midnight east coast time, that would be 9 o'clock PM west coast time.
The price obviously $349, but if you're talking about other countries Countries in UK, it's going to be 319 pounds, and then in Australia, that's gonna be $499 for them.
France and Germany, it'll be available later this Spring.
But countries like Canada and others, Apple has not given an official timeframe of when it'll be available, Available for them.
Now, we also got to see in their press release, we learned some new details that we haven't heard before about the home pod specifically.
Now, the first thing to know about, it will not support multi-users.
This is something that is common on the Amazon Echo or the Google Home.
They made no mention if we'll ever see it.
And the other thing, multi-room support.
This is really important because Apple talks about how you can buy two of them and use them as stereo speakers.
That's coming out in a software update.
Later this year, again, they didn't even narrow down the timeframe, and even if you want to buy multiple home pods, put one in one room, and one in the other, and play different songs from them, that is coming again sometime later this year with the software update.
Another thing we learned here, apple care for the HomePod, it will cost $39.
Now that gives you two years of warranty instead of its original one.
That also includes telephone support.
But, let's say you're super clumsy And you knock into the HomePod and it falls over over and breaks.
If you bring it into a store, you'll need to pay an additional $39 to get a repair.
That's called like incidental or accidental damage.
You can do that twice so So you buy 39 dollars for apple care and then you've two incidents that you'll pay an additional 39 to cover it.
We've seen similar plans with apple tv or the iPhone.
You do have to pay in order to get it service.
But it wont cost like the entire price of the actual home pod.
So let's just break down what it can do right now.
First of all, it can send messages, you can set reminders, and it also listens to podcasts.
You'll also get Siri News, which is kinda like the latest update.
Also Siri integration, this is gonna happen via its six microphone array, and also HomeKit compatibility.
We know it's going to be able to work with the Apple music subscription, but they have not said anything about third party services.
It's powered by the A8 processor, this is the same processor in the iPhone 6, it has this spacial awareness, this is the feature that they really wanna tout And finally it will come in two colors, white and space gray.
This is important because I know, you like to match your decor.
We're gonna talk about it.
Now, the other big question is, will the HomePod get better over time?
Absolutely it will.
It just needs some software updates, really to get it up to speed with what else is out there.
Remember Apple has always positioned this as a smart speaker that has superior sound compared to the competition.
I think out of the box, it most likely is going to versus the Google Home and the Amazon Echo.
Now, how it stacks up against the Google Home Max, which is at $399, that remains to be seen.
But Apple has positioned this as a speaker with premium sound.
That is one advantage that it has out of the gates, but then let's talk about like the other competition.
That's really only the main differentiating feature that makes it better than anything else that's out there.
We know, come on, Siri still inferior to the Amazon Echo and still inferior to the Google Assistant.
We also know that it falls behind when it comes to smart home device compatibility.
And thirdly it has no app or third party skilled support, this is a big deal in the Amazon Echo world.
Trust me, if you've experienced that, you're definitely going to use something like that.
So when you really stack up the main things that make these speakers important, Apple is coming late to the party.
They're behind but I think this is the first time out of the gates that we really truly seen that Apple is not only coming late to the party but they're not really bringing anything special by being a late comer, and we're just gonna have to wait over time to see how they evolve this product.
Now lets be real, will it sell?
Of course it's going to sell we know.
Why are you watching this video if you're not gonna buy this thing?
But also I don't expect Apple to release its actual sales numbers.
They haven't done it again with the Apple watch, with the Apple TV.
It's not gonna sell large enough numbers where they can feel comfortable enough bragging about it after this holiday season when everyone went out in droze.
We're talking about the tens of millions to but Amazon eco pieces or Google home pieces.
So It'll sell but there's no way out of the gates it's going to go bonkers especially at its 349 price point.
Of course, I'm going to buy this because I've gotta review it fairly.
We're gonna see how it stacks up to the competition, but there you have it.
Just kind of another Apple byte, Apple bits.
And we'll see what happens.
Peace.
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