Reactions to the HomePod, new iPad Pro, iOS 11 and more

[MUSIC] What's going on, Brian Tong here and welcome to the Apple Byte for everything good and bad inside the world of Apple. This week, it's my reactions to yes, the HomePod, the new iPad Pro, iOS 11 And everything else from WWDC2017. Now, we won't be able to cover ever single thing, but let's just dive in right now. Okay, first up, the star of the show has to be the new iPadPro paired with the all new iOS11. It's really like it's own iOS. And I know the iPad isn't Apple's most popular product. Tablet sales have declined the past three years in a row. But I am one of its biggest fans and they surprised me with the all new functionality with a dock for apps, the new files app with third-party support for my Dropbox and others and come on we're getting drag and drop all over the place [APPLAUSE] You can drag images, you can drag text, you can drag URLs, you can multi-select and multi hand drag It's a drag fest. Okay Craig, I'll give you that one since the product is awesome, now does the Surface Pro technically do more as a Hybrid tablet NPC? Absolutely, but Apple's approach is clear, we're making this an iPad and you won't interact with any device like this one and that's what i love about it. Now that Apple pencil that Apple avoids at all costs to call a stylus Now of course everything I've done so far I've done using touch. But with iPad Pro we have the best stylus that's ever been made. Whoops. See, that's okay, Infinity photo guy. You have an amazing app, so I'll forgive you. Now I'm drooling over that new screen with pro motion. A 20 millisecond latency is unmatched, and it's finally made the Apple Pencil worth the price of admission. That's a rad apple. Yeah! So yes mainstream media is even talking about the iPad, they're talking about the home pod and other stuff, which we'll get to. But the new iPad Pro with iOS 11 was the standout of the keynote. We'll just have to see if people end up buying them. All right this year's [UNKNOWN] was packed with some much stuff and as for the operating systems it's more of a refinement year especially for the new Mac OS High Sierra. Now we talked to the guys and we said there might be, this might be misconstrued, but they assured us this name is fully baked. So. Thanks Craig but I think you meant Mac OS. [SOUND] Sierra [BLANK_AUDIO] [SOUND] Yeah, he ain't going away any time soon, kids. Now Macs across the board get Kaby Lake updates for better performance. The iMac updates were a total surprise but welcome for For all of you who have been waiting for an upgrade. But then Apple dropped a bomb on us with the iMac Pro. It's sassy and all that space grey, no doubt. The power in this thing is a match with the option for an 18-core Xeon processor. Now the good Good thing Apple has a machine for companies to develop VR and AR content natively on the map. It remains to be seen how many will, but guess what? They should, AR kit is powerful, not because of what it does, we've seen this type of stuff before for years, but Apple just instantly created the largest platform for augmented reality without the need for anyone to purchase a single piece of additional hardware, that's a big deal. Well let's be real, not too many of you are going to be able do dive in on this with a starting price of $4999. This is for professionals. But that's what was so great for me. This iMac was clearly the vision that Apple had in mind for their next pro machine. Like, they didn't do squat with the 2013 Mac Pro for over three years because their vision was that this iMac Would be the next Pro machine. Now that all changed when they realize they were alienating guests who? Pro users. It took them three years to realize this, and they announced this back in April that they had made a boo-boo. So a new module for Mac Pro will be Will be coming maybe by the end of this year. But let's be honest, more likely 2018. Now I'm really hoping we get more from iOS 11 when it's featured with the new iPhones in September. Apple Pay person to person payments in Messages is nice. But I'm not a fan of the new control center. It looks like this mishmash of widgets like a modern art mural, but that's not what I want with the control center. I don't know, maybe it's just me. All right, the big iOS 11 they didn't talk about in the keynote, you can now Now add more control to your Airpods. The settings will now allow you to use a double tap to either go to the next track, or previous track on either ear. And yes, you'll still have the single tap option for pause and play or Siri. Now, it's much needed, and next up, volume control in 2018. See, that's funny at first, until you realize that I am probably right. All right, the biggest letdown from iOS 11, Siri. I was really hoping this was a chance for Apple to show us their vision in the artificial intelligence and virtual assistant game. And maybe, maybe They are holding off until the iPhone in September, I'll give them that but this is a developer's conference and it's all about the software. Now they mentioned machine learning a few times, they gave us a demo of a Siri voice that's more conversational. Here is the forecast to the next ten days, sunny, sunny and sunny. Three different ways to say sunny, very powerful Okay, but they never fundamentally showed us how much smarter Siri really is. WWDC was a golden opportunity to show us the details of Apple's AI and vision with their platform and ecosystem moving forward. Like, is it really that much better? They didn't talk about it, and more importantly they didn't brag about it and that tells me Its not. Everything is moving in that direction. Amazon and Google, they have Better assistants. And people who keep telling me Siri is good enough, try using Those other devices on a day to day basis. Siri is really behind by By a lot, and that's a sad apple. [SOUND] Now it's where things are going and if we don't hear anything about it in September, then yeah, a bad Apple is coming out in full force. But let's talk about the Home Pod, Apple's $349 Home Pod. I have no doubt this will be the best sounding smart speaker on the market with its 4 inch woofer, 7 tweeter array. Whose guts kind of look like an Imperial probe droid. Cool. Now, its ability to analyze a room and adjust the sound for optimal quality will have to be tried out in person, but that sounds neat. Apple positioned this as a music speaker first. The focus wasn't on the smart aspects of it. It has Siri built in, but it was another opportunity to tout its improvements That didn't happen. Now did you know this isn't apple first [UNKNOWN] with the [UNKNOWN] speaker. That was apple's Ipod high five that also retailed for 349 in 2006. Now come on the internet always is the best when it comes to new apple designs, like here check out some of these out takes. Like for example the home pod looks like a scratching post. If you have cats, you might wanna stay away. Some people already found they have HomePod in their bathroom. It also comes in many colors if, you know you're shopping at Joanne's Fabrics, and the fist thing that came to me, the HomePod would be perfect at a campfire. [SOUND] Roasted. Now, Apple was showing it off after the keynote at their demo room but It was hands off for reporters so I've got to admit I like the glowy top that I'll never see from a distance because it's on top but the Apple crew was able to infiltrate Apple's headquarters and I snuck out one of their early prototypes for the home pod so check it out here, you'll notice some of the details like the first attempt at The mesh fabrics and then we have these 2 things here for cable management and I don't know, it's just this form factor. It looks familiar, but I don't know, I just can't place it yet. Alright, this is going to be available in December and of course I'll buy one to try, but we'll see if I keep it. Alright, that's gonna do it for this weeks show. We couldn't cover everything, but we'd love to hear what you thought about the WWDCT note. Email us at theapplybyte@cnet.com or Tweet me @briantong. Thanks so much for watching, we'll catch you all next time. For a bite of the Apple. [MUSIC] So cool. [MUSIC] [UNKNOWN] [MUSIC]