ive been Mac/Apple devotee for years. I want to buy HomePod but want to be sure it will play my entire iTunes library as is the case with my other Apple devices. Spent hours uploading my store bought CD’s years ago. This is critical in my decision.
I've received my HomePod(s) now and begun to listen to music - I can say conclusively that they play anything I want to select from my own personal iTunes library. The HomePods were immediately available as AirPlay speaker choices on the iTunes menu, and I can select one or more speakers (HomePod, computer, other, in any combination one or more) to play my music.
For me, this is exactly what i was hoping for - I can now put speakers throughout my home and direct my iTunes library music to them.
The Siri control is not as complete as it will be for Apple Music. You can only control the music from your computer, as far as selecting the music to be played, and at each HomePod you can individually control volume, and you can also pause the music and go back or ahead track by track from the HomePods. So there is that degree of control but it is not Siri controlled.
One thing about Siri, as others have reported, it is uncanny that you can say 'Hey Siri' at very low volume, even with the music playing very loudly, and Siri will pause the music and wait for a request. That is quite impressive.
I get the whole thing about CDs. But a lot of us ripped CDs to digital files, some at Lossless Bit rates. So we have huge collections already on our hard drives that now seem forgotten. I don’t subscribe to Apple Music or any other service because I already have the music I want to listen too. All I’m asking for is for it to be used as an Airplay speaker with Siri support.
Adding my voice to the others here who consider this critical - my iTunes library is my source of music, I'm not particularly interested in subscribing to Apple Music and it doesn't have the same music that I own myself.
I noticed the same thing in reading the HomePod specs - why would they list all of those formats if the only purpose of HomePod was to stream Apple Music? And yet nothing on the Apple site (at the moment) really addresses this clearly.
I ordered two HomePod units today, before I realized this was uncertain. I'm now hoping that I can be more certain about this before I feel the need to cancel my order.
Unfortunately for Apple, the verdicts are starting to come in. The NYT ran a review today where they compared HomePod to Amazon Alexa and Google Home devices on 14 specific tasks. Homepod cam in last overall. It had the best sound, but was unable to compete in most other areas. At twice the price or more, I think I’ll wait until Apple makes HomePod more capable. I guess I was spoiled by the gift of a Google Home smart speaker. It can do more, it can play my iTunes playlists that Google permitted me to upload to their cloud free of charge, and can do so by voice command as well as manual streaming. Here’s the NYT review from 2/7/18.
Apple’s HomePod Has Arrived. Don’t Rush to Buy It. - The New York Times
I’m actually swinging the other way on this. I’m only interested in the sound quality and almost all the reviews I read say Apple nailed it. Really don’t care about the “smart parts”. It do fine for me as an Airplay Speaker.
good
Please let us know the answer to this question when you get your HomePods. Keeping my fingers crossed for you.
Read this article the other day. Great reporting. It’s made me more interested in the device. I’m actually not caring about all the Siri stuff, more about the audio. So I just might buy it.
Significant that it says Mac rather than include Windows or just iTunes. Not so useful for Windows users then. 😕
tt2
I hope somebody at Apple reads this thread. My iTunes collection is probably 90% burned store bought CD’s done on my Macs over the years, and maybe 10% purchases from iTunes. Right now, my iMac, my iphone, both of my iPads, AND my Google Home device can play all of my iTunes library without any subscription. Google made it difficult, but they allow a person to upload up to 50,000 songs to their cloud, free of charge and then Google Home can play lists from that upload iTunes library, albeit, somewhat cumbersome. Now Apple releases a $349 device that can‘t do what their iMac, iPhone, and iPad can already do, and it can’t even do what one of their main competitors can do with iTunes. What were they thinking? Here I am ready to fork out $349 to buy the HomePod but it has been designed to be less capable than any other Apple device except for maybe the Apple IIe. I have one of those as well. I want to buy a Homepad even though I already have a super fine Google Home device which I am willing to abandon, but Apple designed a machine that is the best sounding device of its kind, it just can’t do almost anything it’s other devices can already do,, nor can it do most of what the competition can already do. Please fix this Apple. I want to give you my money but HomePod can’t play my iTunes library without a monthly subscription. This would not be happening if Steve Jobs were still around. Apple, please come to your senses and fix this ASAP.
From the article:
I want to reiterate, because I've seen a number of people passing around conflicting information: You can stream any audio (including anything from your iTunes library on your Mac) to HomePod
via the original AirPlay protocol.
When AirPlay 2 launches, you'll be able to stream that audio to multipleAirPlay-compatible speakers, but the AirPlay 2 protocol is not required to stream audio from your Mac or other sources.
Homepod
