The Silicon Valley giant is reportedly set to unveil a “smart speaker” to take on Amazon’s hit Echo and Google’s Home at an event later today.
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Rumors have been circulating for a while now that both Microsoft and Apple are planning on bringing their voice assistants, Cortana and Siri respectively, to the home in the form of smart speakers, and at WWDC 2017 Apple finally announced its version.
Using the wake command “Hey Siri”, the much-rumoured device can play music as well as answer queries and control other smart home appliances.
Bolstering its support of this in-house AI assistant, as well as revealing the HomePod, Apple has launched a Siri-based watch face as part of watchOS4, describing it as “an intelligent proactive assistant right on your wrist” that “displays the information users need most throughout the day using Siri intelligence” such as traffic delay information to usual commutes. Some of the most intriguing augmentations that you can expect on Siri when iOS 11 goes live include on-device learning that will help out with recommendations and contextual understanding.
Apple seems to be concentrating on the music capabilities of the HomePod to start. “Although Apple has done a great job of being extremely profitable without having to cater to the mainstream, and they will drop their price over time”, he said.
While Siri was previously available on the Apple Watch, the assistant’s ability to automatically show information was limited.
Apple will begin shipping the HomePod to the United States, Britain and Australia in December. Room-sensing tech will let HomePod learn where it’s placed in a room so it can deliver the best sound; there are seven beam-forming tweeters and automatic detection and balance of two speakers.
The next version of iOS, which powers the iPhone and iPad, as well as desktop software macOS and the Apple Watch’s watchOS were also updated at the firm’s annual developer conference, WWDC.
There were also a couple of updates to Apple’s web browser, Safari, including a speed boost that makes it, according to Apple, the fastest ever desktop browser. Like the Amazon Echo and Google Home, the HomePod will play music while also helping people to manage their lives and homes.
Apple’s entry into the market could change this.
At about 7 inches tall, the HomePod is a bit squatter than the Amazon Echo, but roughly the same size as Google Home. Or if someone texts you about owing money, it will ask if you want to pay using Apple Pay.
Kaleidoscope face needs a picture from you and then it does а magical mashup and creates a kaleidoscope effect on your Apple Watch. Making the most of it will require a subscription to Apple’s own music streaming service, which runs $10 to $15 per month and has attracted 27 million subscribers so far.
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Apple is releasing a new iPad Pro with brighter retina displays. Users will be able to order the tablets Monday; they ship next week.
