Stephen and Jason talk about their recent NASA Social trips, and what the agency’s new budget and direction may mean for the International Space Station, Mars and more.
It’s long, but this is a really great episode about the future of the American space program. My thanks to the sponsors who made it possible:
This week’s Connected is a busy one:
We have HomePod opinions, dreams about WWDC and an amazing new t-shirt.
Seriously, just look at this thing. You can order one today over at Cotton Bureau.
My thanks to our sponsors:
Jon Chase, in his review of the new HomePod for Wirecutter:
An unhappy discovery after we placed a HomePod on an oiled butcher-block countertop and later on a wooden side table was that it left a defined white ring in the surface. Other reviewers and owners (such as Pocket-lint, and folks on Twitter) have reported the same issue, which an Apple representative has confirmed. Apple says “the marks can improve over several days after the speaker is removed from the wood surface,” and if they don’t fade on their own, you can basically just go refinish the furniture—the exact advice Apple gave in an email to Wirecutter was to “try cleaning the surface with the manufacturer’s suggested oiling method.” This really undermines the design aspect of the HomePod—especially if you were thinking of displaying it on some prized piece of furniture—and it will surely be a sore point for many potential buyers. In other testing, we have seen no visible damage when using it on glass, granite countertop, nice MDF, polyurethane-sealed wood, and cheap IKEA bookcases. We also tested the HomePod in the same place a Sonos One regularly lives—and the Sonos hasn’t caused damage in months of use.
It’s amazing this wasn’t caught during Apple’s testing of this device in employee’s homes and the company’s labs. Not great, Jony. Not great.
Update: Apple has updated its “Cleaning and Taking Care of HomePod” kbase article:
It is not unusual for any speaker with a vibration-dampening silicone base to leave mild marks when placed on some wooden surfaces. The marks can be caused by oils diffusing between the silicone base and the table surface, and will often go away after several days when the speaker is removed from the wooden surface. If not, wiping the surface gently with a soft damp or dry cloth may remove the marks. If marks persist, clean the surface with the furniture manufacturer’s recommended cleaning process. If you’re concerned about this, we recommend placing your HomePod on a different surface.
Is it a day to celebrate love, or a scam by greeting card companies? Dive into this and the weird history of Valentine’s Day this week with Stephen and Myke, who neglected to exchange gifts to mark the holiday.
My thanks our sponsor:
On this week’s episode of Query, Serenity and I get into some tips on managing the new smart speaker. Then, questions about file tagging on iOS and USB-C hubs!
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This isn’t an old support document, but it is old:
Amazing widgets for your Mac OS X Dashboard
Apple has informed store employees and authorized service providers that it will in some instances perform repairs for detached or damaged HomePod cables, according to an internal memo obtained by 9to5Mac.
Apple describes damaged or detached cables for HomePod as something it expects to be a “rare instance” for users, but it does have a policy in place to perform repairs at a cost.
If no physical damage to the speaker itself is present, Apple will replace a damaged power cord for $29. That’s far better than the $279 out-of-warranty replacement cost for the HomePod itself, but a removable power cord would have been even better.
Reddit user aerialbyte reports on what happens if you try to use two HomePods in stereo mode. The feature is “coming later this year,” but using two of the speakers doesn’t break quite the way I expected:
I just received the two HomePod’s I ordered! As soon as I added the second one to the Home app, it asked me if I wanted to put them in stereo mode (which is odd since it isn’t supposed to be supported yet). Anyways, I said yes and they were added to a group in the Apple Home app.
What I noticed immediately is that if I tell Siri to play a song, she will only play the song in one of the two (again, probably due to lack of stereo support). If I go into iTunes and select both speakers (as seen in one of the screenshots below), I can tell Siri to change the volume and the changes will apply to both.
The HomePod is the second $349 speaker Apple has pitched over the years. It seemed obvious to compare it to the iPod Hi-Fi:
I’ve been tinkering with my HomePod today, and I realized I didn’t know how to turn the microphones off. On the Amazon Echo and Google Home, there’s an easy way to keep the device from listening. Turns out, Apple has a way as well:
Say “Hey Siri, stop listening.” When Hey Siri is turned off, touch and hold the top of HomePod to talk to Siri. To turn Hey Siri back on, in the Home app, press (or touch and hold) a HomePod, then tap Details and change the Listen for “Hey Siri” setting.’
Got a HomePod on its way? You can get a head start on checking out the User Guide starting now. Don’t miss all the ways you can control the device, what types of things Siri can handle and what a user can do with your personal data if you enable the feature.
Awkwardly, at least at the time I published this, this page refers to AirPlay 2 more than once, but doesn’t seem to list any features that are being held back until AirPlay 2 ships later this year.
With March approaching, it’s possible we may see an iPhone SE 2 in the coming weeks.
The SE was announced in March 2016. It took the guts (more or less) of the iPhone 6S and squished them into the body (more or less) of the iPhone 5S.
The SE is a big hit in my house. I bought my wife an iPhone 6S for Christmas in 2015, but she never adjusted to liking the larger screen size. When the SE came out a few months later, she swapped back to the 4-inch form factor she had come to love with her iPhone 5S. At a full ounce lighter than the 6S, she can run with the SE much easier than a larger, heavier phone.
I don’t think the market for the iPhone SE is very big, but I bet it’s bigger than Apple thought it would be a couple of years ago. I know many SE users are devoted to having the most compact smartphone they can, and I think Apple should continue to serve that market.
In 2016, the SE didn’t lack much of what was found in high-end 6S. Besides the size and weight, here are the other features the 6S boasted over the SE:
The phones shared a processor, so performance was the same between the two. The iPhone SE was cheaper than the 6S, smaller and lighter, and almost as good.
If Apple really does have an SE 2 in the works, what should we expect from it?
I think the design and size would remain the same. The 5S design may have started life in 2013, but I view it like I viewed the full-sized iPod — the design is classic. Why change it?
The aluminum back means that wireless charging is off the table. A glass back would also add to the low weight of the phone, which is a nice feature of the SE.
I would expect to see a physical home button again, as the 4-inch chassis probably doesn’t have room for the Taptic Engine needed for the iPhone 7’s home button.1 Same goes for the headphone jack, which The Verge will be excited about.
Likewise, I don’t see 3D Touch making it into this smaller phone. I think that’s perfectly fine, though; Apple’s implementation of 3D Touch is still so scattershot I halfway think the company may be slowly backing away from it.
A big question is what iPhone’s specs would Apple borrow from to build the SE 2? Would it share a CPU and camera system with the iPhone 8, or would Apple look to preserve its margins and remix the iPhone 7?
As much as I’d like to see the SE 2 be powered by the A11 Bionic chipset at the heart of the 8, 8 Plus and X, I think Apple would cheap out here. However, if using the A10 Fusion chip from the iPhone 7 means the iPhone SE 2 can continue to cost just $349, I think it’d be just fine. Even if Apple recycles the iPhone 7 camera, it’d still be a nice upgrade from the current SE.