New HomePod beta firmware released, unlikely to divulge much about future products

Apple employees with a HomePod have a new firmware version available for testing — with older versions of the device's code having revealed much about the then forthcoming iPhone X.

The firmware is publicly downloadable, but not available through the normal Developer beta release channels. The software itself is useless to anybody without a HomePod, but enterprising developers in the past have pored over data contained in it to reveal secrets about unannounced products.

A summer release of the HomePod firmware divulged the "notch" on the iPhone X, the display size of the OLED iPhone, how Siri will deal with requests beyond music playback, and technical specifications of the standalone speaker itself.

At present, it is not clear what is different in the new release, if anything at all. Also uncertain is what firmware spelunkers will find, as there are no current rumors about impending iOS devices.

Apple's $349 HomePod was revealed at the 2017 WWDC and will ship in 2018. The HomePod is powered by an Apple A8 chip featuring realtime acoustic modeling, audio beam-forming, and multi-channel echo cancelation. It features a subset of Siri, optimized for music consumption.

8 Comments

Kuyangkoh 838 comments · 7 Years

About 6 years ago

My son have a google mini, it was given by Google for buying pixel2xl....
Samsung and Google have give away, Apple have take your money away, hahaha...but love thier products.

fastasleep 6450 comments · 14 Years

About 6 years ago

allmypeople said:

Hoping Apple really dives into this space aggressively and soon.

Got my folks set up with Echo for Christmas: 1 Echo Plus hub, 3 Echo speakers & 1 Echo Dot for what will be the price of 1 Homepod in Cdn$. We had planned to go the Homepod route until the delay was announced.

They're not audiophiles by any means. But having double the speakers in entertaining spaces is really nice. It's not fully set up yet but so far, not bad.

The Echo Dots have horrible sound but they're going to be used on a bedside table and bathroom which is fine for weather, traffic & morning radio. As someone who took broadcasting in school I can vouch for the other speakers. They're definitely solid for the price. Streaming sounds good, music files uploaded to the cloud sound great.

Was someone holding a gun to your head making you purchase a smart speaker by the end of the year?

Scot1 126 comments · 7 Years

About 6 years ago

I just wish that HomePod would have the most up-to-date chip inside instead of one that’s a couple of years old.
I really hate buying old technology at a premium price.

caddyman33 25 comments · 7 Years

About 6 years ago

Scot1 said:

I just wish that HomePod would have the most up-to-date chip inside instead of one that’s a couple of years old.
I really hate buying old technology at a premium price.

Probably didn’t need that more processing power

k2kw 2079 comments · 11 Years

About 6 years ago

Scot1 said:

I just wish that HomePod would have the most up-to-date chip inside instead of one that’s a couple of years old.
I really hate buying old technology at a premium price.

Like the Intel Atom processor in the Echo Show. I’m sure the HomePod will have a much more powerful processor than either the Echo (which I like) or the Google Max. I just hope the HP has software to make that processor needed. Like a local based SIRI that is actually better than current Siri