On this week's episode of the Smart Home Insider podcast, we examine the new Sonos smart speaker launch and suggestions for seasonal device management with guest Jennifer Pattison Tuohy.

Jennifer Pattison Tuohy from The Verge sits in on the podcast for the first time in 2026. She's been a journalist for over three decades and covers all kinds of smart home tech.

We start the episode in one of Jennifer's areas of expertise, Amazon Alexa+. A new report from Wired suggests that Amazon's new AI-powered assistant is struggling. Some of our staffers agree.

And, Rhys Rogers writes about forcing themselves to use Alexa+ for a month straight, met with constant issues. This is a good case for why Apple is more than justified in its internal delay of the next-generation version of Siri until it's fully ready.

Speaking of delays, Bloomberg once again confirms that Apple has been forced to delay not only its new smart display, but the next versions of the Apple TV and HomePod mini, too. Apple apparently sees these tied to Siri, and that update needs to be launched before these can be released.

The big news for the week is the new announcement from Sonos. The speaker maker is once more returning to hardware with two new smart speakers.

Both were rumored, the Sonos Play and the Sonos Era 100 SL debured last week. The former is a mid-sized portable speaker while the latter is the same as the Era 100 without a built-in microphone or virtual assistant.

Wrapping up the episode, Andrew made a crucial mistake that sent his smart home into disarray. This rare bug may be something to watch out for.

While I get into this more in the podcast, it all started when I plugged in an old HomePod running iOS 18 that I hadn't used in a while. When I plugged it in to demo handoff, this resulted in my home reverting to its previous state from at least a year ago.

In short, my two childrens' rooms went back to generic names "Baby room" and "Guest Room" instead of being labeled with their names.

I finally got the HomePod updated but there was no way to automatically fix it all except reconfigure all the devices and room names. Automations and everything still worked, though.

Finally, we talk about seasonal items — like holiday lights or space heaters — and some tips on how you can manage them in the off-season.

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