r/HomePod

Hey guys! New to HomePod and HomeKit, but I’m wanting to get started.

My question comes from my current setup. I use an Echo Dot as a Bluetooth connection to my stereo system when I’m home. I split my time between home and college, so when I’m away, I just use the Dot as a standalone speaker.

I noticed that the HomePod Mini doesn’t have an AUX output, which seems like it would prevent me from connecting it to my stereo system. I’m interested in the HomePod Mini because of its footprint and because it would be a good starting point for eventually building out a HomeKit system.

Is there any sort of workaround that would let me use a HomePod Mini with my existing stereo system, or am I basically stuck with the Echo Dot for this setup?

I am heavily invested into the apple ecosystem, but haven't ventured into smart home stuff yet, so a HomeKit system makes the most sense. Just curious your thoughts or if I'm missing something.

Any way to do this? If I ask Siri to put me thru to ChatGPT with a shortcut on my AirPods it asks me to ‘first unlock iPhone’

It’s driving me crazy.

If you play audio from your Apple TV and AirPlay to the HomePod, if you hit pause will they drop off and get deselect selected? Or will they stay connected indefinitely in the AirPlay menu?

I know the Apple TV 3rd gen doesn’t support eArc, but I’m wondering if there’s a workaround that will allow me to route the audio from my Roku TV through my HomePod Mini speakers. I don’t mind audio latency issues as the Roku TV allows me adjust that. I just want better audio as the quality on the TV’s speakers is garbage. I snagged the Apple TV for $10 mostly to bypass the awful Roku TV’s new UI and make casting from my iPhone easier/better, but was hoping to figure out some way to upgrade the crappy TV audio by routing it through my HomePod minis if possible.

Does anyone know of a budget-friendly way to accomplish this? I can only spend like $30-ish, but if anyone knows of a decent bridging device that would allow me convert the TV audio to an AirPlay signal or something like that I’d be open to buying/trying something. I have a 2024 MacBook Pro and read somewhere that I might be able to use it somehow to bridge that gap, so if that’s what it takes I’d be willing to try it. Thanks in advance 💜

Hi

I have a pair of 2. Gen HomePods which are connected to my Apple TV, today they turned the volume all the way up and kept doing it, so I decided to reboot them, and now they won’t play any sound from the Apple TV 🤷‍♂️

It has been lovely two/three years with them but now these issues are reoccurring even when using the “delayed touch input” settings 🫠

I’m thinking about changing them to something else but all other options are just expensive compared to what I paid for the HomePods 😂

Anyone have 4 OG HomePods or 4 HomePods connected to AppleTv? I have 2 OG’s and 2 minis in my bedroom. (Please, don’t comment with expert advice unless you’ve tried it.) My room isn’t large, so the sound gets bounced around amazingly and the bass is excellent (floor rumbling!)!! I’ve run it through the YouTube Atmos tests…. So I know the minis are more filler than actually reproducing background sounds…. but sometiiiiimes… I wonder. I know the OG’s shoot the sound pretty well, but I’ve heard something about mismatched HomePods before and wonder if there’s a POSSIBILITY four OG’s might compute the sound, differently… or as Apple would say “Different”. I recall seeing plans that hinted that this was their original plan.

Sooooooo, has anyone TRIED it?

After having one of the 2 HomePod Mini’s in my office unplugged for about a day, one of them goes thru a continuous cycle of stating it needs to be reset. When I try the process it just cycles thru it again. Connecting the USB-C cable directly to my MacBook Air let me do a software update & it acknowledged a reset was successful. But after connecting the HomePod Mini to power it just goes thru the attempted reset process again. Changing power adapter, issued by Apple, did nothing as well.
The other HomePod Mini works fine.
HELP!!

Hey,

I am currently upgrading my room with a TV and Apple TV. I wanted to ask whether or not I could use my existing 2 HomePod mini’s paired with a soundbar as my audio/theater setup.

My exact questions are:

- is it possible to sync a soundbar with 2 HomePod minis and a Apple TV 4K

- what soundbar do I need/wich ones are capable of syncing with my HomePod minis with a Apple TV 4K

Thank you ✌️

Has anyone had this happen with their HomePods?

Lately when I’m playing Apple Music, the music will randomly get really muffled, almost like Siri is listening or I’ve said “Hey Siri" except I haven’t said anything. Sometimes it’ll last a few seconds, but other times it stays like that for a minute or two before going back to normal. I'm not sure what to do... My homepods are odd!

I’ve also noticed Siri randomly talking sometimes as if I said something to her when I definitely didn’t, which is kind of creepy.

I’m assuming the two things are related and that Siri is somehow getting triggered when nobody is talking to her, but I have no idea why the music would stay muffled for that long. I tried stopping and starting and it still happens. I have

Has anyone else had this happen or figured out how to fix it? I have a first gen one (the big one) and a homepod mini (from 2021).

Hi Guys,

I have two first-generation HomePods (the OG ones) that I use to listen to music in my bedroom. I also use them with my Apple TV when I want to watch movies in my living room.

My problem is mainly with listening to music on them, especially when using TuneIn. In particular, when I play Ibiza Global Radio, the sound quality seems noticeably lower. The station obviously isn’t streaming at 320 kbps, so the sound can sometimes feel a bit muffled and not as room-filling compared with how Apple Music radio stations sound.

My question is: if I add a HomePod mini to the setup, do you think it could slightly compensate for the lower audio quality by making the overall sound louder and more room-filling?

I’m not expecting the HomePod mini to improve the actual source quality, but I’m hoping that adding another speaker might make the sound feel fuller and give me a little more volume.

Has anyone tried something similar? Would adding a HomePod mini actually make a noticeable difference, or would it just make the limitations of the low-quality stream more apparent?

Thanks!

Alright here’s the dealio. I’m a college student and was looking to buy a pair of the homepods for my apartment. I also dj/mix by myself all the time. I wanted better speakers to dj for my own parties and such (practice too). i have just found that a pair of the pioneer vm-80s are the same exact price. Is a pair of the homepods really worth better sound for my tv and music playing? or should I just go with the vm-80s? Keep in mind I already have fluance speakers for my dj controller; however, I am in desperate need of an upgrade. If the homepods truly are game changing, i’d love to know.

TL;DR
HomePods or Pioneer VM-80s for ~$747? I DJ often and want loud, high-quality speakers for mixing/parties, but also for TV and casual music.

I've had a Sonos speaker from IKEA for a while now, but I had not really been able to watch movies with it because of the lag.

Decided to fix this a few months ago, but it ended up being pretty hard, since I wanted to get audio out of Windows without delay or loss of quality. I had to obtain an EV code signing certificate, make a kernel driver, and get Microsoft to cross-sign it.

And it works! The app streams to my Sonos speaker without noticeable delay. (Sometimes I need to click on re-sync, or subtract 25-100ms from the buffer.)

Are power surges dangerous on homepods or can it handle them fine?

I ask Siri to play any music she first says ok the follows up with “sorry there is a problem with Apple Music” doesn’t matter what I ask for album, radio, ect.I can't play music directly through the home app. The only way is via AirPlay on Mac.

I restart HomePod 2 times and nothing.

Second generation HomePod.

Version 26.6

Hi All,

I'm off to uni in September, and am quite a high tech person. This means my uni dorm will include HomePod minis, smart lights, custom routines etc.

One of my plans was to put one of my HomePod minis in the kitchen area. I feel like (assuming my neighbours are reasonable) this would be a great contribution for listening to music and being social together, as well as being very useful for googling cooking recipes and stuff.

However, I obviously don't want random people to be able to access my reminders, calendar, and be able to call my contacts. Can I disable these features whilst leaving core Siri functionality like setting timers?

Or Alternatively, is it possible to set this second HomePod mini on a different apple account such that we can still talk to it, but it had no data on the account to share?

My HomePod is hard of hearing. I have to get within three feet and speak at a normal volume, or else scream at it from the kitchen. Google Home, on the other hand, never misses a beat when I ask for the weather forecast in a normal voice from the kitchen. Is this just how it is?

Can anyone on 27 beta 5 confirm this? My siri is now smarter and handling most requests and questions accurately without telling me to try on my phone instead. What prompts has it traditionally failed that I can use to test this theory?