"Apple Homepod: a Speaker to Reinvent Home Music"

[oivavoi]

IMD is generally much more audible than HD because the tones do not fall on the harmonic series (natch) and so stick out more. IMD adds dissonance.

Haven't read the thread or anything else but "non-coherent" is a little puzzling to me as well without them providing a definition. Seems pretty incoherent of them...

Apple doesnt speak about non-coherent distortion. That was just an example about newer metrics that apparently do a better job at predicting listener experience than THD. I believe it was two guys at Harman who came up with it: https://www.researchgate.net/public...n_Using_a_Multitone_Stimulus_and_Noncoherence

 

[Thomas savage]

Inside the Apple Audio den
http://eftm.com.au/2018/02/inside-apples-secret-audio-labs-homepod-created-46775

Lots of measuring going on, come on guys quit wasting time and just listen to it.. that will tell you what you need to know.

 

[12B4A]

Got my two pods in. One is up and running and it's pretty much 98% mono. The jury is still out listening to proper stereo speakers until the software is updated on this one.

 

[jhaider]

We've only listened to background music on ours so far. I haven't sat in front of it. In that role it sounds better than the OPPO Sonica.

The voice control seems pretty useless, and will be until they let it accept multiple iCloud accounts and train Siri to recognize different voices for each account. It should have the horsepower to do that. But we bought it mostly to as an extension speaker to use with Airplay, so that is less important for us.

 

[12B4A]

One thing I can say is that it has a pretty heavy handed use of dynamic EQ for bass. It makes Audyssey's dynamic EQ seem neutral by comparison. If I sit in my audio designer armchair, it'd make sense to do this for a mono speaker and then scale it back for stereo. So yeah, jury is still out until proper stereo is implemented.

 

[Thomas savage]

Went to the Apple store to listen to this, just one unit playing...

It’s colured imo ( base is just wrong) and seemed to be a total waste of time and effort, it was a noisy space though but still ...

4/10

Maybe ok for the bedroom

 

[Soniclife]

Inside the Apple Audio den
http://eftm.com.au/2018/02/inside-apples-secret-audio-labs-homepod-created-46775

I'm not surprised Apple built proper facilities, or hired people who know stuff, when they get into a market they usually go all in, after all what are they going to do with all that money but spend a tiny amount of it.

Does make me wonder who else who makes that makes speakers has proper facilities for measuring, I know of very few.
Their is Dynaudio with huge room,

Eve audio.
http://www.eve-audio.com/index.php?page=anechoicroom

(interesting stuff about 1o mins in)
Who else?

 

[oivavoi]

Harman, Samsung in US (from before Harman), Dynaudio, B&O - and I would guess also some guys over in Asia.

 

[Dialectic]

Harman, Samsung in US (from before Harman), Dynaudio, B&O - and I would guess also some guys over in Asia.

There are numerous smaller companies that use government- and university-operated facilities in Canada and the Netherlands.

 

[oivavoi]

There are numerous smaller companies that use government- and university-operated facilities in Canada and the Netherlands.

Interesting. That may explain why Canada and the Netherlands are so extremely over-represented in audio compared to the population size. These guys have more audio engineers per capita than anybody else.

 

[RayDunzl]

8:50

 

[Dialectic]

Interesting. That may explain why Canada and the Netherlands are so extremely over-represented in audio compared to the population size. These guys have more audio engineers per capita than anybody else.

That is correct. In the United States, hardly any real engineers design audio gear, and fewer yet design the many U.S. high-end audio products on offer, most of which are developed by audiophile tweakers.

 

[oivavoi]

That is correct. In the United States, hardly any real engineers design audio gear, and fewer yet design the many U.S. high-end audio products on offer, most of which are developed by audiophile tweakers.

Do you know if there's any collaboration between private audio companies and universities in Germany? There's a decent number of German engineering-based audio companies as well. When I come to think of it, Denmark is also an example of a country where public universities cooperate with private audio companies. B&O has for a long time cooperated with academics - at Aarhus I believe - and I think Dynaudio has done the same.

 

[Purité Audio]

I know the Fraunhoffer ? Institute cooperate with industry I have some of their membrane bass traps manufactured by RPG.
Keith

 

[Candlesticks]

https://www.reddit.com/r/audiophile...orning_raudiophile_measurements_are_underway/

Preliminary stuff there. It's amazingly good with amazing bass extension and low distortion. Problem is that fletcher-munson loudness compensation is automatically applied.

This is the technology I want to see implemented in pro audio speakers. Imagine what you could do with an 8" versus a 4" woofer. Extra SPL and lower distortion.

 

[oivavoi]

https://www.reddit.com/r/audiophile...orning_raudiophile_measurements_are_underway/

Preliminary stuff there. It's amazingly good with amazing bass extension and low distortion. Problem is that fletcher-munson loudness compensation is automatically applied.

This is the technology I want to see implemented in pro audio speakers. Imagine what you could do with an 8" versus a 4" woofer. Extra SPL and lower distortion.

This seems pretty amazing for such a small box. I can't wait to hear it. Yes, just imagine Apple making a bigger speaker, with even a 6.5". That could basically decimate a lot of the offerings in the speaker market. If these measurements turn out to be correct, and there's no other as of yet unmeasured things messing it up, it seems to be rather amazing.

 

[Soniclife]

There are numerous smaller companies that use government- and university-operated facilities in Canada and the Netherlands.

And quite a few UK companies hire them, I'm sure that's common over the world, but it must change how you develop speakers if you don't have good testing facilities down the corridor. Have a look at this response to review measurments from Harbeth, https://www.stereophile.com/content/harbeth-m401-loudspeaker-manufacturers-response, it's clear they use chambers more as a last recourse, and I think are probably more willing than most to hire.

 

[Soniclife]

It does look remarkable in that measurement, but odd it didn't pick up the 1.5KH peak and fix it, wonder if it looks the same with pink noise, clever dsp might interact with freq sweeps in confusing ways.

 

[12B4A]

It might be that when it's on a desk like that it's more detrimental to try to correct. That's a pretty sensitive perceptual area to tweak. Just for the pure entertainment, I can't wait to see what the woo-woo speaker stand manufacturers come up with for "enhancing" your HomePod© Experience™.

 

[Dialectic]

I wouldn't read much, or anything, into the Reddit measurements for two reasons. First, the HomePod is using algorithms to send different signals to different tweeters. For instance, it sends what its algorithm identifies as ambient sounds to the back tweeters.

Second, the measurement setup is wanting. USB mics are fine for finding room modes. They're probably not useful for pronouncing a speaker the best ever, as the Reddit fellows seem to want to do.