Tag: Siri

Apple Has Discontinued Its HomePod Smart Speaker, To Focus on HomePod Mini Going Forward

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In a rather surprising development, Cupertino-based giant Apple has discontinued its original HomePod smart speaker, according to a report in TechCrunch. The company made the decision in order to focus more on the HomePod Mini smart speaker that was introduced by the company last year. While the original HomePod offered better sound, the HomePod Mini was the Apple smart speaker that was received well in the market.

Apple confirmed the development to TechCrunch, saying that the speaker will be available on Apple stores and retailers until supplies last. The company will continue to provide Apple HomePod customers with software updates and service and support through Apple Care, the company was quoted by TechCrunch as saying. Currently, the Apple HomePod speaker is available on the Apple store in both white and space grey colour options. Apple is now betting on the HomePod Mini going forward. The TechCrunch report said that this move could point to Apple’s desire to fill every room with ‘good enough’ sound rather than to focus on the living room with ‘truly unbelievable’ sound.

The Apple HomePod is priced at Rs 19,900 in India and is currently available in both space grey and white colours on the official Apple store. The HomePod comes with a high-excursion woofer with a custom amplifier, an array of seven tweeters, a six microphone array for far-field Siri, internal low-frequency calibration microphone, streo pairing, and more.

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Apple Releases Third Public Beta of iOS 14.5, Stable Roll Out Expected Soon: What’s New

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Apple is rolling out the third public beta version of the upcoming iOS 14.5, days after rolling out the second beta to public testers and the third beta to developers. According to 9to5Mac, the iOS 14.5 Beta 3 does not bring any new features, except for refinements for the existing upgrades introduced with the previous iOS 14.5 beta versions. With the iOS 14.5 Beta 1, Apple introduced the ability to play music from third-party music apps like Spotify while using its virtual assistant Siri. The company recently clarified that the feature does not let users to choose a default music app, but only improves Siri for better results. It essentially means that Siri will again ask for Music app preference in future. The new update also retains the ‘Items’ tab in the Find My app by default. Apple is expected to roll out the stable version of iOS 14.5 for mass users in the coming days.

One of the notable changes that Apple introduced with the old iOS 14.5 beta versions (also present on iOS 14.5 Beta 3) was the ability to unlock iPhones other than FaceID. The latest system allows users to unlock the iPhone even with they are wearing the mask. However, users would additionally require the Apple Watch for the unlocking system to work. This ‘unlock with Apple Watch’ already exists for Apple Macs. Also, with the iOS 14.5 Beta 3, the AirPlay 2 support is available for Apple Fitness Plus.

ALSO READ: Apple Isn’t Letting You Change The Default Music Service In iOS 14.5, But Actually May Just Be It

The iOS 14.5 Beta 2 had introduced new slide gestures in Apple Music for adding a song to the Now Playing queue or adding it to the ‌Apple Music‌ Library. These options were earlier accessible by long-pressing the song on the music app. In addition to new gestures, Apple iPhone and iPad users can also access “Play Last” and “Show Album” by long-pressing the song. The company will reportedly roll out new and upgraded emojis from the Unicode Consortium 13.1. For instance, the Headphone emoji has been updated to look like the AirPods Max rather than a generic set of headphones, and the rock climbing emoji now includes a helmet. Apple has also removed the blood from the syringe emoji to give it a more neutral look that also works for vaccinations.

The Cupertino-based tech giant is also expected to roll out the App Tracking Transparency tool that has been criticised by Facebook and several other ad companies.

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