Seeing some conflicting reports here, some suggesting Google Home Max has better audio quality.
Given that reports suggest that Siri can only answer 52% of queries correctly, it is looking like this is a device that will only appeal to Apple diehards.
For context, Microsoft’s Cortana can answer 57% of queries thrown at it in testing, Amazon’s Alexa can answer 64% of queries, and Google Assistant is way ahead of everyone, answering 81% of queries correctly! (source)
As much as i really want a HomePod I don’t think I will be getting one, I generally don’t see the need for it especially when I have Alexa.
If I wanna play any music I can just use my ATV through my AV which would give better sound anyway.
Yeah at the moment I am seeing it as an expensive kitchen speaker which is where it would go if I got one. If I had the money to burn sure I would get one, but otherwise it’s not on my short/medium term list.
I personally don’t find consumer reports to be particularly relevant these days.
I can’t think of the last time I went ‘let me see what consumer reports has to say’ when a new device comes out.
I also find it pretty suspect that nearly every other review out there proclaims that it sounds better, and then consumer reports say otherwise? Seems like a rush for headline grab but 
I ended up returning mine. I miss it, the sound was great, but I couldn’t find where it would fit into my life.
Consumer Reports has form for being a little contrary when it comes to Apple. Sophisticated click bait? 
Nearly all relevant reviews have the HomePod as sounding better than every other smart speaker (the Google Max has bigger base… because the unit is significantly bigger).
I’m on the fence with it - I’m Apple everything, and I’d love a central hub for my HomeKit enabled devices (currently limited to Hue, but soon to include a heating system).
Siri does need to be improved though - If it could access generic web based question that would be great (which is why Google can answer more questions).
But then Google can only do that due to the data it’s collected and monetised over the past XX years.
As a speaker - It seems to tick all of the boxes, and is “best in class” for it’s price.
As an “assistant”… It doesn’t have the compatibility of Alexa or Google (but then it has only just come out), so it’s still some way off challenging in that department.\
Although supposedly Siri is getting a big bump this year (according to reports from yesterday).
i’d be shocked if they didn’t open up SiriKit slowly over the next couple of WWDCs. The first iPhone didn’t have apps, the first WatchOS was so basic it was painful, but they let Apple build up from a stable base rather than trying to over promise and under deliver. It’s obviously powerful enough to do a lot more in the future.
I hate talking to assistants other than setting timers or sending a quick message if I’m on my own at home, so it works great for me as it is, but I’d definitely be happy to see Siri being able to do a bit more.
There’s a lot of talk about Siri being a poor assistant being able to get things right only 52%ish of the time.
To be fair, there’s high expectations and it’s great that this is being tested. I don’t doubt Siri isn’t quite up there with Google or Amazon Alexa, …yet.
In fact, it may always be behind but in real, practical terms does it really matter to most users?
Probably not.
Ok, Siri can not understand when I want to listen to something French and that’s a minor annoyance.
I was impressed that it could list the top goal scorers for Brighton and Hove Albion. I’m impressed how it can pick up and understand my voice commands, spoken lightly, even when playing music at a decent volume.
I’m impressed at the moment as I said ”Hey Siri, play some music.” and it’s currently playing a blinding selection of tunes. Yes! I really do have impeccable taste in music 
. Seriously, it’s chosen a good selection.
I’m impressed it can do a few other things, timers and alarms can be useful. So too can the weather. I can ask it to play a podcast but it can’t tell me what’s on BBC 1 tonight.
Overall, Sound pretty good, Siri OK. I was expecting more from the sound, tbh.
I thought it is already opened, isn’t it?
Siri isn’t even the biggest issue with HomePod.
It’s that it’s the most walled garden product apple have ever released.
You can’t use it with any other music service. I have both Apple Music and Spotify, Spotify blows it away when it comes to features, especially playlists. (I know you can use AirPlay, but thats not the point)
The speaker has BT 5.0 built in, but doesn’t allow you to use it.
You can’t connect it to a Mac! 
No line in. (I don’t personally use any headphone jack these days, but i know it would be a selling factor for some)
I can see it being opened up more down the line, but it could possibly go the way of the iPod Hi-Fi
Lastly Siri…https://www.reddit.com/r/SiriFail/
On HomePod, only for a few domains - messaging, notes and lists.
MacStories has a decent review thing this morning - https://www.macstories.net/reviews/a-promising-work-in-progress-initial-thoughts-on-homepod/
Seems like a pretty fair write up.
Mega-lolz.
That’s a feature, not a bug 
All in all, I thought the move to the HomePod was going well right until my family staged an intervention. Their annoyance with Siri misunderstanding or misinterpreting has grown over the last few weeks, and the clumsiness with which Siri handles — or doesn’t handle — some requests has become bothersome.
I’ve overheard several interactions with the HomePod that entail a family member asking for a song or album that ends in getting upset with the device when it starts playing something else. The Echo — coupled with Amazon Music — had a much higher hit rate when it came to accurately playing what was desired.
In short, the increase in sound quality doesn’t make up for the frustration of using Siri. The HomePod is going to live in my studio; the Echo is back in its rightful place in the kitchen.
Even prominent Apple fanboy blogger John Gruber from Daring Fireball says :
Apple miscalculated that audio quality should be the top priority of a smart speaker. It’s the “smart” part that needs to be the top priority.
Which, as far as I was aware, was pretty obvious. The idea that a company like Apple could completely miscalculate this raises some serious questions about their vision, to me.
It seems to me that they are going to have to do some serious backtracking soon. They made a big song and dance about “ohhhh, nasty horrible Google collecting all your data, we don’t do that” and as a result they’ve lost the future of computing, which is very clearly based on data collection and using machine learning to train AI.
which is very clearly based on data collection
I will slightly disagree. The future might be based on data collection [citation needed], but in any case there is a way to do so respectfully. Monetize it by charging a fair price for the service (which Apple customers don’t mind paying given the already huge margins on their products) instead of using that data to spam me with shit someone else paid you to put in front of me. 
The fact that Apple completely dropped the ball with Siri has nothing to do with data collection or lack thereof, I’d say it’s more about not allocating enough resources to the project, or poor management, or a mix of both. I think a big part of it is due to Siri’s earlier limitations - back at launch it was a pretty stupid assistant with a very rigid “UI” so even if the speech recognition was flawless there just wasn’t much you could do with it, and the interactions would feel unnatural. They should’ve opened it up from the start, and developers could’ve made up for its initial shortcomings.
I disagree that you can get the kind of data you need from a service you charge for, especially when Google are very, very far ahead already. Apple’s previous decisions in this regard mean they basically know very little about anyone compared to the competition.
Google has been doing phenomenal things here for well over a decade and it shows.
Apple Maps, for example, is total shit. It simply cannot compete with Google Maps. Neither Siri compared to Assistant.
I believe the poor quality of Siri is absolutely related to lack of data collection. A digital assistant is better the more it knows about you. That’s not to say they didn’t also drop the ball in other ways, such as what you described.
