---
title: 'RIP HomePod Mini'
pubDate: '5/2/24'
tags: ['Tech']
---

Recently, my HomePod Mini broke. It will no longer even power on at all. I think I may have damaged the _NON-REMOVABLE_ cable, perhaps while moving furniture (I'm not entirely sure _when_ it broke, but I'll get into that), and my options are send it in to Apple for repair or buy a new one. I have zero motivation to do either.

I've owned my fair share of Apple products over the years, and while most of them have had flaws that got under my skin (but honestly, what product doesn't), none of them have consistently frustrated me as much as the HomePod.

But first, let's start off with the things I like; It looks nice, sounds really good (at least to my ears, but I am admittedly _not_ an audiophile), and is just overall a well-made piece of hardware - non-removable power cable notwithstanding.

However, all of that is totally undone by the software. Specifically, Siri.

I never really understood the complains people had about Siri before I had a HomePod. Probably because I never really used Siri regularly on my other devices.[^1] But Siri is the primary way you interact with the HomePod. Sure you can just AirPlay some music to it from your phone, but it's, at least in theory, easier to say "Hey Siri, play some music" and have it intelligently play a selection of music that fits your tastes.

When it worked, it was amazing. But when it didn't, which slowly became more and more common over time, it was infuriating. The number of times it would just fail to do something I asked it to do 100 times before without issue by responding "I'm sorry, I can't do that" was, as the meme says, Too Damn High!

However, the last straw for me was during the period sometime after iOS 16 (can't remember exactly which update, but it was after the initial release of version 16), and leading up to the release of iOS 17, when it would consistently insist it wasn't connected to the internet. No amount of factory resets would resolve the issue for more than a day, and eventually even AirPlay would just decide to randomly stop working. I know it wasn't my network because during this period I moved to a new apartment and had to get a whole new network setup, and the issue still persisted.

By the time iOS 17 rolled around and the bulk of the issues seemed to be over though, I had already fell out of the habit of actually using my HomePod. Worst of all though, I lost trust that it would continue to function reliably. It just continued to sit on my shelf, in silence, for months after iOS 17 seemingly fixed my woes.

Then one day I decided to play some music. Not sure what possessed me to try on that particular day, perhaps I was feeling a bit masochistic, but when I spoke the words, "Hey Siri, play the new Taylor Swift album," I was met with silence. I asked again, still nothing. I tried the old "turn it off and on again", and the weird little lightshow it usually does didn't happen. I tried another outlet, and got the same result, and I finally accepted that thus cool-but-infuriating little speaker was dead. I hadn't used it in weeks, and I'd moved furniture around to clean several times in that period so I can only assume I damaged the (I'll repeat; _NON-REMOVABLE_) cable while doing that.

My first thought was, "Well, surely I can just buy a replacement cable." That is when I learned the hard truth.

My second thought was, "Well, I'll just buy a new one." So I went to Apple.com, added a nice dark blue HomePod Mini to my cart, and decided that I'd wait.

It's been a week, the HomePod is still in my cart, and I'm not sure I'll ever hit that checkout button. The truth is, I don't miss it. I'd love a little high-quality speaker to play music and podcasts out of, but it's just not worth the frustration for me. I'd pay at least $100 for a speaker that sounds as good as the HomePod Mini, supports AirPlay, and does not have Siri (or any other virtual assistant). That's the route I'd probably go _if_ I can find something like that, though I'm not crossing my fingers.

So, RIP to my HomePod Mini, the most infuriating Apple product I've ever used.

[^1]: I use Siri occasionally on my iPhone, and not at all on my Mac or iPad.
