HomePod to support FLAC, will disable personal notifications when owner isn’t home

Additional details continue to surface about Apple’s upcoming HomePod ahead of its launch date, including a new report from 9to5Mac revealing that the new wireless speaker will support the lossless FLAC audio format, providing additional evidence of Apple’s strong focus on the HomePod as a high-end speaker system rather than simply a home assistant. Lossless audio formats have long been preferred by the audiophile community, as they allow for unadulterated reproduction of high quality recordings, and although Apple’s ALAC format has been the company’s answer for this, the open nature of FLAC has made it a considerably more popular choice since it’s more widely supported. Apple added FLAC compatibility in iOS 11 last year, so although it wasn’t completely unexpected for the iOS-based HomePod to include FLAC support, it wasn’t entirely clear whether the codec would be supported over AirPlay.
A second report by Refinery29, one of the first publications to review the HomePod, also sheds some light on how HomePod will handle serving up personal data via Siri requests for information such as messages, reminders, and notes. The report confirms that HomePod will only work with a single iCloud account, and that person’s iCloud account will be the one used for Apple Music as well as sending iMessages, setting up reminders, and adding notes via Siri. Although Apple will work for any user in the household regardless of who is at home, the primary user can also choose to receive personal voice notifications that will only be active when the primary user’s iPhone is on the same network.