Apple’s new smart home hardware has been finished for months. Siri was the hold-up.

Apple is preparing a push into the smart home with a new Apple TV 4K, an updated HomePod mini, and a hub device built around its rebuilt Siri, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reported on Tuesday. The hardware for the first two has reportedly been finished for months and is already being tested by Apple employees on the Cupertino campus.

That detail is the story. Apple did not have a hardware problem, it had a software one, and the entire lineup sat waiting on an assistant that kept slipping.

What is coming

The new Apple TV 4K keeps the current form factor but replaces the ageing A15 with an A17 Pro or better, enough to run Apple Intelligence and Siri AI. The current box supports no Apple Intelligence features at all, so the chip upgrade is what makes the rest of the strategy possible.

It is also expected to gain more...

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