Hello, my name's Tom and this is Proper Honest Tech.
There's a famous quote that's been attributed to Steve Jobs about why
companies shouldn't rely too heavily on market research. The quote reads;
"Some people say give the customers what they want, but that's not my approach.
Our job is to figure out what they're going to want before they do. I think Henry Ford once said,
'If I'd ask customers what they wanted, they would've told me a faster horse.'
People don't know what they want until you show it to them. That's why I never rely on
market research. Our task is to read things that are not yet on the page."
So it's kind of ironic that a product that really made me think of that quote
wasn't an Apple product, but was instead an accessory FOR an Apple product.
The product in question is this, the Battery Base for the HomePod mini,
designed and manufactured by a company called Mission Accessories.
And the reason why I mentioned the quote at the opening of this video, is because the problem that
this product solves is one that I simply didn't realise I might have. The fact that the HomePod
mini is a static item, which has to be plugged into a wall outlet in order for it to operate.
Quick disclaimer, the good people at Mission Accessories did send me a couple of these
at no cost to myself, but they did so in an entirely no strings attached
manor - they've had no say in or visibility of this video review,
prior to me posting it here on the channel, and they are not sponsoring this video in any way.
Now, this is a pretty straightforward product so I'm going to keep this review pretty short and
sweet. The Battery Base essentially makes your HomePod mini portable, to a degree, allowing
you to enjoy several hours of operation anywhere that you can still connect to your home's Wifi.
I say 'several', because the literature online suggests it's up to 9 hours of playtime, while
the literature on the actual product box that I was sent suggests 5 hours. I'm not sure which
is correct, although I did leave this quietly playing music the other day and it still had
juice when I came back to it some 6 hours later, so perhaps that 9 hour figure is more accurate.
It works by creating a little plastic nest which securely holds on to your HomePod mini.
And it really is a secure grip, I was able to hold the unit upside down and even shake it a bit,
without the HomePod coming loose at all. Beneath that nest is a space for you to coil the cable up
neatly out of the way, and connect it to the Battery Base, you'll need to do that
because the Battery Base of course is now how your HomePod mini is going to draw it's power. A second
USB C cable, which is included with the product, hidden away in that base when you first open it
up, you'll then connect to your AC adaptor and plug into the rear of the Battery Base.
This allows you to charge the Battery Base, and of course if you're not charging,
it will allow you to leave it sat on your desk and operate the HomePod mini as normal. On the front
of the Battery Base is a power button, although to be honest you're probably not often going to
use this, and above that are 4 LEDs, giving you an indication of the charge level of the device.
At the bottom of the base is a plastic lid with a built in magnet,
making removing and reattaching the lid a piece of cake, and holding everything securely in place.
Plastic arms on the inside allow you to coil your cable away nice and securely,
and the bottom of the base is made out of a grippy plastic, it's actually much grippier than the base
of the HomePod mini, so you should be able to find somewhere to position this in your home with
relative ease, and be confident that it's going to be secure. It's a bottom-heavy unit thanks
no doubt to the internal battery, so you're very unlikely to ever knock this thing over.
Once everything is set up, this thing works... well, just like a HomePod mini.
And I guess that's the beauty of this thing, it's very simple. It's your HomePod, but more
portable. The HomePod mini during my testing was just as capable at listening out to my voice,
and the audio sounded good wherever I put the device, I certainly didn't hear anything which
made me think that the Battery Base was impacting the audio quality in any kind of negative way.
So, why would you want one of these? Well, perhaps in your house, you've got a room
where you sometimes want to enjoy the use of a HomePod, but not all the time?
Maybe a dining room, or a conservatory, or even the patio table, provided your wifi will extend
far enough? It might not make sense to have a permanently mounted HomePod mini there,
or you might not physically be able to, but it might make sense to have one of these in
the kitchen for example, and know that when you've got friends over for dinner,
and you want to enjoy the dulcet tones of some smooth jazz with your conversation, you can just
unplug this, pop it in the dining room, and enjoy a few hours of use. Once you're done,
just return it to it's normal spot, plug it back in, and once charged, you're ready to go again.
I guess it's kind of like the Sonos Roam. Only, it's Apple, not Sonos, and the combined cost
of a HomePod mini at $99, and one of these at $40, is cheaper than the Sonos offering. Sure,
it's not a bluetooth speaker all of a sudden, but the whole point of this product is literally that
you own a HomePod mini, and you want to make it more portable. That's it. If you fit into that
category, this product is for you, and in that respect, I simply can't recommend it enough.
It comes in black and white to match the HomePod Minis, costs 40 bucks,
and I've included links to them in the description of this video.
So there you go, I hope you found this video useful. If you did, do please consider leaving
me a like, and subscribing to my channel for more content like this in the future.
See you on the next video!