“Apple’s next version of OS X will probably not include Siri, the digital, voice-activated assistant embedded in the iPhone and iPad, an analyst predicted,” Gregg Keizer reports for Computerworld. “‘Siri would require hardware modifications as well as software,’ noted Ezra Gottheil of Technology Business Research on Monday. ‘I expect that Siri will show up in some future edition, but I don’t think it’s urgent at this point.’ But an expert very familiar with the insides of iOS devices disagreed.”
Keizer reports, “Aaron Vronko, the CEO of Michigan-based Rapid Repair, an iPhone and iPad repair service, said there’s nothing precluding Siri from running on current Mac hardware. Most of the processing workload is done on Apple’s servers, not locally, Vronko said, and Macs have audio processing chipsets — and in the case of the Retina-equipped MacBook Pro, multiple microphones — to match what’s inside the iPhone.”
“Even Macs with a single microphone could handle Siri, although with less accuracy, Vronko argued. On the iPhone 5, Siri relies on three mics (the iPhone 4S, the first Apple device to support Siri, sported two) to strip out background noise and produce a higher-quality audio signal,” Keizer reports. “Yet a one-mic Mac wouldn’t be a deal breaker. ‘You’d expect a Mac to be in a quieter environment,’ Vronko noted. ‘When you’re talking [to Siri] on an iPhone, you’re often in a car or in a crowd.'”
Read more in the full article here.
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