Smart Light Bulbs - Live With It

Sarah Lane has spent the last three months living with smart light bulbs from Phillips and LifX. On this episode we talk about her findings. 

SMART LIGHTBULBS

PRODUCTS:

- Hue Starter Kit E26: 4-Pack White Bulbs and Bridge - $99.99

https://www2.meethue.com/en-us/p/hue-white-starter-kit-e26/046677530365

- LIFX A19 Mini Color Bulb (2) - $44.99 each

https://www.lifx.com/products/lifx-mini-color-e26?variant=45291940302

CURRENT SALE PRICES:

Hue 4-pack $39.99 on Amazon 

Hue 4-pack with Bridge $89.99 on Amazon 

Lifx single A19 color bulb $35.99 on Amazon 

SIMILAR MODELS:

Hue 4-pack with Bluetooth (some control without Bridge) $49.99 - announced in June

Hue Edison-style bulbs, $25 each - announced in September

SARAH’S PRE-SMARTBULB HOME SETUP: 6 “replaceable” standard bulbs in 5 lamps not connected to any wall switches or recessed lighting. 

- STUDIO: 1 globe tabletop lamp

- LIVING ROOM: 1 exposed (no shade or covering) Edison bulb table lamp, 1 traditional 2-bulb table lamp with shade 

- BEDROOM: 2 traditional tabletop lamps, one next to bed 

HUE BULB WITH BRIDGE PROS:

- Control via Amazon Alexa, Siri/HomeKit, Google Assistant, and Cortana

- Companion app is easy to navigate, scenes, timers, labels, room designations. 

- Control lights remotely when not home via the Bridge (not possible in the bluetooth versions without a Bridge)

HUE BULB CONS:

- White only light has a range of warmth and brightness but no actual hue control, it’s a programmable dimmable light

- Although there is now a version that uses bluetooth control to bypass needing a Bridge, that limits the bulbs to Alexa support and fewer integration capabilities

LIFX BULB PROS:

- Control via Amazon Alexa, Siri/HomeKit, Google Assistant, and Cortana

- No need for a bridge, each bulbs connects via wifi, easily added to the system via a scannable code on the box 

- Full color range allows for huge variety of creative lighting

- Built-in color scenes and motion can create moods, pulse to music, flicker, even strobe

LIFX BULB CONS:

- If exposed (not behind glass or shade), the bulb is kinda industrial looking

- Some limitations with timed scenes, you can’t start a scene that’s a different color/mood than what it was last, you need to change it in the app. 

INITIAL CHALLENGE: WHICH BULBS GO WHERE?

Since I had 2 color LIFX bulbs, my initial thought was to double them up in a single room so I wasn’t switching between LIFX and Hue apps all the time, assuming I settled into a particular room for 2+ hours or more (TV in living room, reading in bed, etc). I also thought this would be a convenient way to use multiple assistants since I have a Sonos One speaker in both the living room and the bedroom, and the speakers can be set to Amazon’s Alexa and Google Assistant independent of each other. So I started with both LIFX color bulbs in the bedroom and the 4 Hue white bulbs in the living room and studio which are adjacent rooms. 

Quickly I realized the fun aspect of having color lights was wasted in the bedroom, because the only time I even turn on the lights is when I’m reading at night. Very rarely I’m getting dressed when it’s dark outside, and during the day there’s plenty of sunlight coming in form the windows. But I wanted to have at least some accent color in the bedroom, so I kept one LIFX there and moved the other to the living room, replacing my exposed non-dimmable Edison bulb. Because the other lamp in the living room is a two-bulb input, it seemed too complicated to split the bulbs between products.

I also had gotten used to my Sonos One speakers set to Alexa. Sonos added Google Assistant support back in May, but I didn’t find much use In programming different assistants to different rooms, so after some testing I switched everything back to Alexa. I could have also set everything to HomeKit but that would have required me to command everything through my iPhone, rather than the Sonos Ones.

INITIAL THOUGHTS:

• Once all my lights were properly named and grouped, I could control everything easily. Within the Alexa app I grouped “living room lights” with “living room color light” so that I could control the whole room via voice, or just the LIFX (color) light. Same thing in bedroom. Studio just has one Hue white bulb so that room didn’t need much setup. In hindsight, I should have put the bedroom color light in the studio so that my background has color and motion options behind me when I’m recording video, but setting the bedroom color light to deep rosy glow is a nice touch.
• Both products were easy to set up. My LIFX bulbs were a little finicky connecting to my wifi network, but in general everything worked fine out of the box.
• At first, just talking to Alexa to turn lights on and off or change brightness/hue was very satisfying. I had to force myself to program scenes and timers. Solutions for previously non-existent problems.

NITPICKY STUFF:

• Because I have two brands/interfaces in both the bedroom and living room, I have to remember to say “color light” or “white lights” if I don’t want to control the whole room as “living room lights”. This is usually not an issue but makes how you name all your bulbs important. 
• If I’m in the living room watching TV, I  periodically tell Alexa to “turn up/down the living room lights” which will control both Hues and the LIFX, but occasionally Alexa thinks I’ve asked to turn them off, or gets confused if I say anything out of order 
• Some of the color options on the LIFX are just colors I don’t like to fill a room. I love the color green, but any green hue makes the room feel sickly. Too much blue makes the room feel sterile. Most of the motion options are too distracting for lamps so close to a chair or sofa. I will never set my color lights to flicker outside of a Halloween party which I will never have, etc. The strobe option literally warns you that the light may trigger an epileptic seizure. It’s a feature I tried exactly once, laughed at how jarring it was, and never used again.
• Even though the LIFX has some pointless color options, the color range does make the Hue bulbs seem boring in comparison

HALFWAY IN:

Over the course of 3 months I tried various routines that both the Hue and LIFX apps either suggest, or I just thought I would like:

• 1. I set my Hue white light next to my bed to gradually light up over a 30 minute period starting at 630 am and reaching full brightness at 7 am. The idea is that it mimics a natural sunrise at your time/duration of choice. The problem is that in order for it to have an impact, I had to close the shades on both bedroom windows to block out the actual sunrise, which ruined airflow and felt unnecessary. However, I keep very regular hours and use the natural sunrise as my alarm clock. My bedroom is very quiet so I don’t have to close my windows, and I’m a floor higher than any of my line-of-sight neighbors so privacy isn’t an issue leaving my shades open. I can see this being really helpful for anyone keeping non-standard hours, living in areas of the world with minimal sunlight during the winter, anyone experiencing seasonal affective disorder, or those who need to close off the windows for noise or unwanted light coming in. The feature is obviously pointless if you wear an eye mask. 
• 2. I set my studio light to turn on at 1 PM PT and off at 230 PM PT so that I never have to think about it before or after recording DTNS. Great feature. 
• 3. Both the Hue and LIFX apps allow me to trigger the lights to various settings in conjunction with sunrise/sunset or any other time of day. I programmed my living room Hue lights (both within the same lamp) to turn on 30 minutes after sunset, right about when the room starts to feel too dark. I could do this separately with the LIFX bulb in the same room through the LIFX app, but just to avoid sitting in the dark the Hue is fine. I usually turn on my “living room color light” which is set to a deep purple when I settle into binge some TV shows, adds  warmth to the room without adding much brightness.
• 4. I was out of town for a couple weeks in July and had forgotten to set any schedules for my lights while I was away. Being able to turn the Hue lights on and off a few times was nice to add a little security and make it seem like someone was home, and more energy efficient than leaving a light on all day or asking my cat sitter to do anything. 
• 5. I tried a “if the bedside Hue light is on, at 11 pm turn it off” routine to try and force myself to go to sleep at 11 pm if I happened to still be awake reading or on my iPhone. I’m often lights out before 11 pm anyway, but the few times the light did turn off at 11 pm I was still reading for a reason and just turned it back on. You can set a gradual fade over time, that might help this feature feel less authoritarian. I ended up ditching the routine altogether. 

FINAL THOUGHTS:

• Most of the scheduled routines are unnecessary to me because my house is bright and naturally well lit all day. I don’t like having lights on in any room I’m not actually in because it feels energy wasteful. So besides tinkering around in both the Hue the LIFX apps here and there, I’m mostly just telling Alexa to turn various rooms up, down, or off. In spaces with fewer windows and/or natural light or multiple people in a house hanging out in various rooms at the same time, it makes a lot more sense. 
• I don’t know when I’d use the “pulse to music” feature in the LIFX bulbs (the Hue bulbs only do this if they’re color bulbs, not my white bulbs). Maybe if I were exercising in a dark room? 
• I cannot stress how satisfying it is to get into bed after forgetting to turn off the living rooms lights and telling Alexa to do that from my Sonos One. 
• I’ve gotten a good sense of what I *always* want, what I *sometimes* want, and what I *rarely* want when it comes to lighting. Smart lightbulbs have absolutely become part of my household, and I plan to expand more bulbs into rooms like the kitchen, bathroom, and hallway, although all three use recessed lighting and will require different bulb models. 

FIN