this post was submitted on 01 Aug 2023
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My Hue bulbs cost like $15 but god damn I love them. Every ceiling fan in my house is now dimmable from my phone. My game room has lights that I can change the colors of to make my DnD games more immersive. And since they're LED they'll probably last for ages.
Yeah they really are a big quality of life upgrade. Being able to shift your lights to a nice warm color and dim them all instantly is amazing. Makes the house so much cozier at night. Every time we do it, it’s and instant mood shift.
It made it a lot easier for me to sleep, too. Being able to go from "lightly lit and more cool" to "very little but quite warm" light about an hour before bed helps my brain figure out that sleeping should be done at night.
Yep totally it’s a great wind down towards bed
I got a couple of smart bulbs a while ago, but I'm apparently the only one in the house willing to use them through a phone or smart speaker Everyone else just turns the lamps of at the switch, which completely defeats the purpose. I gave up on the idea until such time as I can buy some with a manual toggle included.
I stuck a tablet on the wall using Command Strips and it just stays plugged in, in case I want to change the lighting but my phone is across the room.
Hue makes programmable wall switches, but if you have a smart speaker hooked up to them you can just ask it to dim the lights or make them red or whatever. I find that's handy for color modes and settings that one might not use very often.
I bought smart switches for mine. While I often use my phone or voice, switches are often faster to use, particularly if the switch is well located (eg, turning the light on as you enter the room). Even though I have widgets on one of my home screens for my main light modes, I have to basically interrupt what I'm doing on my phone to use my phone. And voice control is just frustratingly unreliable (I'm also not sure how to use what Philips calls a "scene" from Google Assistant -- I don't usually want to turn my lights off, but rather I have different programmed colour + brightness).
For strangers and guests, switches are usually the only thing they can easily use.