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> On Dec 4, 2016, at 11:18 AM, Sieghard Weitzel <[email protected]> wrote: > > Hi, > > Thought I post a few thoughts about the Philips Hue lights I recently > purchased. To start out with I can say that both my wife and I are very > impressed and happy with how this system works. I am the sort of guy who > likes to read as few instructions as possible when it comes to setting up > these type of gadgets. When I received the stuff I put in all the light bulbs > and then connected the bridge and downloaded the app. As soon as I opened it > I was guided through the setup quite nicely, but hit a bit of a snag when I > was told that in order to set up Home Kit integration I had to either scan an > 8-digit “Home Kit Code” or enter it manually. The app said the code was in > the packaging or on the accessory. I asked my wife to look and she did see it > on the bottom of the bridge and also I think in the little booklet that came > in the box, but for some reason it wouldn’t scan and since it’s only 8 digits > I just quickly entered it manually. > What I thought wasn’t explained too well was how to set up the individual > lights and rooms, it’s fairly intuitive, but the app said to make sure all > lights were turned on which means to make sure the actual wall switch was on > so they have power because of course if a light is turned off at the wall > switch it is not available to be controlled and the idea is to leave the wall > switches on and to turn on the lights either by telling SIRI to turn them off > or you can very easily use the Home app to do this and once Home integration > is set up there actually is a third page when you pull up the control centre > which can show up to 9 accessories and you can turn lights on or off simply > by tapping on the light you want to control and it turns on or off, if you > swipe down or up (rotor action) you get a “Show More Controls” and this opens > up a screen where you have a slider where you can flick up and down and > control the brightness, from 100% all the way down to I think 2%. > Anyhow, back to the setup. When I turned on all the lights they all showed up > with the name of the bulb model, e.g. Philips Hue White” or “Philips Hue > Ambient White” etc. The problem was that I have 6 of the ambient white and 3 > of the just white and I had no way to figure out which light was where. I > then decided to turn off all lights with their wall switch and only leave on, > for example, the hallway light where I happen to have just one of the 3 white > bulbs. Once Idid this all lights shows as offline except for this one and I > then went ahead and renamed it “Hallway”. Then I turned on the light at my > front door/entry way. Here are two white bulbs and I didn’t really care which > one was which and I just called them Front Door 1 and Front Door 2. Then I > did the Kitchen where I have a lamp over the dining table, a 3-bulb fixture > in the middle and a 2-bulb fixture over the sink area. I only had enough > bulbs to put in one over the sink and 2 in the middle and by using the same > method as before I named them Dining table, Kitchen 1 and Kitchen 2 and > Kitchen Sink 1. Lastly I did the bedroom where I have 1 bulb in the ceiling > fixture and 1 in my wife’s bedsight lamp, I called them Bedroom Ceiling and > Jackie’s Lamp. > Once that was done I was easily able to group, for example Front Door 1 and > Front Door 2 into a room I called “Front Door”, similarly I grouped Kitchen 1 > and Kitchen 2 together as “Kitchen”. > Interestingly enough I looked all over the place in the Philips Hue app and > could not really find any place where you can turn the lights on or off. I > think the app is primarily for setup, you can setup your rooms, SIRI voice > control, create scenes (or pick from existing ones) and so on. I haven’t > played around with the scenes a lot yet, but they are things like “Bright”, > “Read”, “Nightlight”, “Energize” etc. If you have ambient white bulbs you get > things like “Tropical Twilight”, “Savanna Sunset” etc. and if you have the > colour bulbs you can do even more as they can do 16 million colours. > I then tried to set up my wife’s iPhone to work with SIRI and then realized > that once I connected the Hue bridge to her phone that it disconnected it > from mine, e.g. SIRI voice control was only working either on my phone or on > hers. I then decided to do a bit of reading and learned that I had to make > sure it was working on mine and then I can invite/share people to use it. The > article I read also mentioned that the ideal setup is to use an iPad or Apple > TV as a hub. Since we do have an Apple TV Fourth Generation I set that up > this morning, I just had to make sure I was signed in with the same iCloud > email as I use on my phone and now that this is all done I was able to invite > my wife, she accepted and I gave her full permissions so now we can both use > SIRI to turn lights on or off, we can do this even if we aren’t home and we > can also both use the Home app where it is a simple matter of double tapping > on any particular light or room to turn it on or off, or as I said before, we > can just swipe up to bring up the Control Centre and toggle the lights on or > off there. For me using SIRI is easiest, my wife is Filipina and SIRI > sometimes still has trouble understanding her accent, but now with Control > Centre it’s pretty easy to control the lights as well. > I bought the White Ambient starter kit which comes with the bridge, two bulbs > and a wireless remote. This remote is about the size of the Apple TV 4th gen > remote and has four large buttons one on top of another. The bottom one is > off, the top on is on and the middle is a rocker switch which acts as a > dimmer, top is up which means increase brightness and bottom is decrease > brightness. > You can configure this remote in the Hue app to control either the entire > home or up to two rooms, but you can also choose a single room. You can also > configure the top button to do different things for up to 5 quick presses, > for example, a single press would turn the light on in the kitchen on full > brightness, a double press would turn on the “Relax” scene, a triple press > the Night Light scene etc. > These wireless remotes come with a magnetic wall plate which you can either > stick to a wall with double sided tape or, in my case, I just stuck it to the > fridge for now and the little remote then in turn sticks to the plate > magnetically or you can take it off and bring it with you. You can get as > many of these as you want, they are only $24.99 here in Canada, so I assumme > maybe $19.99 in the States, you can then basically have a remote for each > room, maybe have one stuck by the front door, one in the kitchen, one in the > bedroom etc. > There is also a so-called tap switch which as opposed to the remote doesn’t > even need a battery, it somehow uses kinnetic energy, but it is $49.99 and > you can similarly program it to perform several actions. > There is also a new motion sensor available which would turn on the light > when it senses motion and I assume you can program it to turn off after a > certain amount of time, this could be useful in a utility room or laundry > room without windows where you would always want the light to come on when > you walk in, stay on as long as you are there and turn off a few minutes > after no motion is detected. > You can also set up automation based on other things, for example, you could > set up the lights so they all turn off when your iPhone is out of range of > the house, I think it uses a geofence for this. Similarly, if you had a > smartlock which was Home Kit enabled, you could set up the lights so they > would come on as soon as you unlock the lock. > Like I said, this is very slick, I think the fact that Philips has been doing > this for I think at least 4 or 5 years shows, the current bridge is the > second generation and the bulbs you can now get are just starting on their > third generation which means they are brighter and the colour bulbs reproduce > colours apparently a lot more accurately as before. There are many other > options out there, but not all are Home Kit enabled and for me that was > definitely a factor. Philips Hue, by the way, also supports control via > Google Home, Amazon Echo and Nest. This shows that it is very possible for a > manufacturer to have a product which supports not just one or two of the > major standards but allof them. > > > Regards, > Sieghard > > -- > The following information is important for all members of the V iPhone list. > > If you have any questions or concerns about the running of this list, or if > you feel that a member's post is inappropriate, please contact the owners or > moderators directly rather than posting on the list itself. > > Your V iPhone list moderator is Mark Taylor and your owner is Cara Quinn - > you can reach Cara at [email protected] > > The archives for this list can be searched at: > http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "VIPhone" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/viphone. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.hi Sieghard, My brother has the Phillips hue lights, and he is cited. I think he would be interested in reading this message as he likes to see how we can do things without our site. Would it be OK if I share this message with him? I didn't want to do it without asking first. Thank you very much. God bless, Wren Langley -- The following information is important for all members of the V iPhone list. If you have any questions or concerns about the running of this list, or if you feel that a member's post is inappropriate, please contact the owners or moderators directly rather than posting on the list itself. Your V iPhone list moderator is Mark Taylor and your owner is Cara Quinn - you can reach Cara at [email protected] The archives for this list can be searched at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "VIPhone" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/viphone. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
