Light bulbs are one of the easiest places to start adding connectivity to your home, so we decided to try out two of the best options. Here’s what you can do with Philips Hue and C by GE, and why you might want one system over the other.
Be careful with Philips Hue. It's a rabbit hole. Once you get started, next thing you know you'll have your house filled with them and you'll buy nothing but Philips Hue because you're stuck in the ecosystem. In fact, I sometimes even forget I bought the starter kit. It's just a standard part of my house now and I just buy a bulb every once in a while. I don't even know how much money I've invested in it at this point, but too much for sure.
Same. I bought the starter pack for the bedroom and then the next day loved them so much I bought the strip light and another starter pack (secret is starter packs with bridge is cheaper than just buying 2 bulbs even if you just want the bulbs)
Chiyo You can use other bulbs with the Hue system. IKEA Tradfri and Cree Connected have the ability to be connected to Hue. Hell, I’ve got my GE Link bulbs connected to my Hue Setup.
You're not stuck in any ecosystem. Philips hue uses zigbee which is an open standard. You can buy IKEAs smart bulds and connect to a Hue-hub for example.
Try Stack Lighting. It's actually smart in that it turns on when you walk into the room, dims and brightens based on how much natural light is in the room, and changes color temperature based on the time of day to match your circadian rhythm. Highly recommended.
+Cade Tyrell wait wait what's so special about LIFX? one of 'em LIFX bulbs cost around $70 . so if you buy 3 of 'em it'll cost you like $210 . (even more expensive than Hue) !
Ushira Dharmaratne No bridge/hub is required because they run through wifi, you can get two for $98 on their website. More accurate colors than Hue as well.
this. if you don't want the infrared light gimmick, one bulb is $50 without needing any bridge, it's 1100 lumens per bulb instead of 800 (Way brighter), and the color representation is far better. Downside is the bulbs are physically heavy
I'm curious if the zigbee hub that comes with the philips hue is somehow limited or locked into the philips hue system or if it's can fully control and talk to other standard zigbee products. Smart lightbulbs are just the beginning of zigbee products and I don't want to have to get a new zigbee hub for future smart home stuff I get.. It'd be like having a separate wifi router for different brands of phones or computers..
I have an important question. Those C bulbs, when you turn them off and on with a light switch, does the color reset? Because it does so with the hue lights, which makes them annoying; because I like using my light switches, its easier than always getting out an app.
As I understand these smart light bulbs switch needs to be turned on at all times if you want to control it wireless via phone, Would this cause the bulb to use more electricity compared to a non smart one?
Verge overlooking to make the point that since the things are LED bulbs they last a multiple of years longer than any other type of light source, making them actually quite cost effective.
have you heard about Pulse products? you should do a review of them. they have smartbulbs with Bluetooth that you can dim them. the plus is that they have embedded speakers, WiFi repeaters, and cameras.
+Thomas Anderson Probably because they're the same price as these two but the LIFX are very inferior technologically. Every bulb has a WiFi element that needs to connect to your router. Read the reviews all over Amazon: this has caused a crazy amount of unreliability with these bulbs. Not only that, but it limits their potential for 3rd party expansion and integration.
Aaron Smith What? The LIFX is $59.99 for one color bulb, the EXACT same as the Hue. And for that, you're getting a product that is technically inferior and supported less than Hue.
+Corvus yeah but all my friends who bought that said it was slow and unresponsive. Hue on the other hand does not have individual light bulbs that connect to a network, it hubs them together with that light router. It makes things a lot faster and responsive. No more than a half a second delay. For instance the others that i've seen have taken upwards of a couple minutes for the change. And I have 65 mbps internet with 2 top notch wirerouters in my house. So the hue is by far your best option. They also don't have support for homekit so if you have an iOS device you won't be able to do fancy stuff like ask Siri to turn on and off the lights, dim them and change the colors. but you can still do this through the app though.
Al2leKill I don't know what you're talking about. My LIFX lights turn on and off/change colors instantly. Also, I can use them with my iOS iPad and my Android phone, and my Windows PC. No expensive hub needed, and the globes 'mesh' together so you can use them even in areas of your house where the WiFi coverage is spotty. No problems whatsoever.
+Corvus Thanks for this! Every few months I lament the poor blues/greens of Hue and go Googling for better competitors. Somehow I missed LIFX, and upon inspecting it, Cnet says that blues/greens are excellent. I'm already sold on buying LIFX from now on as I upgrade my home, but could you tell me if any colors are lacking? Any other cons?
Best thing about Philips Hue is the integration with Philips Ambilight on their TVs. You get a room filled with continuously changing colours based on the movie you're watching on the TV!
+David Williames exactly right... this feels a lot more like an advertisement since there is almost no "Comparing" done in the video. They basically went ahead and made C by GE seem just like an alternative to Phillips Hue, meanwhile they're fairly different products.
I need these in my life, but since they're $200 for the starter kit I can't justify it right now :( Ps: I already have the TCP Lighting system which was cheaper but no where near as flexible.
The Phillips hue are exspensive but totally worth it just cough up the 500-800 dollars an completely redo the lighting in your home. It’s worth every penny!
I have a Nexus 6P and the C by GE is not worth it. The app takes too long to connect and every time you exit the app you have to Force Close it to get it to connect again the next time. If you update the firmware on the light bulbs it will no longer connect to the Android app anymore until you factory reset the light bulbs. My Pixel C can't even find them. Another annoying thing is you have to use the C by GE app to control them and can't automate the process.
Everyone is talking about lifx and hue but these 2 are super expensive for bulbs with Wi-Fi that can be dimmed through the phone instead of circle on the wall
Missing in all smart light articles is When users buy these why do they still need a receipt for warranty? What I mean is that I should be able to look at my app and see The date it was installed The date the warranty expires The date serial number of the light The amount of actual ON time the light has had This should be very easily trackable information I still need to revert to the same way since Edison invented the bulb to deal with warranty...go find that receipt In my mind I think I know why but what do you think about not being able to track your light and power usage on such devices.
+Tony Bell For one, they're LED bulbs which IIRC last upto 17 years or something ridiculous like that. They also use much less power than your typical halogen bulb. Then you have all the fancy stuff on top of that; you come home, your lights turn on automatically when you get there, change colour when it rains... whatever you want.
First time I heard about these so called smartlights I was pretty skeptical to ve honest. A collegue of mine showed me how he was able to turn on and off any light in his home all the way from the office. He said he had gradually switched over all his bulbs to smartbulbs within a few weeks. I only got 1 to begin with but ordered another 5 the day after I got it. Especially since he showed me how to get 5 for free if I buy 5. If anyone is interested just drop a comment and I'll hook you up too. I just keep buyin more of these and everyone in the house is loving them :)
Every one seems like a dim bulb. First, it has huge weaknesses, you need a phone to control them. This means that you must have your phone with you, and the app, and to turn on a light you have to be on your network in the app. Basically a huge time waster when you could just flip a switch. Bluetooth is also not secure. Let's do the math. For those of us that want a led lightbulb at 8.5 watts (800 lumens) Walmart has them for $2.17. Hue gives you fancy colors and all that connected crap that takes forever (by comparison) just to turn the bulb on at $59.95. With just 5 bulbs, that makes your savings $288.90. That's a sizable chunk of change you throw away on a disposable commodity that "sets the mood". For that price, don't you think you would be happier with a better TV or maybe friends that don't judge you based on your lighting?
The heu lights stil work white only normal light switch. You don't need your phone to put them on or off. En you don't need tho be on your home WiFi. Works also on 4g or on Wi-Fi @ another place.
I don't want color changing bulbs, I just want to be able to come home and say "computer, lights" and they come on. Controlling lighting with my phone sounds is not a highlight of usability.
Philips hue suck. they never connect. the customer service sucks. they redirect you to a consumer made forum for troubleshooting. that's some great customer service right there. good luck getting your bulbs synced to the hub
The poorest Hue review I've ever seen! You didn't mention control over 4g, geolocation activation, auto-dimming, time-sets activation.. And without talking about all the impressive 3rd part apps. Also Philipps announced a new app coming soon.
Color changing leds w/ remote control? Don't buy them yet. They are getting cheaper and cheaper by the day due to the launch of many new brands and competition. Give it a few months and prices will be much lower, as of now they're charging for the fad and exclusivity.
+Anthony Craft They last 15 000 Hr of on time. In practice that is around 15, YEARS. That is a lot cheaper than ANY kind of bulb switched out over the same period of time only lasting a few years each.
+R a m s n e t Which would be even less with any other kind of bulb if you actually keep the lights on that much. What is your point exactly? If lifetime is all you want, go with the white philips hue. That thing is rated for 25 000 hours.
MentalEdge You can get LED bulbs that are FAR cheaper than $200 though. I am arguing that the premium for these "smart" features is not particularly convincing at this point. (personal opinion)
Everything is expensive when it's in its first couple of years of infancy. Eventually prices come down and become standard. I remember when regular LED bulbs were expensive. But ever since their introduction they've dropped up to 95% in price.
