Philips confirms Outdoor Lightstrip, other new Hue lights on the way

AppleInsider

Phlips has announced a slew of new HomeKit-compatible Hue lights due in 2018, including the previously leaked Outdoor Lightstrip.

The Outdoor Lightstrip will come in 7- and 16-foot versions, priced at $89.99 and $159.99, according to Philips. The difference versus the company's existing lightstrips is mainly weatherproofing, though that also means the product can't be lengthened or shortened.

Philips accidentally revealed the accessory in July, when a product page briefly appeared on the company's Dutch website. No release date has been set.

Due in October is the Ascend collection, including wall ($99.99) and table ($129.99) lights, a $149.99 pendant, and a $179.99 floor lamp. The first two will come with E12 Hue color bulbs, while the latter will ship with Hue A19s.

Philips Ascend floor lamp | Image Credit: The Verge

The Being ceiling pendant uses a unique ring-shaped bulb, but is limited to shades of white. It should launch on Aug. 20 for $249.99.

Philips Being ceiling pendant | Image Credit: The Verge

Shipping on the same day is another pendant, the $99.99 Enchant, which uses a down-facing color bulb. Potentially controversial are the company's new Adore bathroom fixtures, a mirror ($249.99) and a ceiling light ($179.99). Both are limited to shades of white, and the ceiling fixture has non-replaceable LEDs, though Philips is promising about 30,000 hours of use.

Philips Adore vanity mirror | Image Credit: The Verge

strangedays

Just start making bright bulbs, please. 60w equivalents aren’t enough... Still waiting for a great 150w equiv smart bulb. 

edited August 2018

payeco

What is the warranty on these things? Unless it’s 10+ years I don’t know why you’d buy expensive fixtures with lights integrated into them. If the light goes bad now you’ve got to replace the whole fixture for a lot more than just a bulb would cost and if it’s one of the wall sconces you have the added pain in the ass of having to remove the thing.

payeco

StrangeDays said:

Just start making bright bulbs, please. 60w equivalents aren’t enough... Still waiting for a great 150w equiv smart bulb. 

I don’t know how soon you’re going to see those. The market for non-smart LED bulbs at that brightness is pretty small as it is.

Check out LIFX’s bulbs. They’re rated for 75 watts equivalent and are really bright, brighter than a standard 75w equivalent IMO. Their color reproduction is also much better than the Hue bulbs. I also like them because they don't require a hub, they connect directly to wifi; and they also support HomeKit.

If you need more output for a specific light pick up something like this to add more bulbs to one fixture and increase the light output. They also make two bulb and three bulb versions. It's not the same as one large bulb, I know, but it can make a big difference. There are also some smart light sockets available if you just need the ability to turn a light on and off, which would work with a big 150w equivalent.

jeffreytgilbert

you know what a great feature would be? Figuring out how to make a lightbulb for less than $50 per bulb. These are so crazy expensive and once you start adding them you have to replace every bulb in the house to get the proper effect. Worse than that is they've added new colors now for newer bulbs and theres going to be another generation with mesh networking, so you'll have to replace them all before you ever get to enjoy the longevity of them, so pricing them like bulbs and not super expensive luxury bulb computers would be a welcome change. Their software is historically really, really annoying and doesn't even have a premium over the functionality of other competing softwares. They don't even need to be charging this much for bulbs. 

payeco

jeffreytgilbert said:

you know what a great feature would be? Figuring out how to make a lightbulb for less than $50 per bulb. These are so crazy expensive and once you start adding them you have to replace every bulb in the house to get the proper effect. Worse than that is they've added new colors now for newer bulbs and theres going to be another generation with mesh networking, so you'll have to replace them all before you ever get to enjoy the longevity of them, so pricing them like bulbs and not super expensive luxury bulb computers would be a welcome change. Their software is historically really, really annoying and doesn't even have a premium over the functionality of other competing softwares. They don't even need to be charging this much for bulbs. 

I know this isn’t something that can be repeated but I got my LIFX bulbs, which normally retail for $59 each for $3.50 at Lowe’s about 18 months ago. Lowe’s no longer carries them so I guess they were clearing out inventory at their stores. A store about a hour from me had 17 in stock so I went and bought up everyone one they had. At the time I only needed 12 to replace every bulb I had that was A19 size. Put the other 5 on eBay for $5 below MSRP and sold them all in a couple days.

To your point though, no, they don’t need to be charging this much for them. The problem is enough people are willing to that they’re not going to lower the price until the market drops off. It’ll have to happen eventually. With these bulbs rated to last 10-20 years there are only so many people out there willing to spend $1000-$2000 to replace all the bulbs in their house with color changing smart bulbs.

tallest skil

jeffreytgilbert said:

you know what a great feature would be? Figuring out how to make a lightbulb for less than $50 per bulb.

It’s not even a question. I mean, the entire industry is (PURPOSELY) doing everything wrong. All of the hardware should be as stupid as possible so that it remains easily interchangeable. The “smart” device should be the wall socket. How often do you replace those? And they’re room-specific. Rather than having to remember to “reassign my lamp” like some sort of dystopic nega-future, you can swap your lighting fixtures all you want and your room assignments all stay the same.

Additionally, someone should do a case study on how often the different colors of lighting are even used, because what on Earth kind of feature is that.

payeco

tallest skil said:

jeffreytgilbert said:

you know what a great feature would be? Figuring out how to make a lightbulb for less than $50 per bulb.

It’s not even a question. I mean, the entire industry is (PURPOSELY) doing everything wrong. All of the hardware should be as stupid as possible so that it remains easily interchangeable. The “smart” device should be the wall socket. How often do you replace those? And they’re room-specific. Rather than having to remember to “reassign my lamp” like some sort of dystopic nega-future, you can swap your lighting fixtures all you want and your room assignments all stay the same.

Additionally, someone should do a case study on how often the different colors of lighting are even used, because what on Earth kind of feature is that.

You don’t even need to change the socket if you want to control turning the light on an off. Just get a WiFi outlet and control it that way. Not a clean as the control being in the wall but at lot easier to retrofit.

I think more people that you’d think use the color changing functionality. I live in NYC and while walking around I see colored lights on through people’s windows all the time. Granted I have no way of knowing these aren’t single color bulbs people are using but my guess is they’re color changing smart bulbs. I personally know a few people who I never would have guessed would be people that would get into color changing bulbs but they have a couple and say they love them and do use the color changing functionality. My 12 year old nephew loves them. He uses them to set the “ambiance”, for lack of a better word, while he’s playing video games.

mushmash

Now what they need to do is to actually make them affordable.

luckily I’m not that deep into the hue hole yet, so i might go for IKEA’s Trådfri, now that they support Homekit as well, and for a fraction of the price...

strangedays

tallest skil said:

jeffreytgilbert said:

you know what a great feature would be? Figuring out how to make a lightbulb for less than $50 per bulb.

It’s not even a question. I mean, the entire industry is (PURPOSELY) doing everything wrong. All of the hardware should be as stupid as possible so that it remains easily interchangeable. The “smart” device should be the wall socket. How often do you replace those? And they’re room-specific. Rather than having to remember to “reassign my lamp” like some sort of dystopic nega-future, you can swap your lighting fixtures all you want and your room assignments all stay the same.

Additionally, someone should do a case study on how often the different colors of lighting are even used, because what on Earth kind of feature is that.

Wall sockets (outlets) would be stupid for lamps. If I walk into a dark room and the wall outlet is set to off, I can’t override that and operate the lamp plugged into it. But with smart bulbs like Hue, I can. Yes, if it’s set to off via HomeKit and I walk into the room and manually operate the lamp I can turn it on regardless of HK scene. 

And the colors are awesome — from incandescent warm hues to blues and reds during events (we like them for movie times). 

Guessing you don’t own anything in this product line, huh?

edited August 2018

strangedays

payeco said:

StrangeDays said:

Just start making bright bulbs, please. 60w equivalents aren’t enough... Still waiting for a great 150w equiv smart bulb. 

I don’t know how soon you’re going to see those. The market for non-smart LED bulbs at that brightness is pretty small as it is.

Check out LIFX’s bulbs. They’re rated for 75 watts equivalent and are really bright, brighter than a standard 75w equivalent IMO. Their color reproduction is also much better than the Hue bulbs. I also like them because they don't require a hub, they connect directly to wifi; and they also support HomeKit.

If you need more output for a specific light pick up something like this to add more bulbs to one fixture and increase the light output. They also make two bulb and three bulb versions. It's not the same as one large bulb, I know, but it can make a big difference. There are also some smart light sockets available if you just need the ability to turn a light on and off, which would work with a big 150w equivalent.

Those bulbs are OK, but only 800 lumens. My brightest LED lamp bulb is the Switch 100, at 1600 lumens (100w equivalent). Good for a living room or reading lamp, and that’s what I’m looking for in a smart bulb option. Nothing yet. 

edited August 2018

tallest skil

StrangeDays said:

Wall sockets (outlets) would be stupid for lamps. If I walk into a dark room and the wall outlet is set to off, I can’t override that and operate the lamp plugged into it. But with smart bulbs like Hue, I can.

Clearly you’ve never been to Ireland (or, I imagine, the UK). Each wall socket has a switch on it, because you don’t want to plug something into a live 220 outlet (it fucking sparks blue at you and makes you think you’re going to get electrocuted). That’s the kind of thing I’m talking about, except also controllable from your iDevice (little Wi-Fi chip in the wall, rather than a bulb). In no capacity would the user be prevented from using his sockets except through a smartphone. The phone would simply show the status of the socket and also be able to turn it on/off around the switch.

Guessing you don’t own anything in this product line, huh?

I can’t justify the cost and don’t see much reason to have the colors. I would love to see a setup, though. I could have my mind changed. I don’t think there are stores in the US that care about “whole home product setups” though. Like, Best Buy (once) had little “rooms” in their store where people could experience audio equipment and even home theater setups, but there’s no store that showcases connected appliances on a room by room basis. Like a faux living room with said home theater that ALSO has connected lights.

Sounds like something Apple would have to be responsible for setting up, but since they’re only in charge of the connectivity software they wouldn’t get any monetary benefit from building out entire example rooms/house plans.

payeco

StrangeDays said:

payeco said:

StrangeDays said:

Just start making bright bulbs, please. 60w equivalents aren’t enough... Still waiting for a great 150w equiv smart bulb. 

I don’t know how soon you’re going to see those. The market for non-smart LED bulbs at that brightness is pretty small as it is.

Check out LIFX’s bulbs. They’re rated for 75 watts equivalent and are really bright, brighter than a standard 75w equivalent IMO. Their color reproduction is also much better than the Hue bulbs. I also like them because they don't require a hub, they connect directly to wifi; and they also support HomeKit.

If you need more output for a specific light pick up something like this to add more bulbs to one fixture and increase the light output. They also make two bulb and three bulb versions. It's not the same as one large bulb, I know, but it can make a big difference. There are also some smart light sockets available if you just need the ability to turn a light on and off, which would work with a big 150w equivalent.

Those bulbs are OK, but only 800 lumens. My brightest LED lamp bulb is the Switch 100, at 1600 lumens (100w equivalent). Good for a living room or reading lamp, and that’s what I’m looking for in a smart bulb option. Nothing yet. 

The Minis are rated at 800. The full size are rated at 1100. IMO they’re under-rating them though. I’d say they’re more like 1300-1400 lumens.

edited August 2018

franklinjackcon

I've been buying a few Hue bulbs - just the white ones as coloured lights belong in brothels and dodgy night club toilets - and am starting to realise that while changing the bulbs is a nice easy transition, I really need connected, built-in dimmer switches instead with dumb LEDs. They should have a small physical switch that can turn the power on/off if needed and otherwise just act like the Hue dimmer switch, which is nice but really doesn't compare to something in the wall. I'm patiently waiting for Friends of Hue switches to come on the market later this year instead but I'm not optimistic. Most of the connected switches I've seen so far are underwhelming.