Philips' fall Hue lineup to include first-ever Smart Plug & Filament bulbs

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One of Apple's most important HomeKit partners, Philips, is reportedly planning a host of new Hue products for the fall, among them its first smartplug and several retro-style filament bulbs.

Philips Hue Smart Plug and White Filament


The Hue Smart Plug will cost 29.95 euros, and integrate with HomeKit, Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant, and of course the Hue mobile app, Dutch site iCulture.nl claimed on Monday. Until now Hue products have been almost exclusively lighting-related, even its switches and motion sensors.

The Smart Plug is presumably intended as a way of bring smarthome functions to "dumb" lights. By its nature though it should support other accessories such as fans and air filters, so long as those devices can be permanently toggled on. No launch date is known.

The Hue White Filament line should ship in September in E27, G93, and ST19 form factors, at prices between 19.95 and 29.95 euros. Also known as "Edisons," filament bulbs are built after the first-ever electric lights with snaking, unfiltered lighting mechanisms. It's unclear if Philips is using real filaments or LEDs, but similar smartbulbs by Sylvania use LEDs, presumably because real filaments would both consume more energy and die faster.

Philips may be enabling some of the new bulbs to operate solely on Bluetooth, rather than requiring a Wi-Fi bridge, iCulture added. These include the Filament collection and revisions of existing Go, Candle E14, and GU10 lights.

The second-generation Go is expected in early October for 79.95 euros. Another design tweak includes a better plug position, making the dome-shaped mobile light less prone to tipping over.

The second-gen Go on the left, an updated GU10 on the right.
The second-gen Go on the left, an updated GU10 on the right.


Most of the new Hue products should ship either in September and October, including Fugato, Argenta, and Centura spotlights, expected to cost between 64.95 and 89.95 euros. Adore mirror lamps and bathroom spotlights should arrive in November and range between 49.95 and 149.95 euros.

Fugato spotlights on the left, an Adore lamp on the right.
Fugato spotlights on the left, an Adore lamp on the right.


Most or all of the new products will likely see their (official) debut at IFA Berlin on Sept. 6, and eventually come to the U.S., an essential market for Philips.



Comments

  • Reply 1 of 18
    dewmedewme Posts: 5,328member
    LED lighting has had an amazing impact on lighting designs. Going into a large scale lighting store in hopes of finding a fixture or two to address your living or working space lighting needs used to be a difficult, but not impossible, undertaking. With the advent of LED lighting and its ability to fit into just about any imaginable form factor or fixture design, not to mention color variability and programmability, picking out lighting has become a mind boggling challenge, but in a good way. This is an area of innovation that kind of snuck up on us, but when you look back only 10 or so years the progress that's been made and the depth of entrenchment that LED lighting has made in our everyday life is very impressive. 
    StrangeDayslolliver
  • Reply 2 of 18
    mystigomystigo Posts: 183member
    D'oh. I upgraded almost every bulb in my house to the filament style ones already. Just the dumb ones, but had the smart ones been available I might have done a few that way instead.
    The energy savings have been dramatic by the way. Year over year has shown an absolutely astonishing difference. I had no idea the lights were consuming so much power.
    I spent about $200 on the bulbs and have already saved more than that.
    edited June 2019 lolliverhmurchison
  • Reply 3 of 18
    22july201322july2013 Posts: 3,564member
    Will the new Hue smart switch still require the Philips hub? How does its price compare to its competitors?
  • Reply 4 of 18
    SoliSoli Posts: 10,035member
    mystigo said:
    D'oh. I upgraded almost every bulb in my house to the filament style ones already. Just the dumb ones, but had the smart ones been available I might have done a few that way instead.
    The energy savings have been dramatic by the way. Year over year has shown an absolutely astonishing difference. I had no idea the lights were consuming so much power.
    I spent about $200 on the bulbs and have already saved more than that.
    I'm a little confused by your comment. I thought filament were the same as incandescent and that LED is the most power efficient bulbs on the market today.
  • Reply 5 of 18
    StrangeDaysStrangeDays Posts: 12,834member
    Soli said:
    mystigo said:
    D'oh. I upgraded almost every bulb in my house to the filament style ones already. Just the dumb ones, but had the smart ones been available I might have done a few that way instead.
    The energy savings have been dramatic by the way. Year over year has shown an absolutely astonishing difference. I had no idea the lights were consuming so much power.
    I spent about $200 on the bulbs and have already saved more than that.
    I'm a little confused by your comment. I thought filament were the same as incandescent and that LED is the most power efficient bulbs on the market today.
    They mention it in the article, but there is now a type of filament has a plastic LED snake as the light source element, rather than a thin piece of hot metal. It's designed to mimic traditional Edison bulbs. They're all over the big box hardware stores now.
    edited June 2019 Solilolliver
  • Reply 6 of 18
    SoliSoli Posts: 10,035member
    Soli said:
    mystigo said:
    D'oh. I upgraded almost every bulb in my house to the filament style ones already. Just the dumb ones, but had the smart ones been available I might have done a few that way instead.
    The energy savings have been dramatic by the way. Year over year has shown an absolutely astonishing difference. I had no idea the lights were consuming so much power.
    I spent about $200 on the bulbs and have already saved more than that.
    I'm a little confused by your comment. I thought filament were the same as incandescent and that LED is the most power efficient bulbs on the market today.
    They mention it in the article, but there is now a type of filament has a plastic LED snake as the light source element, rather than a thin piece of hot metal. It's designed to mimic traditional Edison bulbs. They're all over the big box hardware stores now.
    Thanks. 
    lolliver
  • Reply 7 of 18
    StrangeDaysStrangeDays Posts: 12,834member
    These are interesting. But what I'd really like are....brighter....bulbs. Please. lol.. For some reason you can get really bright LED bulbs (ex: 1600 lumens), and smart bulbs, but not really bright smart bulbs. 
    oseame
  • Reply 8 of 18
    oseameoseame Posts: 73member
    These are interesting. But what I'd really like are....brighter....bulbs. Please. lol.. For some reason you can get really bright LED bulbs (ex: 1600 lumens), and smart bulbs, but not really bright smart bulbs. 
    This. My lights are all Hue except the ones that really need to be a bit brighter which are dumb LEDs… Perhaps it's down to fitting a wifi chip in the bulb, but I can't help feeling it's a cynical tactic to convince us to upgrade in a year or two without waiting for our current bulbs to expire.
  • Reply 9 of 18
    Will the new Hue smart switch still require the Philips hub? How does its price compare to its competitors?
    At 30 euros, you'd hope it doesn't require the hub and it better monitor electricity consumption too. You can get perfectly good alternatives for half that price and they connect to wifi
  • Reply 10 of 18
    This could be really nice. I like the look of those bulbs. I use several Philips Hue Color Ambiance bulbs in my home. I love them.
  • Reply 11 of 18
    SoliSoli Posts: 10,035member
    Will the new Hue smart switch still require the Philips hub? How does its price compare to its competitors?
    At 30 euros, you'd hope it doesn't require the hub and it better monitor electricity consumption too. You can get perfectly good alternatives for half that price and they connect to wifi
    Is WiFi really the way to go for dozens of light bulbs in a home? I thought Hue’s wireless protocol used less power and didn’t interfere with your 802.11 traffic.
  • Reply 12 of 18
    22july201322july2013 Posts: 3,564member
    Soli said:
    Will the new Hue smart switch still require the Philips hub? How does its price compare to its competitors?
    At 30 euros, you'd hope it doesn't require the hub and it better monitor electricity consumption too. You can get perfectly good alternatives for half that price and they connect to wifi
    Is WiFi really the way to go for dozens of light bulbs in a home? 
    That's a good question, for which I'd like someone to explain the correct answer. I'm tech support for my friends/family and I don't know the answer.
  • Reply 13 of 18
    StrangeDaysStrangeDays Posts: 12,834member
    Soli said:
    Will the new Hue smart switch still require the Philips hub? How does its price compare to its competitors?
    At 30 euros, you'd hope it doesn't require the hub and it better monitor electricity consumption too. You can get perfectly good alternatives for half that price and they connect to wifi
    Is WiFi really the way to go for dozens of light bulbs in a home? I thought Hue’s wireless protocol used less power and didn’t interfere with your 802.11 traffic.
    Yes, the reason why home automation use something other than wifi is (has been at least) because they are a lighter weight communication protocol than wifi, making them faster and more reliable. I have both types of devices, and anecdotally my wifi-only switches seem slower and have had more freak-outs requiring a device restart (there's even a reset button my iDevices wall dimmer switch -- like an old Nintendo or Atari console!)
    edited June 2019
  • Reply 14 of 18
    Soli said:
    Will the new Hue smart switch still require the Philips hub? How does its price compare to its competitors?
    At 30 euros, you'd hope it doesn't require the hub and it better monitor electricity consumption too. You can get perfectly good alternatives for half that price and they connect to wifi
    Is WiFi really the way to go for dozens of light bulbs in a home? I thought Hue’s wireless protocol used less power and didn’t interfere with your 802.11 traffic.
    I have a Hue bridge as I have the bulbs but if I had to have a bridge for every different device/brand in the house, I would get sick of it fast. At least wifi that most other smart plugs have, allows you to dabble with different brands. That needs to be the goal if home automation will ever work.
  • Reply 15 of 18
    SoliSoli Posts: 10,035member
    Soli said:
    Will the new Hue smart switch still require the Philips hub? How does its price compare to its competitors?
    At 30 euros, you'd hope it doesn't require the hub and it better monitor electricity consumption too. You can get perfectly good alternatives for half that price and they connect to wifi
    Is WiFi really the way to go for dozens of light bulbs in a home? I thought Hue’s wireless protocol used less power and didn’t interfere with your 802.11 traffic.
    I have a Hue bridge as I have the bulbs but if I had to have a bridge for every different device/brand in the house, I would get sick of it fast. At least wifi that most other smart plugs have, allows you to dabble with different brands. That needs to be the goal if home automation will ever work.
    I'm under the impression that Hue works with Zigbee 3.0 (IEEE 802.15.4) PAN (personal area network), which is why it works with the Echo Plus's* built-in hub works for Hue and others. Is that not correct? Can't you use any 3rd-party hub that supports the Zigbee 3.0 specification with any vendor's products that support Zigbee 3.0?


    * I've decided to shun what I learned in school as a kid, and I'm going to add an apostrophe 's' for words ending in 's' if you'd say both.
    edited June 2019
  • Reply 16 of 18
    Soli said:
    Soli said:
    Will the new Hue smart switch still require the Philips hub? How does its price compare to its competitors?
    At 30 euros, you'd hope it doesn't require the hub and it better monitor electricity consumption too. You can get perfectly good alternatives for half that price and they connect to wifi
    Is WiFi really the way to go for dozens of light bulbs in a home? I thought Hue’s wireless protocol used less power and didn’t interfere with your 802.11 traffic.
    I have a Hue bridge as I have the bulbs but if I had to have a bridge for every different device/brand in the house, I would get sick of it fast. At least wifi that most other smart plugs have, allows you to dabble with different brands. That needs to be the goal if home automation will ever work.
    I'm under the impression that Hue works with Zigbee 3.0 (IEEE 802.15.4) PAN (personal area network), which is why it works with the Echo Plus's* built-in hub works for Hue and others. Is that not correct? Can't you use any 3rd-party hub that supports the Zigbee 3.0 specification with any vendor's products that support Zigbee 3.0?


    * I've decided to shun what I learned in school as a kid, and I'm going to add an apostrophe 's' for words ending in 's' if you'd say both.
    I can't claim to be an expert but my understanding is that the bulbs will work with third party hubs but the dimmer switches won't.
  • Reply 17 of 18
    ivanhivanh Posts: 597member
    Will the new Hue smart switch still require the Philips hub? How does its price compare to its competitors?
    Yes, it does require the hub. Premium priced over and less variety than IKEA TradFri series.
  • Reply 18 of 18
    ivanhivanh Posts: 597member
    A smart plug without energy consumption, current flow, power bill calculation is a dumb plug.

    I look forward to see a smart power extension board.
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