Philips - Hue A19 60W Equivalent Wireless Starter Kit - White

We were in Best Buy shopping for another item and spotted the Philips smart bulbs starter kit so picked them up. We had been considering adding them or something similar. Installation was very simple, in fact after the log in it did it for us. The only reason I do not give it a 5 star is we cannot connect our Amazon Echo to it. But we are satisfied with operating these from our smart phones, tablet, etc. We get a kick out of our 2018 smart bulb in a 1940's old lamp, picture I have added. The lamp belonged to my grandmother and my husband rewired it. That's quite a different use in 2018 from 1940 , old meets techie. The other is in a rewired lamp from the 1930's. We enjoy the features, dimming, brighter, tones and hues as well.

I purchased the hue light hub kit to replace an old appliance timer that I have on a couple of lamps in my house. I added the timers to keep from coming home to a dark house. It's a nice unit and when you pair it with a Google home, you get a way to control lights with a voice command. I recommend this product if you are into home tech.

I like everything Phillips make very good quality and technology I will be buying more very soon!

It was easy to install. Works well. Will buy more bulbs to expand to other areas of the house.

The best idea so far it's awesome in every way possible

All products worked as advertised.. I can complete the smart upgrade in my home at my leisure.

Cheaper version of Phillips WiFi control- mini controller is cheap w bundled product

I recently purchased a Google Home and was wanting to start with some home automation. First thought was with my lighting since Philips Hue is one that it is compatible with. I thought I would start with this and see if it was something that I would like. Setup was very simple. First, put the bulbs in whatever locations you want. For me that was simple since I have a small apartment and live by myself; living room and bedroom. Easy. Second connect the hub. Power and cat5 to my router. No brainer. Last downloaded the Hue app on my phone. Follow the quick start and everything is connected. Everything works on the first go. Brilliant! Note: there are two Hue apps. The 2nd generation allows you to set up rooms and gives you scenes out of the box that are useful. There are presets for full on, dimmed and nightlight for each light. The only downside is that the routines, like Home and Away, do not work properly. Sure you can use your phone as a remote, but I wanted it to turn my lights on when I get home and off when I leave. There is an option for setting a location but it doesn't work. Just do a quick internet search and you will see that. But there is the 1st generation app. The location settings and timers work perfectly! Location awareness turns my lights on when I pull into the complex and shuts them off when I leave. Just what I was wanting. Downside, the scenes are not very good, you can't set up lights as a room (easily) and the light controls are sliders which gets annoying. Fortunately you can use both apps simultaneously. So I setup routines using 1st gen and control the lights manually using 2nd gen. Works like a charm. Now I have exactly what I was wanting. I was so thrilled that I bought another bulb and a dimmer switch. Great for my bedside lamp. I setup a routine that turns all the lights off at bedtime except the bedside lamp. For that I have the dimmer so I'm not left in the dark. I also have setup up some recipes in IFTTT to blink the lights when it's bedtime and to automatically turn my lights off at midnight. Just in case I fell asleep with them on, of course. Integration with the Google Assistant is seamless. I can just say 'Ok Google, turn on (whatever)' or 'Ok Google, dim (whatever)' and it does it. Almost like having my own Javis. I admit it, I'm hooked. The only issue I've had was when I tried putting one in the kitchen it had an issue with connecting to the hub from time to time. Can't move the hub right now so I just removed it for the time being. Once I get a place of my own I will be adding more lights, some I plan on using the color and some the white ambiance. Another note, if you really want to get the most out of the automation part you really need to use a Google Home or Amazon Echo. The app is great but it is kind of a pain to have to use it. Much better to just use voice commands. The only reason I give it 4 stars instead of 5 is because of the issues with the 2nd gen app. Once the get that resolved it will be a perfect lighting solution.