FabianWhile we continue to wait for the big updates, including multi-bridge support and new 24-hour scenes, Philips Hue is working on some improvements under the hood. The recently released version 5.30 brings some bug fixes and stability improvements.
However, I did notice one small new feature, at least on the iPhone. There is a new option for the widget on the home screen: you can integrate your Hue Secure camera into the widget. However, not the camera image, but just a button that you can use to activate the live view in the Hue app without any detours.
New firmware for the Hue Secure cameras
Philips Hue has also released new firmware for its Hue Secure cameras. Software version 1.2.26 has been distributed to the cameras since November 18. This includes many improvements to the Bluetooth connection and possible restarts of the battery model. However, there is also an innovation that could be noticeable in practice.
“Improved lighting-related false positives during motion detection”, according to the release notes. I can imagine that this will primarily prevent falsely detected movements in light and rain. However, I have not yet been able to try this out in practice. Feel free to write in the comments if you have noticed any changes.
In the next two weeks, the connection to Amazon Alexa and Google Home should also be activated. This will then make it possible to call up the live view of the Hue Secure cameras on a supported device, such as an Echo Show or Fire TV. As soon as this function is available, I will definitely publish a tutorial on how exactly the pairing with the external system works.
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Not for Android it seems
Finally have my Philips Hue Secure Flood Light Camera installed outside! Tried to access the live stream using the latest firmware (1.2.26.877000), Android app (Version 5.31.1 (18892)) and Hue Bridge (BSB002 | 1.67.1967054020).
However, I see the message: “We’re having trouble connecting to your camera. Please make sure you have an active Internet connection and try again”. I have tried several times without success. My Pixel 7 Pro is running GrapheneOS (which has worked fine with earlier versions of the Hue app) and has an active Internet connection (VPN = none). The camera is visible on my network with port 22/ssh open (apparently running SSH-2.0-dropbear_2022.83). The app describes the connection as “Fair”, occasionally “Good”.
Any suggestions on how to diagnose and fix the problem?
I attempted to use my old Samsung Galaxy S8 running Android version 9 but that is too old to be compatible …
Any further information on Davy Maekelberg’s comment “Not for Android it seems”?