To round off the week, I would like to present you with some pretty tough news. It’s a press release from Signify, the manufacturer of Philips Hue, which you can read here. In a nutshell, it’s about restructuring and planned savings of 200 million euros per year. The good news from our point of view is that the four business areas that Signify wants to focus on in future also include the consumer business area with the Philips Hue and WiZ brands.
In my opinion, the Philips Hue wall switch module is one of the best accessories for the smart lighting system. It solves the problem of ceiling lighting being disconnected from the power supply and turns the classic switch on the wall, where everyone knows how to operate it, into a smart switch.
The update of the Philips Hue app to version 5.6, which is expected before Christmas, is still a long way off. However, new firmware for the Hue Bridge has been released in the last few days. You may have already received version 1961135030. You can check this in the settings of the Hue app.
I actually wanted to wait a few more days to make this little announcement, but there’s not much else going on today when it comes to Philips Hue. So let’s get this little announcement out of the way: Hueblog is back on Instagram. You can already find the first stylish pictures on the channel and of course there will be many more in the future.
It’s not a big surprise and it was already announced. But I don’t want to withhold this little announcement from you, because then we can put the issue to bed. Philips Hue has recently removed the Hue Bluetooth app and the Hue Sync app from the Apple App Store and the Google Play Store.
Secretly, quietly and silently, Philips Hue has brought its Christmas scenes back to the Philips Hue app. As I have been asked about this several times over the past few weeks, I didn’t want to withhold this little hint from you. As always, the Christmas scenes can be found in the Hue light scenes gallery directly in the Hue app.
There are already a number of ways to control the smart lamps from Philips Hue. Via app, automation, voice control or with smart accessories such as the Hue dimmer switch or the Hue motion sensor. There could soon be a magical new alternative to the motion sensor – and Philips Hue smart lamps will be at the centre of this.
Controlling the Hue lamps directly with the mouse and keyboard is a very pleasant thing, especially when you’re sitting at your desk at home. I’ve already introduced you to a few options, such as We Love Lights, a nifty little app for the Mac. If you don’t want to spend any money, there is now another alternative.
Just a fortnight ago, iConnectHue delivered an update that, among other things, provided initial rudimentary support for the Hue contact sensor. Now developer Stefan Göhler has already released the next update. His premium app iConnectHue is now available in version 5.2 for iPhone and iPad. If you use iConnectHue in combination with music, you can now enjoy an improved strobe light that offers more speed and dynamics.
It’s actually quite simple with Philips Hue, there are three different types of light. Products classified as Hue White only have white LEDs with a fixed colour temperature. White Ambiance uses cool white and warm white LEDs to create different shades of white. With White and Color Ambiance, in addition to the white LEDs, there are also coloured RGB LEDs so that a total of 16 million colours can be mixed.
Fabian