Energy Efficient Lighting

TAG | remote control lighting

Sep/16

30

Ikea makes grab for affordable smart lighting market

Comments off · Posted by admin in LED

Innovative retailer Ikea is setting its sights on the smart lighting market.

Ikea’s plug and play solution features a tiny transmitter that has been installed within the luminaire, which can communicate with a remote control.

Ikea, the flat-pack furniture giant, has announced that it is to release an affordable range of smart luminaires that can be controlled wirelessly using a remote control.
Although the smart lighting market has been growing, it is still often confined only to expensive, high end, products.
Ikea’s TRÅDFRI LED fixture is simpler than many of the already established smart lighting products on the market.
‘The new luminaire has been developed after research showed that small changes in lighting can have a great impact on people’s well-being and intellectual abilities,’ a spokesperson for Ikea commented.
Ikea’s smart luminaires are simple screw-in fixtures that are able to sit in pendant lights and lamps.
The plug and play solution features a tiny transmitter that has been installed within the luminaire, which can communicate with a remote control.
The remote device is able to control up to ten LED light sources around the house and can adjust lighting levels from a warm yellow glow all the way through to ‘full beam’ brightness.
It will also be possible to control the lights using a smartphone app but this will require a hub, similar to the Philips Hue, which allows users to change the brightness levels of their lighting.
The luminaires will be available to buy in stores in April next year. Ikea has not yet put a price on the light sources, but it is expected that they will be affordable and in line with current prices at the budget retailer. Ikea intends to extend their smart lighting range further in the future to include light panels.

· · · · · ·

Sep/16

26

Meet ‘Alexa’ Amazon’s new device that can control your home lighting

Comments off · Posted by admin in LED

The Echo is a smart-speaker that responds to the name ‘Alexa’.
Philips Hue will also be compatible with the Echo, meaning you will be able to adjust the strength of your light fixtures using your own voice.

The Amazon Echo will feature a voice control capability that will allow you to turn off your lights and adjust your central heating with the sound of your voice. The Echo is a smart-speaker that responds to the name ‘Alexa’.

Amazon has announced a partnership with Hive, the smart-home platform developed by British Gas. The Echo will be compatible with Hive Lights and and Hive Active Heating.

Philips Hue will also be compatible with the Echo, meaning you will be able to adjust the strength of your light fixtures using your own voice.

As well as the Echo, Amazon are also launching the cheaper second generation Echo Dot mini-speaker, which features an even more nimble ‘Alexa’, which can trigger pre-set home lighting scenes. This means that you will also be able to voice-activate colour changing as well as dimming your lighting.

So, if you have created a sunny lighting scene in your bedroom that involves orange and red hues that adjusts in brightness as the sun sets, you could activate this by simply saying, ‘Alexa, turn on scene sunny day’ and she will happily oblige, (that is if you want to ascribe a sex to a gadget designed by a multi-billion dollar corporation out to get you to spend more money.)

You will not be able to ask ‘Alexa’ to change the colour of individual light sources if you are using the Hue, but you will be in with a chance if you own Hue’s competitor Lifx, which is compatible with Amazon’s speaker.

Hue is able to communicate with ‘Alexa’s’ arch-enemy ‘Siri’ though to change the colour of individual light sources.

The Amazon Echo will be available to buy from the 16th of September 2016.

· · · · ·