Multi-Tint, Multi-Color LED Bulbs Are Here

StarHalo

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Available Monday at your local Apple store, the Philips Hue lighting system gives you four preset Kelvin temperatures ("Energize, Reading, Relax, and Concentrate"), and can also recreate any color using your iOS interface; you can click on a particular region on a digital image, and the bulb will light that color. Buy more than one bulb and set each to a different shade. Includes on/off timers, the interface is hackable/appable so you could write a program to control your light any number of ways, and even some social options, so you can share your palettes and preferences with others. All in an 8.5 watt compact package without the goofy fins.

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slebans

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Very cool but very expensive. A good first start for Philips.
A couple of other links:
http://news.consumerreports.org/hom...a-web-enabled-led-debuts-at-apple-stores.html
and
http://gizmodo.com/5955671/philips-hue-first-impressions-wi+fi-lighting-plus-fun

As a developer, I do like the idea of Philips releasing an API. A Zigbee compatible Motion Sensor driving a Hue system would allow me to have the "time of day" aware lighting system promised by science fiction a long time ago. Add a voice interface for even more control/fun.
 

SemiMan

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I am a little disappointed that for that price they are not including white LEDs in the system as well. Monochromatic RGB simulating white is not the most pleasing light source. This will be worse than triphosphor as while triphosphor has narrow peaks, it still has a lot of energy in other areas.

Definitely high on the cool factor!

Semiman
 

Steve K

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I saw the press release earlier today... kinda nifty and definitely another way to play with your phone. I have to wonder if this is just a novelty, or do people really want to fiddle with the color balance of their lights? Maybe for the reading lamp on the end table? Maybe for a task light in the kitchen?

I don't think I'd want to have to tweak the color of every bulb in the house, though! Think of the issues of getting all the bulbs in a room matched up! Or could you group the bulbs in a room so that they can be adjusted as a single entity?

All in all, an interesting concept, and certainly something that differentiates LEDs from CFLs and incandescents.
 

MichaelW

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The fins tell me that attention toward junction temperature has been paid.
By 2015, the electric wiring of the house will be sufficient heat sink for LED lights.
 

UnknownVT

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I am both astonished and impressed by the fact they have managed to get CRI as high as 91 using what are basically discreet RGB LEDs.

I know that stage lighting to get 16.8 million color possibilities never seem to be able to get a "white" that resembles anything worthwhile, and any photo post processing is always difficult to get a white balance that is even acceptable.

and yet Philips have managed a CRI of 91 using discreet RGB LEDs (albeit with different tints) -
when the LED industry are struggling to get past the mid-80's CRI even with the most advanced "white" LEDs.

I wonder how they did it -
just being silly/cynical - since CRI is dependent on color temperature or CCT -
perhaps that high CRI is only for one specific CCT
.... up in the UV range?
 

StarHalo

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While trying to do a Halloween window lighting setup, it occurred to me that this would all be a lot easier with a pair of Hue bulbs - just put them in clamp lamps, set one orange and one purple, presto, Halloween. Set one red, one green, Christmas. Pink and yellow, Easter.

Just a few of these bulbs moved around my house as needed would replace pretty much every other kind of bulb I have..
 

kaichu dento

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These bulbs are a great idea and remove the need to worry about whether a particular customer will prefer cool, warm or neutral, not to mention being able to change with the mood of the user, or who is in the room at the time. I prefer warmer tints for atmosphere, cooler for work.
 

idleprocess

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"Goofy fins" make heatsinks more effective, so one also wonders about the thermal characteristics. Or perhaps the overall 8.5W package and power dissipation at expected settings/brightness is sufficiently low that fins aren't needed ... or it's marginally intelligent about these things and can taper off power consumption should heat levels rise too high.

Seems useful for club-type settings where ~16M colors would be useful, but I wonder about using them for work/living. Seems like some sort of "tuneable" white with white LEDs + complimentary discrete color LEDs to strengthen color/spectrum as desired would produce better light for work/home.

Would be interesting to do a blind test with people that complain about CFL spectrum using these bulbs to determine the degree to which the complaints are psychosomatic (ie, lots of people with pet allergies only begin to experience symptoms when they see the animal).
 
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idleprocess

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I don't think I'd want to have to tweak the color of every bulb in the house, though! Think of the issues of getting all the bulbs in a room matched up! Or could you group the bulbs in a room so that they can be adjusted as a single entity?

I would guess that the smartphone app has a decent UI to make said adjustments simple and painless. Bet that individual or groups of bulbs can be set to any number of presets with ease.
 

anuragwap

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Philips hasn't revealed the full design details behind Hue, but has said that it uses a mix of three colored LEDS – lime-green, red-orange, and royal-blue LEDs. Philips said that the lime-green LED is crucial to the lamps' ability to deliver a CRI of 91. -LEDSMAGAZINE

I am really curious about this new 'lime green' LED used in Hue. Probably its not the usual 525nm LXML-PM01-100, but perhaps a wide-band phosphored LED?
 
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ClassicGOD

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I was going to order the starter pack but they will be available where I live in 4 months. What I'm worried about is PWM - it's present in all HUE reviews I watched and I'll have to check how bad it is in person or wait for some comprehensive review on CPF ;)
 

slebans

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I am really curious about this new 'lime green' LED used in Hue. Probably its not the usual 525nm LXML-PM01-100, but perhaps a wide-band phosphored LED?

A bit more info released on the Hue Bulb and the lime-green LEDs contained in a post covering the release of the Luxeon T series.
http://ledsmagazine.com/news/9/12/7
Hue's lime-green LED

We used the chanced to interview the Lumileds executives to ask other questions as well such as for details on the mysterious lime-green LED that is presumably very important to the function of the Philips Lighting Hue lamp. Lesaicherre was guarded with details but said that Lumileds had advanced the efficacy of green LEDs that in general has trailed other colored LEDs industry wide.

Reportedly the lamp uses five of the lime-green LEDs, four red LEDs, and 2 blue LEDs. That means that the green LED is approaching the efficacy of the red ones.

The lime-green color itself was not the source of the efficacy gain. Instead, that lime-green LED better enables the mixture to deliver the full color-tunable range according to Hartnett. Lumileds does plan to offer a lime-green LED commercially, but is still mulling over plans as to which Luxeon family in which it will launch the product.
 

StarHalo

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Update: Version 1.1 now supports geofencing - the system recognizes each user's cellphone and can automatically turn on to a preset when they enter and automatically turn out the lights when they leave. The timer has a random feature that can be set for when no one's home, making different lights turn on and off from time to time to make the space appear occupied. And the dev app is online, so anyone on the Internet can start writing programs for the system; it uses the Zigbee standard, so any compatible device can control any parameter of the lighting.
 

Derek Dean

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I love the idea of this system, and Philips seems to have done a good job with the implementation. I'll be following this with interest.
 

avada

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Anyone have an idea how adjustable color temperature bulbs work. Recently others like Samsung and LG cam out with theirs.

Are they RGB Led with phosphors? Where you can modify the spectrum by driving the different colors appropriately. Or maybe simple white leds combined with colored led which change the color temperaure?
Or something I didn't think about?
 
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