Need advice on good smart (GU10) lighting in a louge and dining room - Dual dimmer control etc

NeilF

NeilF

NeilF

Soldato
Joined
15 Nov 2003
Posts
14,473
Location
Marlow
So I'm new to smart lighting.

I want to put GU10s in our lounge and adjoining dining room. I want good quality controls:-
  • At the very least - Dimmer control for lounge and dimmer control for dining room, both in the dining room.
  • Ideally - Dimmer control for lounge and dimmer control for dining room in the dining room and another dimmer control for lounge in the lounge too.

We also have some lighting outside the lounge to consider to light directly outside (the decking). If that can easily be made smart (at least on/off), great!

Seems Philips Hue is the bees knees, but is it the wise choice here? Are there sensible alternative that offer good quality controls.

ps: And obviously I want everything to be controllable via Amazon Echo voice commands too :)
 
Mr.Cookie said:
I've got 21 of these http://imgur.com/gallery/UcGjAVl

Purchased from tlc 5.80 each, they run off the smart life app which you can add as a skill to alexa, I've found them to be extremely good.
I can do a video of them if you'd like.
Click to expand...
Does that mean you have 21 more devices connected to your router? :eek:

Or do they go through a single hub?


A main things is also I need those nice functional tidy dimmer switches in the lounge/dining too too...
 
NeilF said:
So I'm new to smart lighting.

I want to put GU10s in our lounge and adjoining dining room. I want good quality controls:-
  • At the very least - Dimmer control for lounge and dimmer control for dining room, both in the dining room.
  • Ideally - Dimmer control for lounge and dimmer control for dining room in the dining room and another dimmer control for lounge in the lounge too.

We also have some lighting outside the lounge to consider to light directly outside (the decking). If that can easily be made smart (at least on/off), great!

Seems Philips Hue is the bees knees, but is it the wise choice here? Are there sensible alternative that offer good quality controls.

ps: And obviously I want everything to be controllable via Amazon Echo voice commands too :)
Click to expand...

Hue will pretty much do what you've asked, if you're not interested in RGB or ambiance, then you can pick up the tradfri dimmable gu10s for £6/ea. Which will keep your costs down significantly.

For your decking lights, if they're wired into a plug, then a smart plug will take care of this. If they're hardwired into a switch, then you'd need to look at something like a sonoff module, but you'd need additional hardware to have it all talking.
 
Innr lights and switches also pair to hue and show up as a light so you can have a single app control it all

I have a couple of their outlets with lamps plugged in to control from the hue app along with other hue stuff.
 
fish said:
Innr lights and switches also pair to hue and show up as a light so you can have a single app control it all

I have a couple of their outlets with lamps plugged in to control from the hue app along with other hue stuff.
Click to expand...
I looked for Innr switches and came up pretty empty?

I suppose the solution would be:-
  • The smart GU10 bulbs (eg: 8 in the lounge and 6 in the dining room) wired in to be constantly powered?
  • A hub (Hue?).
  • Two smart switches to control a bank of 8. Two smart switches to control a bank of 6. Mains powered?
  • An app to define and also control the above setup?
 
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Zigbee-Phi...ld=1&keywords=innr+plug&qid=1615459168&sr=8-5

This is a link to the one i bought. That's what i meant by switches for plug in lights/floor lamps.

For light switches the hue and ikea ones work fine. I have not tried multiple switches on sets of lights but have 24 lights controlled from a single switch installed in the kitchen. The hue app is fine for me but mileage may vary.


I also have some of these over the light switches. Easier access to turn off lights should you need too but mine stay on.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Samotech®-...keywords=hue+wall+plate&qid=1615459408&sr=8-5
 
So do you have to get Hue GU10 bulbs to work with the Hue kit (eg: their app and hub)? Or can you get cheaper alternatives?

EDIT: WOW! So a 14 colour GU10 Hue setup would be about £600 by my calculations!!!!
 
Last edited:
I would ask do you need colour or is white fine seeing as you can go from warm to cool?
 
fish said:
I would ask do you need colour or is white fine seeing as you can go from warm to cool?
Click to expand...
Yeh, I think I'll just go with the ambient white variant for a lot less...

My current question is does the V2 Hue Dimmer switch screw directly/straight over a standard light socket box. ie: If I open up an existing light switch (dimmer). Hardwire the wiring so bulbs always powered. Can I then simply screw the V2 Hue Dimmer Switch straight over that light switch position/box. The screw holes appear to be 6cm apart which looks right!?
 
I have the v1 and the item i linked to fits over a switch (but screws through the same holes). The v2 looks to be similar (may be wrong). I would suggest that you install a switch rather then a dimmer rather than hard-wire a light on all the time otherwise you need to turn all of the lights off every time you need to change a bulb etc.
 
fish said:
I have the v1 and the item i linked to fits over a switch (but screws through the same holes). The v2 looks to be similar (may be wrong). I would suggest that you install a switch rather then a dimmer rather than hard-wire a light on all the time otherwise you need to turn all of the lights off every time you need to change a bulb etc.
Click to expand...
No the V2 doesn't seem to be compatible with those V1 conversion plates... :(

Why would I need to turn the power off to a set of bulbs to change a bulb? I'm happy to (carefully) change a GU10 with the power still going to the socket, just as I am with a bayonet fitting.

Please don't tell me you HAVE TO have a legacy switch for Hue bulbs to be programmed or something!? EDIT: I've found a video of someone installing Hue GU10s doing exactly what I've sugested?



EDIT: With my notion the V2 can cover an existing light switch socket, and ideally even screw over it, this article says about the V2, "...because it means that the dimmer switch should completely cover the standard EU in-wall boxes. The base plate of the previous dimmer switch was too narrow for this." - https://hueblog.com/2020/12/21/philips-hue-dimmer-switch-new-generation-gets-more-modern/ (So maybe the reason there aren't any V2 conversion plates is because you don't need them?)
 
Last edited:
No you don't HAVE TO have a legacy switch. However this means that each of the light fittings will have permanent power if you bridge the switch. In the future if a lamp is changed then you run the risk of whoever is changing the lamp to then contact live terminal inside the fitting. It is a cautionary thing.
 
NeilF said:
Yeh, I think I'll just go with the ambient white variant for a lot less...

My current question is does the V2 Hue Dimmer switch screw directly/straight over a standard light socket box. ie: If I open up an existing light switch (dimmer). Hardwire the wiring so bulbs always powered. Can I then simply screw the V2 Hue Dimmer Switch straight over that light switch position/box. The screw holes appear to be 6cm apart which looks right!?
Click to expand...

Yes that should work fine. These mounting fixtures aren't created by Philips, they're just 3D printed from someones design. They're actually designed to sit on top of the switch, but can't see why they wouldn't still fit if you removed the switch.
 
fish said:
No you don't HAVE TO have a legacy switch. However this means that each of the light fittings will have permanent power if you bridge the switch. In the future if a lamp is changed then you run the risk of whoever is changing the lamp to then contact live terminal inside the fitting. It is a cautionary thing.
Click to expand...
Indeed, so instead of turning a hidden switch off, turn a fuse breaker switch off...

If I do this in the lounge/dining room, the wiring will be redone so I'll see if a hidden switches (like you have for shower etc) can be tucked away for those circuits, which otherwise will be constantly powered for the Hue bulbs.
 
I can confirm the Hue Dimmer Switch V2 perfectly covers/screws into a standard light switch socket.
 
NeilF said:
Does that mean you have 21 more devices connected to your router? :eek:

Or do they go through a single hub?


A main things is also I need those nice functional tidy dimmer switches in the lounge/dining too too...
Click to expand...

Why does 21 devices connected scare you? It should be fine. They don't use a hub, each lamp connects to wifi.

I've got the same lamps in 3 rooms. I think there's 29 of them in total and they're fantastic things. I'd happily recommend them.

We didn't want to use dimmers, we do everything via Alexa or Siri Shortcuts so I can't comment on the physical dimmer option.
 
the-evaluator said:
Why does 21 devices connected scare you? It should be fine. They don't use a hub, each lamp connects to wifi.

I've got the same lamps in 3 rooms. I think there's 29 of them in total and they're fantastic things. I'd happily recommend them.

We didn't want to use dimmers, we do everything via Alexa or Siri Shortcuts so I can't comment on the physical dimmer option.
Click to expand...

Presumably the issue with wifi would be if you did a router change, then that would be a ballache to reconfigure everything again. The luxury of a zigbee/zwave hub is they use a different protocol for communicating and any change in wifi setup wouldn't even be noticed by a zigbee/zwave hub.
 
Semple said:
Presumably the issue with wifi would be if you did a router change, then that would be a ballache to reconfigure everything again. The luxury of a zigbee/zwave hub is they use a different protocol for communicating and any change in wifi setup wouldn't even be noticed by a zigbee/zwave hub.
Click to expand...

Just set the new router to use the same wifi network name and password as the old one. No changes needed to the clients then.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom