Hacks@Home: How to get started with smart light bulbs
Smart Home
$8 for a smart bulb?
[SOUND] Now that's a bright idea.
This is the affordable and awesome Wyze Bulb.
It's a great way to add simple, practical smarts to your home.
Let me show you how to set it up and use it for cool connected tricks.
[MUSIC]
This video is part of the Hacks It Home Series, sponsored by AT&T Fiber.
The CNET smart home is powered by AT&T Fiber.
So let's get started with this smart bulb.
Part of the fun of the smart home is feeling a bit like a wizard.
Say a voice command like you're casting a spell, turn on the reading lamp.
And voila, the lamp turns on, and you have a reading light.
While this is great for showing off, Is smart bulb can legitimately make your life easier if you have a hard to reach lamp.
Or even if you just want automated help because your hands are full or you're feeling lazy.
Every smartphone is going to have an app so you can control your lights remotely.
That's especially cool if you want to flip on a lamp while you're on vacation.
The y's bowl does have an app And it works with Amazon's assistant and Google Assistant.
If you have a smart speaker the wise bold will fit into your larger Smart Home nicely.
Plus, it's $8.
That's awesome.
And significantly less than smartphones from competitors like Philips Hue and light fix even better.
It performed well in our lighting lab and is pleasingly bright.
Even better still, it connects to Wi Fi directly.
Some smart bulbs require their own hub that you also need to buy.
Not so with the wise bulb.
So, bulb in hand.
Let's get it set up and see what we can do with it.
First, pick your lamp If you have a reading lamp in a hard-to-reach spot, that's perfect.
If not, whatever lamp you want will be fine.
If you're just getting started in a smart home pick a lamp that you use often so you get used to interacting with your connected gadgets.
One word of caution.
You don't need to outright avoid a lamp that you can control with a switch.
But it can make your life more complicated.
If the switch is off, that means there's no power to the lamp.
It doesn't matter how smart your bulb is, you won't be able to turn it on or off remotely if it's not getting any power.
So, leave the switch on if you do pick a lamp connected to it.
Once you have your spot switch out the light bulb There's a joke here about how many smart home experts it takes to change a light bulb.
But it's really not more complicated than that.
Almost everything else happens in the wise app, which you can download for iOS or Android.
Create a wise account.
Then tap the three dots from the main page of the app and hit Add product.
Select the bulb, and then you'll need to turn the bulb itself on.
Then off three times, you'll see a pulse.
Enter your Wi Fi info into the app then your phone will connect to the bulbs Wi Fi.
From there, give the app a bit to work and the bulb will soon stop pulsing.
It's good to go at that point.
Name it something you'll remember, maybe the reading lamp, the living room lamp.
Naming it after a room is good, but make sure to keep it sample so you can say the name easily when giving voice commands.
And that's it for the bulb itself.
Now with the app you can turn it on or off and you can set schedules.
The light can turn on or off after a set amount of time.
It can turn on at certain times of the day.
This is great if you need a little light to help you wake up in the morning or if you wanna deter crooks while you're out of town.
But the bulb gets better if you already have other smart home gadgets, like a smart speaker.
If you have an Echo Dot or a Google Home Mini, you can control the bulb with a voice command.
Again, the bulb works with both Amazon's Assistant and the Google Assistant.
You'll need to sync it with the respective apps for each.
Then you can cast a spell on your smart home.
Turn the bulb on or off with your voice You can also raise and lower the brightness.
I recommend starting small with any smart home product.
But if you're using the wise bulb and like it, you can always add more bulbs.
Then you can group them by rooms or turn them all on or off at once.
A smart bulb is a simple way to add automation to your home and a wise bulb is a good starting point at only $8.
After a little setup, you'll be able to enjoy your very own Smart Home magic.
