On Sun, 3 Mar 2019 08:38:27 +1100, "Rod Speed"
wrote:

wrote
Rod Speed wrote
wrote

and most of my lights are on dimmers,

All the Hues have dimming built in.

just for that reason.

Why just for dirty yellow ?

Exactly. That is the problem with dimmable LED and CFL.
the intensity changes but not the color, although by popular
demand I understand they now have color shifting LEDs.

The Hue ambiance white bulbs give you full
control over the color temp and the intensity.
So do the color bulbs and the led strips.

I agree for task lighting bright white may work better.
I have hot white LEDs over my work benches.

I select cool white.

I have "natural light" tubes in the kitchen light tho.

I used to use fluorescents on the kitchen but now have Hue led strips
over the benches and a number of Hue color bulbs set to cool white.

I am one of those people who think too much
light at night screws up your circadian rhythm.

I don't get that effect. But I keep pretty weird hours,
normally go to bed by 9pm and its unusual to get
up later than 5am.

In the summer, very hot here, not unusual to have 10
days in a row over 100F, I have a light on when eating
dinner in the evening but turn it off after eating and usually
just have the two computer screens on in the evening.

I don't have any physical switches at all anymore,
use the Hue motion sensors to turn the lights on
automatically for all rooms and use siri to turn
them all off when going to sleep. I have to use
siri to turn do not disturb on because of the
unusual hours I sleep so no big deal to turn the
lights off too.

Most people say I live in a dark house.

Yeah, I mostly operate like that myself. I used to think
that I did that in summer because the 150W PAR38s
do get pretty hot but find I still prefer to turn the
room lights off after eating even now with the Hues.

I don't in winter tho.

The Hue system isnt cheap but very powerful and flexible.

I just have motion/occupancy sensors everywhere, inside and out.

Yeah, same as me. but the hue external ones are only
just coming out now, so have yet to be added here.
Much better than dedicated motion/occupancy
sensors on particular lights because you can have
the sensor control any or groups of your hue bulbs
and the various scenes too and have the by time
of day etc so you can have it say do the pattern
you prefer for watching TV etc when that sensor
sees you watching TV etc.

Except for the one light that lights the kitchen, dining
area and living room, the rest are pretty much only on
when you are walking around.

The hue system allows full control over the time the
light is on for so its easy to have it all completely auto
even when cooking something that needs a few
personal interventions during the cooking phases
with a return to the main room after having say
turned the thing being cooked in the digital air fryer
that I use for most meals except steaks, roast leg of
lamb and curries etc.

After my wife goes to bed I turn off the kitchen light and only
have the TV and the motion light. I am up late most of the time.
It is about 12 feet of rope light near the ceiling in series with a low
wattage incandescent bulb. Just enough to see where you are going.

With the hues you can do that entirely by programming
and have it smart enough so that if you get up for a ****
in the night it runs the lights between the bedroom and
dunny at that very low light level so you don't get dazzled.

Its even trivial to turn that off just for half an hour etc
so you can walk around the house with no lights on
at all so you can check on whats happening outside
when you hear something untoward. My house faces
onto a park/walkway with 5 massive great 8'x8' patio
doors facing onto the park with no fence at all so the
park feels like its part of my yard. All the bedrooms
have at least one of those patio doors instead of
windows. The only conventional windows are in the
bathrooms and dunnys and above the kitchen sinks.

I put that in 35 years ago when I found out the
girls were using the fridge for a night light.

Yeah, night lights are very handy at night and
trivial to have the hue system do every light
you have that is in the area you walk about in
do that completely auto by movement sensor.

And trivial to automate any pattern you like
lights wise for when you are away from home
and want to make the place look occupied.
With full remote control from anywhere in
the world if your alarm system or surveillance
cameras tell you that something is going on
and you want to light up the house and tell
the burglars that the cops are on their way.

I doubt I am changing anything here. If it works I am not screwing
with it and my lighting is such a small part my electric bill I would
never get the money back.
Maybe if I was building a house or in a major remodel I might think
about something like that tho.,