Gadgets

Approximate Transcript:

Speaker 1: This video is about the TP link light bulb, WiFi light bulb. I like the Smart Plug a little bit better, I feel like it has better range and is a bit more reliable. These two circles right here are actually light bulbs and the red boxes are the smart plugs and here is my router.
This right here, Alexa, turn off David’s desk lamp. It doesn’t work very reliably despite there being a range extender right there. It might also be my router. I think I might need to replace it, it’s a little bit spotty.
Let’s go ahead and try this one over here. Hello Claire. Alexa, turn off Claire’s lamp.
Speaker 2: Sorry, Claire’s lamp is not responding.
Speaker 1: The light bulbs, I just don’t feel like the range works, this lamp doesn’t work that often. I only got two of the light bulbs. I would recommend the plug over the light bulb. The nice thing about the light bulb is you can, when it is working, you can dim it in the app. You can dim it all the way down to 5% and that is a nice feature but overall it’s more important for them to be reliable. If you have a really strong signal then maybe you won’t have those issues. It might be worth giving it a shot but I tend to like the smart plug a little bit better.
Speaker 2: Thanks for watching and please like this video.

I was very excited to see my Roku Ultra 4k come in the mail on free one-day shipping with Amazon! Enjoy:

Approximate Transcript:

David Hood: This is David Hood at Heatastic and this is my unboxing of the Roku Ultra. We actually got it from Amazon in one day. We order and got it on the same day. We’re comparing it to the Amazon Fire which we recently got, so I’m very curious. We have an older Roku, the Roku Two that … Had it for four years. I think it’s about time an upgrade. You okay Benjamin?
Benjamin: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
David Hood: Okay. Let’s see, there’s not a lot of stuff in here. Let’s see what’s underneath here.
Benjamin: [Aquanauts 00:00:35]. Do [inaudible 00:00:37]
David Hood: It comes with a much upgraded remote. I’m actually glad they didn’t make it to small. I like how it fills up the hand.
Benjamin: [Aquanauts 00:00:45] to the …
David Hood: Yeah. That’s my son adding his color to the video. There’s not a lot in here. Let’s check out this little manual in here. It’s pretty light. It looks nice. Advertisements. Probably don’t need that. We might not even need the quick set up guides. Here we go. Oh very nice. Only pictures just in case I can’t read which you know I never really learned. Okay thanks for watching. Like this video. Bye.

Being able to control my lights with my Amazon Alexa is super geek-sweet. Being able to control my lights with my smartphone is secondary and I almost never use it that way.

What is my setup? How well does it work? What are my concerns? Watch the following video to learn more:

Approximate Transcription:

Speaker 1:                           Alright, this video is about the TP Link HS100 Smart Plug. What I’ve started off with here is drawing a picture of my house. As you can tell, I’m a great artist. Right here, this is my router. Each box is actually a Smart Plug, each red box. Actually, these circles are the Smart Light Bulbs and this X is a range extender, and I’m actually standing right there. What I’m going to do is, I’m going to turn off this light. That’s actually the overhead light. Alexa, turn off master bedroom. Alexa, turn off master bedroom. So we got this one …

Echo device:                       That command doesn’t work on that device.

Speaker 1:                           Whoa. That’s the first time I’ve ever heard that. There’s three lamps. One, two, that lamp actually is not working very well, and three. Let’s try this again. Alexa, turn off master bedroom. There’s actually Alexa groups that you can do to … I’m not sure why it’s not working right now. Alexa, turn off David’s lamp. That should be this lamp right here. Well, of course as soon as you try this it doesn’t work. Let’s walk over here to the Echo. Alexa, turn off master bedroom.

                                                So, here’s part of the problem.

Echo device:                       That command doesn’t work on that device.

Speaker 1:                           That is really weird. I’ve never heard that before. Part of the problem, and we don’t have a big house … Let me turn this back on. We don’t have a big house and that’s why I got the range extender over here because this lamp really has had problems with connecting, and even the Echo is right here. I’ve got another, the main Amazon Echo … This one’s a dot and then I got the main Amazon Echo right here. They have trouble, all three of these have had trouble connecting at different times. This is actually the TP Link Range Extender and it has mixed results, but it also might be I think my router is not so great. They have trouble connecting, but it’s nice because I can actually do bedrooms. All five of these are set up as bedrooms so I can say, “Alexa, turn off bedrooms.” There we go. Turned that one off. This one is also the light bulb and it seems to have a little bit more trouble connecting than the Smart Plug.

                                                Let me go ahead and show you what … Alexa, turn on David’s lamp. This is actually the Smart Plug down here. This device right here. It’s actually very easy and quick to set up. I really, really like it a lot and it’s really convenient for when all the lights are off and you’re walking in the bedroom at night and I just want to turn on the lamps, I just say it and it’s great. Or when I’m laying in bed and I want to turn off the lamp, I just say it and that’s always nice and convenient.

                                                It is frustrating that it seems like these three, one, two, three, have trouble working. This is a lamp that it’s pretty close to here and it works really reliably. This one right next to the router always works. Always, always works. Also, it’s really nice with Amazon to be able to say, “All.”. Actually, there’s a group that’s all, so I can turn on all or turn off all. Actually, I reset some of these and so it’s not working right now.

                                                Let’s do this again. Alexa, turn off bedrooms. Okay, so that worked but again this one’s not working. This one actually isn’t working separately. I can’t even turn it on manually. The good news is that if you have trouble connecting a normal lamp you should be able to turn it on. I think the light bulbs out so I need to change that.

                                                Overall, despite it being not perfect, it is very cool and it works a lot of the time. It’s actually working less now than it usually does, so I’m pretty happy. I’m going to shoot a separate video about the light bulbs and my opinions on those. I’m really happy with the HS100 and I feel like if I had a better router and maybe if I set up the range extender a little better that probably if I had a better router or even a smaller house, which my house is 1850 square feet so it’s not really big, then it would work better. Maybe if I had a second router or again a better range extender they would be more reliable because this one right here, it works 100% of the time. This one right here works 99% of the time. The Smart Plug definitely works better than the light bulbs.

                Thanks for watching. Please like this video. Bye.