@heartny no kidding, these are “mood lights.” It’s hard to find programmable LEDs with 1K lumens, e.g. bright enough to read by. I hope they’re going to be more readily available soon. Meh, indeed.
@heartny sure, they aren’t workshop or gallery lights. But if you have stuff worth illuminating with more than 450 lumens then why are you on Meh?
I find that one on white and 100% brightness is just barely bright enough for a 10x10 room. 2 is plenty for the room. I usually keep one at max and one at minimum.
I have one of these. Not perfect but nice to be able to use without a hub. Took a second time around to link to Google Home after registering with the Geeni app, then was able to remove the app and use Google Home by itself. The default soft-white light is the brightest setting, while the rest of the colors are a bit dimmer. One works fine for our small bedroom but may need multiple if trying to give good light coverage to a larger room. Good thing this is a 2-pack.
@pbirgel The default soft-white probably works as a porch light, but colors are dimmer so if they’re always going to be in color, not so well. I don’t know how weather-resistant these are either so if planning to use outside they should have adequate protection from the elements.
As a side-thought colored porch lights could be useful if you needed people to find your place at night (grandma look for the blue lights, like at K-mart lol)
@shahnm I have a lamp plugged in behind a couch and it’s like Tetris with furniture to budge it and put something controllable on the outlet itself so that was my reason. Ymmv of course.
@hchavers I enjoy being able to turn off my nightstand light by voice as it’s hard to reach from the bed. Also if I stay out later than expected and come home go a dark house, I can turn on the lamp without having to fumble across the room. But the reason I got the smart bulbs is for my stairwell. My house is split level, the back yard is at the bottom of some steep stairs (built prior to codes). I am often outdoors till after sunset, or playing games with friends in the downstairs game room, and have to climb the stairs in the dark. Now I just yell up to Alexa to turn on the light. They provide a measure of safety.
I hate to sound like a broken record but you should not install any unvetted smart device on your home network unless you know what you are doing. They can be easily hacked. And once on your network, the hacker can access your other devices or use them for denial of service attacks.
@squishybrain It’s a huge stretch to claim devices like this “can easily be hacked” and that doing so means the hacker will be “on your network”.
There are two known cases of smart lighting being compromised. The first was with Hue lighting, which hopped into the zigbee protocol and allowed control of the lighting. This required physical proximity and did not allow access to the network, just the lighting.
These bulbs don’t use zigbee.
The second was with Lifx bulbs, which did reveal network credentials, but it had to do with how Lifx did peer to peer communication in a mesh. This hack was far from easy. It required physically taking one of the devices apart so the code could be copied from it and reverse engineered.
These bulbs don’t use a mesh network.
Even with your home network credentials, they’d need to be able to compromise your other devices, which should have their own security.
It’s more accurate to say there’s potential threat any time you place an unknown device on your network. We don’t know if it is a problem or not, just that it could be. Claiming that they CAN easily be hacked just isn’t true.
And you could always set up another access point in a different subnet to keep these things away from your home network.
Until I looked it up on Amazon, I thought they only did those two colors. Some pics of colors other than pastel shades of blue and pink would have been nice, especially if you’re not shopping for babies. (I mean shopping for things for babies — not buying babies, you freak.)
The photos make it look like some kind of gender conformity thing for light bulbs, and I ain’t got no time for that.
If you put these on a normal switch, do they turn back on with the last setting when power is reapplied?
It would be nice to set them to red before bedtime, to preserve night vision and avoid the blinding white if I need to get up in the middle of the night.
Network, and voice control is all well and good, but sometimes a good solid switch is all you need.
@AGentleman Mine turn on whatever color and brightness I had them set last. I just tested. Alexa, turn A2 red. It turned on and was red. Alexa, turn A2 off. Alexa, turn A2 on. Behold, it was red. Mine are in table lamps.
I believe that @awk and @narfcake will agree with me that this Saturday bundle (so called) is a fitting end to a literally mediocre week of items that included odd candies and blades, much as I hoped for.
And a shoutout to @barney - purple lights!, right?
@sligett But there was the Fuko-thon. In fact I ordered more from Meh this week than any other week. It was about as exciting as we get around here. On a scale of 1-10…a solid 2!
@sligett Oh sorry when you wrote “mediocre” I thought you meant “mediocre” but now I understand you meant mediocre. Appropriate celebrations will now ensue.
@mediocrebot@narfcake I know…I was like, “Hey, man, I’m just here to buy lightbulbs at 4am” …as I slowly back away ensuring I don’t look directly into Mediocrebot’s robot eyes…
These work well by themselves but if you try to mix in with Hue or TP-Link devices… they don’t work well. I have the bulbs and the switches by Merkury (and the bluetooth fidget spinners, too) from Meh and they are all in our Meh give-away tote.
Seriously, what company is stupid enough to use the word “mercury” anywhere near their light bulb, whether it contains any or not? Ah, that would be ignorant foreigners from China.
@phatmass I figured it out. You gotta get the Geeni app and then also enable the Geeni skill in the Alexa app. These work great!!! Thanks Meh! “Alexa, turn master bedroom purple”.
I got mine today. The instructions seemed familiar, so, instead of installing the Geeni app, I used the Smart Life one I already had install for a different brand cheap Chinese wifi bulb, and it worked.
That way I just told Alexa to discover new devices and she found it. I didn’t need to add another skill.
These are not bright, as previously noted. They are for accent lighting, not seeing.
I bought 6 of these and love them. Works great with Alexa, and the white setting is very similar to what I had in my living room before (3 of them are there). When watching movies I have them go to a color which is perfect atmosphere. Really fun. What a deal, way cheaper than other options right now. I hope these come back, and the higher lumens ones too. Thanks MEH!
Specs
What’s in the Box?
2x Bulbs
Pictures
Lights
Box
One bulb
Two bulbs
Price Comparison
$49.99 at Amazon
Warranty
1 Year Merkury
Estimated Delivery
Monday, Aug 8 - Wednesday, Aug 10
Yeah but do they play music?
Watt meh
Only 450 lumens? Lumen-challenged. Meh.
@heartny no kidding, these are “mood lights.” It’s hard to find programmable LEDs with 1K lumens, e.g. bright enough to read by. I hope they’re going to be more readily available soon. Meh, indeed.
@heartny sure, they aren’t workshop or gallery lights. But if you have stuff worth illuminating with more than 450 lumens then why are you on Meh?
I find that one on white and 100% brightness is just barely bright enough for a 10x10 room. 2 is plenty for the room. I usually keep one at max and one at minimum.
These are gimmicks that belong in Amsterdam.
I never thought I’d want you to bring back the shitty bundles.
@cinoclav
I tried desperately to come up with an appropriate /giphy or /image for “shitty bundles”. No luck.
Fortunately, duckduckgo to the rescue. Behold: shitty bundles…
@shahnm blame!
@dseanadams I’m still waiting for a photo of your dog.
@sammydog01 Where were you?
https://meh.com/forum/topics/meh-face-pillows-1#5abe497e36c0ce005c23e715
@cinoclav Slacking off apparently. Cute pup!
I have one of these. Not perfect but nice to be able to use without a hub. Took a second time around to link to Google Home after registering with the Geeni app, then was able to remove the app and use Google Home by itself. The default soft-white light is the brightest setting, while the rest of the colors are a bit dimmer. One works fine for our small bedroom but may need multiple if trying to give good light coverage to a larger room. Good thing this is a 2-pack.
@AdmiralDave How would they be for porch lights?
@pbirgel The default soft-white probably works as a porch light, but colors are dimmer so if they’re always going to be in color, not so well. I don’t know how weather-resistant these are either so if planning to use outside they should have adequate protection from the elements.
As a side-thought colored porch lights could be useful if you needed people to find your place at night (grandma look for the blue lights, like at K-mart lol)
It’s not two-for-Saturday, dammit!
@narfcake If you’ll look at the available evidence, you’ll find that you are mistaken…
@narfcake If they threw in a box of Peeps it would totally be a bundle.
@sammydog01 How about a bag of candy corn?
I really really want to come up with a reason to want these. But I cannot.
@shahnm Because you really really want to?
/image wishing makes it true
@shahnm I have a lamp plugged in behind a couch and it’s like Tetris with furniture to budge it and put something controllable on the outlet itself so that was my reason. Ymmv of course.
How much Merkury is in these bulbs?
/giphy mercury
@mrkenneth RIP Freddie!
Finally, I can just say “Lights on”. Because we all know how hard it is to walk to the switch.
Was that the argument against TV remotes too?
@hchavers
/giphy clap on clap off the clapper
@hchavers There’s nothing greater than being in a nice toasty bed and telling Alexa to turn on/off the lights.
@cinoclav @hchavers I’ll suggest that there’s perhaps at least one other thing that’s greater in a nice toasty bed…
@shahnm I’ve been in this relationship too long. I’m going with laziness.
@hchavers I enjoy being able to turn off my nightstand light by voice as it’s hard to reach from the bed. Also if I stay out later than expected and come home go a dark house, I can turn on the lamp without having to fumble across the room. But the reason I got the smart bulbs is for my stairwell. My house is split level, the back yard is at the bottom of some steep stairs (built prior to codes). I am often outdoors till after sunset, or playing games with friends in the downstairs game room, and have to climb the stairs in the dark. Now I just yell up to Alexa to turn on the light. They provide a measure of safety.
@cinoclav @hchavers AMEN!
I hate to sound like a broken record but you should not install any unvetted smart device on your home network unless you know what you are doing. They can be easily hacked. And once on your network, the hacker can access your other devices or use them for denial of service attacks.
Signed,
squishybrain
IT person
@squishybrain OH NOES!!! THE RUSSIANS HAVE DIMMED MY LIGHTS AND MADE THEM GOLD AND RED AGAIN!!1!2!2
/image rly Russians?
@stinks I think it’s more like hackers will eventually add it to a bot net and could use it to access your internal network.
@squishybrain Specifically, denial of light service attacks!
@dude. Well played
@squishybrain It’s a huge stretch to claim devices like this “can easily be hacked” and that doing so means the hacker will be “on your network”.
There are two known cases of smart lighting being compromised. The first was with Hue lighting, which hopped into the zigbee protocol and allowed control of the lighting. This required physical proximity and did not allow access to the network, just the lighting.
These bulbs don’t use zigbee.
The second was with Lifx bulbs, which did reveal network credentials, but it had to do with how Lifx did peer to peer communication in a mesh. This hack was far from easy. It required physically taking one of the devices apart so the code could be copied from it and reverse engineered.
These bulbs don’t use a mesh network.
Even with your home network credentials, they’d need to be able to compromise your other devices, which should have their own security.
It’s more accurate to say there’s potential threat any time you place an unknown device on your network. We don’t know if it is a problem or not, just that it could be. Claiming that they CAN easily be hacked just isn’t true.
And you could always set up another access point in a different subnet to keep these things away from your home network.
@squishybrain if they could get these lights to recognize my network, thinking it might be worth it.
@squishybrain @stinks laughs in Cyrillic characters
@craigthom @squishybrain
/image chicken dinner
Until I looked it up on Amazon, I thought they only did those two colors. Some pics of colors other than pastel shades of blue and pink would have been nice, especially if you’re not shopping for babies. (I mean shopping for things for babies — not buying babies, you freak.)
The photos make it look like some kind of gender conformity thing for light bulbs, and I ain’t got no time for that.
If you put these on a normal switch, do they turn back on with the last setting when power is reapplied?
It would be nice to set them to red before bedtime, to preserve night vision and avoid the blinding white if I need to get up in the middle of the night.
Network, and voice control is all well and good, but sometimes a good solid switch is all you need.
@AGentleman Bulb Review says NO
@AGentleman Mine turn on whatever color and brightness I had them set last. I just tested. Alexa, turn A2 red. It turned on and was red. Alexa, turn A2 off. Alexa, turn A2 on. Behold, it was red. Mine are in table lamps.
@AGentleman @OldCatLady He’s talking about removing power from the light, not just turning it off and on.
To test, unplug the lamp for five minutes, then plug it back in and see if it’s still red.
I’m evidently not a big light nerd. What’s the joke with the numbers?
/giphy clap clap clap
I believe that @awk and @narfcake will agree with me that this Saturday bundle (so called) is a fitting end to a literally mediocre week of items that included odd candies and blades, much as I hoped for.
And a shoutout to @barney - purple lights!, right?
@sligett But there was the Fuko-thon. In fact I ordered more from Meh this week than any other week. It was about as exciting as we get around here. On a scale of 1-10…a solid 2!
@awk Um, yeah that’s what I was trying to say. It’s as though April has brought a rebirth to Meh.
/giphy confetti
@sligett I love purple.
@sligett Oh sorry when you wrote “mediocre” I thought you meant “mediocre” but now I understand you meant mediocre. Appropriate celebrations will now ensue.
@awk Ayup. I meant Mediocre™!
Sorry, I respectfully disagree I thought the product has been outstanding for the last Cpl. weeks.
@mellowirishgent Yes! I think my use of the word mediocre has been misunderstood. I meant it as praise.
Okay, Meh, I will buy some more. Twist my arm…
/buy
@bramby2 It worked! Your order number is: crooked-guilty-stitch
/image crooked guilty stitch
@mediocrebot well that just got super political a little too early in the morning
@bramby2 @mediocrebot Who knew bots could be politically sided?
@mediocrebot @narfcake I know…I was like, “Hey, man, I’m just here to buy lightbulbs at 4am” …as I slowly back away ensuring I don’t look directly into Mediocrebot’s robot eyes…
@bramby2 @mediocrebot @narfcake Well clearly Mediocrebot is an asshole…
Color me…MEH! (tribute to the great Roger Lindamood)
These work well by themselves but if you try to mix in with Hue or TP-Link devices… they don’t work well. I have the bulbs and the switches by Merkury (and the bluetooth fidget spinners, too) from Meh and they are all in our Meh give-away tote.
@SoftAsFur What problems have you had using these with devices from other manufacturers?
@craigthom it seems like interferance with the others wifi or maybe these just suck and i would have problems without my other devices anyway
@SoftAsFur So what problems have you had using these with devices from other manufacturers?
Not “what do you think the cause of the problems was?”, but “what were the problems?”
@craigthom not connecting all the time. Have to ‘restart’ the bulbs constantly.
@craigthom wait for the Phillips Hue package that Meh offers every once in awhile
@craigthom @SoftAsFur I’m very happy with my sengled elements bulbs. Lot cheaper than phillips and well reviewed on Amazon, 4-4.5 stars. If I could break myself of the habit of turning things off manually they’d be perfect. These are dimmable 60w equivalent 2700k soft white.
Two bulbs with hub $40
Eight bulbs with hub $130
One bulb, needs hub $10 add-on item
No Windows Phone app? meh.
@Stumpy91 It’s a good excuse as to NOT buying into any of these connected devices.
/buy
@llangley Sorry, the
/buycommand is currently only available to VMP members.I wondered how that worked. Guess I’ll take it as a sign sigh
/image sign sigh
nocturnal-willing-island
Someone just HAD to mention PURPLE.
Sigh.
/image nocturnal willing island
Seriously, what company is stupid enough to use the word “mercury” anywhere near their light bulb, whether it contains any or not? Ah, that would be ignorant foreigners from China.
450 lumens and a company too parsimonious to get HomeKit certified? Terrible, just terrible. Bunch of knuckleheads.
Woot used to have some clever ad writers. Maybe, MEH could hire some of them.
Why the fuck am I thinking of buying these?!
@mfladd Because the kids will have fun changing colors and doing strobe effects and turning a light on from another room, and so will you.
@mfladd The Sphero R2-Q5 would be more fun.
@OldCatLady Ack! You’re not helping!
Ummm… so how do I get these to work with Alexa?
@phatmass I figured it out. You gotta get the Geeni app and then also enable the Geeni skill in the Alexa app. These work great!!! Thanks Meh! “Alexa, turn master bedroom purple”.
I got mine today. The instructions seemed familiar, so, instead of installing the Geeni app, I used the Smart Life one I already had install for a different brand cheap Chinese wifi bulb, and it worked.
That way I just told Alexa to discover new devices and she found it. I didn’t need to add another skill.
These are not bright, as previously noted. They are for accent lighting, not seeing.
@craigthom these delivered yesterday. Not sure why Geeni needs camera, etc permissions to use light bulbs…
@craigthom But then again so does Smart Life. Maybe I can disable after install?
@llangley If it’s Android you can pick and choose what permissions it gets.
I think it needs the camera to scan the UPC codes for new purchases, if you go that route. UPC code scanning is not necessary.
The Tuya Smart application should also work, but it doesn’t work with Google Home.
I bought 6 of these and love them. Works great with Alexa, and the white setting is very similar to what I had in my living room before (3 of them are there). When watching movies I have them go to a color which is perfect atmosphere. Really fun. What a deal, way cheaper than other options right now.
I hope these come back, and the higher lumens ones too. Thanks MEH!