Lutron Electronics has added its Caséta Wireless system to the growing list of devices that support Amazon Alexa range, which includes the Echo, Dot, Tap, and Fire TV.
The Caséta Wireless system features various connected LED lights that can change color or brightness on demand. The integration of Alexa allows users to change the lights through voice commands, an ideal solution when you cannot find your smartphone.
Amazon has been steadily improving the range of voice commands for the Echo, to the point it can now hear you from a few meters away. So if you want to turn the lights on when you enter your house late at night, there’s a good chance your Echo will hear you from the porch.
Another day, another smart home system looking to break into the market. This time, a team of ex-ASUS engineers have launched a Kickstarter for SmartAll, an AI butler that connects to smart devices.
The hub, which is on sale at Kickstarter, is a small camera with an LED strip around it. It is able to recognize up to five family members and customize a room to their liking — it is also able to spot intruders and create a “panic mode” where the lights and alarms turn on. Users are able to livestream the camera’s POV from a mobile device and save footage. On top of all the camera capabilities, the hub also understands voice commands, like “turn on the television” or “turn up the heating”.
Once all the smart devices are connected to the butler, it will begin learning patterns and start to automatically make decisions after seven days. If you boil the kettle at 8.30am each morning or turn off the lights at 11pm everyday, it will do that task for you.
Lutron and Amazon continue to add to smart home family
Lutron already provides a mobile app, available on iOS, Apple Watch and Android, for turning on and changing the light’s colors. The system also supports other smart home hubs like Works with Nest and Apple’s HomeKit, so this is a completion of the smart home package to make sure all consumers are happy.
These aren’t the first lights to take advantage of Amazon’s Alexa platform, Philips Hue, LIFX and Belkin WeMo are already integrated and offer similar functionality.
Lutron’s Caséta Wireless kit currently retails for under $100, and most wireless lightbulbs launched after 2014 are compatible with the system. You can check Lutron’s compatibility page for more information.
Hundreds of other devices are starting to integrate with Amazon’s platform, as customers start to realise the benefits of the Echo, Dot, and Tap in everyday life. Even platform hubs like the Nest thermostat and SmartThings are integrated with Alexa, taking advantage of the voice commands and APIs Amazon has on offer.
SmartAll supports over 1,000 devices now
It should be noted that while SmartAll supports over 1,000 devices, including Nest’s thermostat, the iRobot Roomba, and a selection of smart home door locks, it hasn’t launched any other smart home devices.
That might be a bit of a strain when it comes to connecting everything up and ensuring that devices work correctly. For one-function items like a door lock or a kettle that might not be too hard, but for a vacuum things like what rooms to clean and how long to clean may be hard to compute.
SmartAll already has an SDK ready for developers to build on the platform. It plans to add health management and emotion recognition to the hub in future updates, giving you food tips and changing songs to fit your current mood.
On Kickstarter, SmartAll is selling its butler for $199, though it has an early bird still available for the first 500, at $149. One year of cloud recording service costs an additional $100 or $299 with the butler.
Popular
Tags
Videos