The Hue bulbs are so versatile that you can do just about anything that you can imagine. Indeed, you can create a scene for holidays -- such as red and green for Christmas or orange for Halloween. Yet, the true beauty comes from creating scenes with multiple bulbs with different hues (pardon the pun). The results can be stunning. For example, a scene to mimic the colors of Autumn or a scene to create the mood of a sunset. This is much more interesting than setting all of the lights to just one color. It truly does change the way you think about lighting. I have about 35 Hue lights now!

In addition to the bulbs, there are free-standing floor spotlights which give nice ambient light to walls and also light strips. You can do some very creative things with the light strips. For example, you can mount them under cabinets, under stair rails, inside book cases, under tables, under sofas, etc. I have a light strip surrounding a wall-mounted Beosystem 4500, not visible but adding ambient color on the wall, that looks spectacular.

I believe that the bulbs are expected to last about 5 years. Something that troubles me is that Hue still has not created a means to REPLACE a bulb so that a new bulb can take the place of an old one in all of the settings. I'm hoping that as time approaches the 5-year mark that Hue will see the need for this so that we won't need to reprogram everything. Hue also has not created a way to back-up all of the settings! Many of us on the API forum have been cautioning Hue that this is really needed. In the early days of the new 2.0 bridge, there was a horrible bug that prevented Apple HomeKit from working. Stupid people at Hue customer service were advising people to do a factory reset of the bridge -- which would lose all of the saved settings (and still did not fix the bug!) Fortunately, the bugs have been sorted, but this really showed the need to be able to back up the settings. When you spend the time to carefully create the light scenes, you don't want to lose that. Something to be aware of is that creating a Scene using the Hue app or API actually loads a copy of that configuration on each and every bulb! This is nice because it prevents the popcorn effect and bulbs not responding to the command.

When you start getting the Hue bulbs, you should take the time to take the API tutorial to understand the JSON coding behind how they work. It really is quite easy. With the JSON coding you can really get "under the hood" and get even more control out of the system. This is how I created a great many custom strings for the MLGW.

You can get really imaginative and create IFTTT recipes for just about anything you can imagine. For example, when your favorite sports team wins, the bulbs can start flashing the team colors. When it starts raining, the bulbs can switch to blue to let you know. If there is a fire or an intruder, the bulbs can start flashing red.

Another suggestion for the Hue bulbs is to take a look at the Isamu Noguchi light sculpture paper lamps.These can range anywhere from $100 to over $1000. The results are gorgeous.

I have 3 hue bulbs and 1 Hue bloom - i rate them, had them a few years and they have been faultless

I would like them to have a bayonet fitting rather than the edison screw

I have been looking for the new bridge but its not available anywhere. 

Having more bulbs can actually make your Hue system perform better. The bulbs create a mesh network, relaying the commands to each other, extending and strengthening the network. Also, the more bulbs that you have, the more detailed your colored scene will be, creating pools of color.

@Chris, you certainly didn't offend me. The Beo6 isn't for everyone. Especially if you have just a basic B&O audio/video system. The Beo4 is definitely more intuitive when it can control everything that you need it to control in a basic system. It's when you get into a more elaborate home automation system that the Beo6 really shines. It's rather awkward to press "LIST" " CONTROL" "15" for example on the Beo4. It's also quite hard to remember what you have controlled by all of those CONTROL and LIGHT triggers. However, with the Beo6 you can label  those commands, creating virtual buttons that carry out the command in a single press. Also, you can group and arrange the virtual buttons in ways that make sense to you. You can even create sub-screens. If I didn't have a MLGW/BLGW or BeoSound 5, I would probably prefer the Beo4, too.

A place where some people might overlook installing a Hue bulb is in or near the shower. Replacing the light bulbs that are in or near the shower with a Hue bulb creates a feeling of soothing luxury that you can't imaging living without ever again!

Aussie Michael wrote:

I have 3 hue bulbs and 1 Hue bloom - i rate them, had them a few years and they have been faultless

I would like them to have a bayonet fitting rather than the edison screw

I have been looking for the new bridge but its not available anywhere. 

Hue does have B22 bayonet fittings now.

beojeff wrote:

Having more bulbs can actually make your Hue system perform better. The bulbs create a mesh network, relaying the commands to each other, extending and strengthening the network. Also, the more bulbs that you have, the more detailed your colored scene will be, creating pools of color.

@Chris, you certainly didn't offend me. The Beo6 isn't for everyone. Especially if you have just a basic B&O audio/video system. The Beo4 is definitely more intuitive when it can control everything that you need it to control in a basic system. It's when you get into a more elaborate home automation system that the Beo6 really shines. It's rather awkward to press "LIST" " CONTROL" "15" for example on the Beo4. It's also quite hard to remember what you have controlled by all of those CONTROL and LIGHT triggers. However, with the Beo6 you can label those commands, creating virtual buttons that carry out the command in a single press. Also, you can group and arrange the virtual buttons in ways that make sense to you. You can even create sub-screens. If I didn't have a MLGW/BLGW or BeoSound 5, I would probably prefer the Beo4, too.

beojeff wrote:

A place where some people might overlook installing a Hue bulb is in or near the shower. Replacing the light bulbs that are in or near the shower with a Hue bulb creates a feeling of soothing luxury that you can't imaging living without ever again!