reviewed Govees 10-panel kit, w

2021/05/21

(We reviewed Govees 10-panel kit, which retails for $199.99.) Each hexagon panel has numbered ports matching little triangles on the wires to define the direction of the lights, and you follow each step individually. Join 350,000 subscribers and get a daily digest of news, articles, and more. There are a few negative things to say about the Hexa Pro lights, and my main gripe isn't the product's fault. Youll notice little raised feed on the back of each panel, which helps with installation and ensures theyre all the same distance from the wall for a clean, smooth look. Sorry Movie Theaters, I'm Never Going Back, Fitbit Is Turning on Blood Oxygen Tracking, I Thought Smartwatches Were Dumb, I Was Wrong, Sony's WH-XB910N Are Downright Affordable, The 7 Best Smartwatches and Fitness Trackers, Google Pixel Watch: Everything We Know so Far, Samsung Could Kill the "Classic" Galaxy Watch, Olive Pro Earbuds Are Affordable Hearing Aids, Garmin's Smartwatch Has "Unlimited Battery", Withings Debuts the Most Stylish Smartwatch, Amazon's First Fitness Device is the Halo, The Pixel Smartwatch Could Launch in 2022, Meta Quest Pro: Everything We Know so Far, New Ultrahuman Ring Tracks Metabolic Health, The Govee Home App Has Endless Possibilities, Why Smart Lighting in Your Home Is Worth It, Nanoleaf Launches a Limited Edition Ultra Black Triangle Set, Govee and Razer Will Light Up Your PC Life, The Absolute Weirdest Junk You Can Buy On Amazon, How to Use Your Phone as a White Noise Machine, 2022 LifeSavvy Media. There are no inline controls, aside from an on/off switch, so you dont have to mess with the app all the time. Like the Nanoleaf lights, Govees Glide modular panels can be arranged in different patterns and can shine in millions of different colors, and you can choose from more than a dozen elaborate animations or create your own. A range of automation options is available that let different Govee lights communicate with one another. With Govee, you get much of the same experience with 10 bright and beautiful hexagon panels, all for only $199. Offering a more artistic spin means RGB lighting can be a legitimate part of your room decor instead of just a party gimmick. Animation styles are varied and customizable. And again, compared to Nanoleafs Shapes lines, Govees solution is much thicker (but also less expensive). As you build your design, the app will show you where you canor cantplace more panels; while Nanoleaf lets you connect more panels on any available panel edge, the Govee app only lets you add the next panel to the one you last placed, one after the other. The Govee app comes loaded with 30 preset animations for the Glide panels, ranging from Forest, Ocean, and Sunset Glow to Breathe, Energetic, and Kaleidoscope. A PCWorld contributor since 2014, Ben joined TechHive in 2019, where he covers smart speakers, soundbars, and other smart and home-theater devices. How much you spend depends on whether you opt for the seven-pack or ten-pack. They will stick to practically any surface after the recommended 30-second press, but some panels started to pop loose after a couple of days. Having my whole living rooms Hue bulbs light up with whatever game or movie is on has been life-changing. Apple Music vs. Spotify: Which music streaming service is the best? Sticky pads won't last if the panels are moved. Their app is much better-designed, and their tie-in with the Matter home networking protocol makes them rather future-proof.

Those points can be spent on rewards. Want to decorate your walls with glowing, pulsating light panels? And if you really want to get creative, Govee has a DIY section where users can customize literally every aspect of the light panels or try setups from the community. This results in the light bleeding through and out the sides, which helps fill the room with rich colors. And with the Glide Hexa, those directional options work on music, too. The Govee and Nanoleaf panels may have very different installation procedures, but they are similar in terms of their nearly identical mounting plates, while the (again, nearly identical) pull tape allows you to remove the panels without damaging your wall. The animations range from subtle and soothing to garish and borderline annoying (the app even displays seizure warnings for some of them), but theyre all customizable, and theres a DIY tool that lets you create (but not share, as you can with Nanoleaf panels) your own animations. Everything beyond that is overkill. The real-time sync works great, but the microphone can be overly sensitive at times, even after turning down the sensitivity, and picks up every little noise, instrument, or vocals. Theres a new version on the way that makes the tiles look like cubes. That way, you can change the effects in addition to the colors and styles. Unlike the snap-in links that come with Nanoleaf panels, the Govee linking cables feel somewhat flimsy, and as Ill describe in a moment, they dont actually hold the panels together. The thin, flexible strip that connects Govees light panels together will bend over itself as you move the panels into position. had similar reservations with Govees app, internet-connected microphones bundled with my lights in the past, The best outdoor security cameras for 2022, When is USB-C coming to the iPhone? When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. By submitting your email, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Copyright 2022 IDG Communications, Inc. Works with Alexa, Google Assistant, and Siri shortcuts. That said, I had a much easier time installing the Govee panels than my Nanoleaf Canvas tiles. For example, each hexagon has five ports on the back to send power to the next hex, but you can only hook one up to each previous panel. The biggest functional gap in my book is the lack of HomeKit support. The few tiles that ended up using the included adhesive have little pull tabs sticking out which are a continual eyesore. Luckily, it's not a permanent commitment since the Hexa Pro panels use adhesive pads rather than screws and mounts, so removing them once or twice would be simple enough if it looked askew or off-center. Thanks to an in-line microphone on the power cable, you can pair the panels to a phone or computer or just let it listen to music and match the beat. The Glide Hexa Light Panels are also smart, capable of being scheduled or controlled with Alexa and Google Assistant voice commands. Watch it before you start. While Govee didnt supply a lumen rating for the lights, they can get fairly bright when turned all the way up, especially if you set the color to white.

The Govee Glide Hexa Light Panels are beautiful, easy to install, and offer a wealth of customizable animations. As for software, the Govee Home app (for Android and iOS) has a comprehensive layout tool that helps you every step of the way, gives you layout ideas, then shows which numbered port (between 2 and 5) each ribbon goes in as you place them on the wall. You can change each Hexa panel color individually, add beautiful color gradients, sync them up to music, or select from a wide array of pre-sets in the app to set the ambiance or get any party started. Budget smart home manufacturer Govee specializes in low-cost versionssome might say knock-offsof popular smart lighting products, with mixed results. Beautifully bright and colorful with diffused RGB light. My primary point of reference was a strip of Nanoleaf Canvas tiles I had recently installed in the bedroom. Meanwhile, Govees connectors were not only flexible but also had enough slack to get creative if needed. Apples iOS users deserve to have unified home lighting control across multiple brands just like Google Home and Alexa users enjoy with the Glide Hexa Light Panels. Why trust us? You earn points for commenting on discussion threads and posting on their knock-off version of Instagram baked into the app. The company even added a YouTube instructional video to the setup wizard, saving you some headaches. On the back of every panel, youll find the primary input port for power, plus five additional numbered ports which send the power out to the next Hexa through a ribbon cable. Govee hopes to market this notion with its new Hexa Pro RGBIC light panels, shipped as a pack of 10 hexagon-shaped plates with adhesive tape. He's previously written for GottaBeMobile, SlashGear, AndroidCentral, and InputMag, and he's written over 9,000 articles. We select and review products independently. An in-line microphone allows for real-time syncing with music that looks great. The fire or breathing options inside the app will probably be your favorite, where the lights flicker or breathe with a lively effect. The Govee Glide Hexa Pro LED light panels are available on Amazon and the official Govee website with a $250 MSRP. First off, they include a physical level and alignment bracket to make sure your placement works. This allows for a larger adhesive to be used and for the adhesive tab to be hidden. Still, if there's nothing more than solid primary colors, you could save a lot of cash by buying something simpler. Unfortunately, Govee only enables that function by having a separately-sold camera mounted on top of your display which constantly scans whats on screen. And because there are several LEDs inside each panel, the Govee Glide Hexa gets insanely bright, almost too bright. This is a hotly-contested category, largely dominated by Nanoleaf. Its a cumbersome solution that I wouldnt bother to try.

But Nanoleaf does let you connect more than one power adapter to its panels, so it seems like something Govee could address. We were fans of the Govee Glide, a cheaper clone (as our reviewer put it) of the LIFX Beam, as well as the Govee Lyra Floor Lamp, which bears a strong resemblance to Philips Hues far pricier Signe floor lamp. The app allows you to slide around virtual panels and explains which link cables to use and where. I must stress the importance of the planning process: Don't go sticking these panels to your wall until you're confident with a layout. The official advertisements for the Glide Hexa Pro show various patterns and color combinations as inspiration, some curiously showing more than the 10 panels in the box. When you open the Govee Glide Hexa Light Panels box, youll find a neatly wrapped series of the 0.6 inch-thick Govee panels, each of which measures about 6.25 inches across (for comparisons sake, Nanoleafs Shapes panels are 8 inches across). I like that you can change the direction of the lights and animations. When the time comes, I can just take the tile off the bracket, then pull the adhesive off. Setting timers is easy. Inside the small box, youll get 10 tiles, all the connector ribbon cables, a power adaptor, a control box, extra sticky pads, an alignment tool, and even a level to ensure everything goes smoothly. The user base would undoubtedly increase, and I hope it happens even for my own sake. Thank you for signing up to Windows Central. The Govee smart light ecosystem has been growing steadily over the years, and theyve recently added wall panels to their lineup. Each Govee light panel has a snap-on mounting plate that sticks to the wall using pull tape. If you want, you can use the tiny level to ensure that the first panel is parallel to the floor; I used my iPhones level instead. These new light panels are variations on the existing Govee Glide range, which features triangle shapes and flat hexagons. Govee manages to stand out with more of a unique 3D cube design, but the kit is close enough to a Nanoleaf Hexagon 7-pack 'smarter' pack. One key feature that the Govee Glide Hexa Light Panels lack is any touch functionality. The Glide Hexa Light Panels provide a full range of color at an impressive level of brightness. Cory Gunther has been writing about phones, Android, cars, and technology in general for over a decade. Finally, you cant share your customized light animations with other members of the Govee community, a key benefit of the Nanoleaf panels. However, if you want to make adjustments or change the color, the app is required. The app can suggest some ideas if you're struggling, but I already had my perfect design ready. No complaints here! Govees app is robust and offers the features youd come to expect and then some. Govee pushes users to sign up for their Savvy User program, which gamifies engagement through an entire social channel built into the app. I would be most concerned about continued app support. If so, I could turn these into an NFL logo or something neat. The Govee Glide Hexa Light Panels were a breath of fresh air by comparison. Paper Girls review: time-traveling, girl-power Goonies is good enough, The best movies on Disney+ right now (July 2022). If you prefer the look of the Govee panels to that of the Nanoleaf lights (the competitors do have some key design differences) of if youve already invested in other Govee lights and want to say in the same ecosystem, the Glide Hexa Light Panels make for an eye-catching way of decorating your walls. Will Govee want to keep five-year-old products supported in their app while continuing to pursue the latest mobile operating systems? Adhesive pads make for an easy setup if you have appropriately smooth walls to display them. The treat with the Glide Hexa Light Panels is with their mounting system. The Govee app has a tool that lets you pick a design (left) or create your own (center). Govee could open the API up a little wider and allow animated DIY scenes to be enabled remotely. Govees modular light panels cut a lot of corners compared to Nanoleaf, its obvious inspiration. All in all, the installation process for the Govee Glide Hexa Light Panels was great.

Nanoleafs Hexagon and Triangle line popularized smart light tiles, but its easy to spend a small fortune outfitting your office, game room, streamer setup, or DJ booth. Visit our corporate site (opens in new tab). Govees Glide Hexa Light Panels are essentially bargain-priced Nanoleaf knock-offs, but they chop a lot of features and theyre not that much cheaper. Since the hexagon panels completely obscure the mounting section in the back, it's not as much of an issue to only use sticky pads. Once thats done, a setup wizard will ask that you test each panel by connecting them directly to the Glide Hexa controller one by one. Both sets are so similar that deciding between them will have to be a personal preference if the 3D effect is enough to convince you.