Philips Hue

     Lets find a movie, pop some popcorn, sit back on the couch, set the mood and watch the movie. Sounds like a great Friday night in for most or even a movie night with friends. But lets focus on the one command, "set the mood". Most people just cut the lights off and watch the movie in complete darkness only using the light from the TV to set the mood. When you go to the movie theater, its not 100% darkness in there, there are a few lights in there that help set the mood and help those know where they are going. And that is where the Philips Hue Personal Wireless Lighting system comes in. There is more than movie night lighting with this unit so lets dive in and see what we got. This is the Philips Hue.

     So lets get the cat out of the bag, this is not your normal average everyday lighting unit. This my friends is a $199 wireless lighting unit with personal settings, different mood settings and a variety of colors for your personal needs. Still not convinced, that's ok, this is not for everyone, I was brought into this unit with the quest for my own home personal automation. So far, this is the first step. But on to the Hue lights. So what this is really is a light bulb (3 of them) that you can program ( a slew of different colors) and personalize to your own discretion. When you get your system you get 3 sets of wireless bulbs, a disc shaped wireless hub (or the bridge that the lights connect to) and a network cable. Yes this has to be hard wired to your existing router, but that's ok, just hook it up and put it somewhere out of sight. Once you get everything out of the box, you download the app in either the Google Play store or the App Store on iOS. You can also connect via your computer and that's cool as well just incase you are away from home and you want to control your lights or you want to turn them home while your on vacation or if you are a Windows Phone owner, because there is no native app on Windows Phone...yet (I don't even know if there will be one either). So whatever your preference, there is a way for you to connect to this system.

     Once you go through the very simple setup and then naming your lights so you know which one is which, that is when the magic happens. I will give you an example of how we use our lights. I have a ton of timers set, but they are all at different time intervals. The kids get up in the morning to the "Waking Up" mood setting. This turns on at 5 am Monday through Friday, every week and shuts off at 7:45 am every week as well. When the light cut on, they are set to come on as incandescent lights and they are at about 45% brightness. That way when they get up, its not totally dark in the house and they don't have to search for lights in the house. I have all three lights coming on and they serve there purpose very well. So the afternoon is a little different. The lights are set to come on at 4:50 pm (now because where we are it gets dark around this time and totally darks outside at about 5:15-5:30 pm) and then cut off at 11 pm. Those lights are at a different color white, almost a yellowish color light. So its bright in the house but not to much. The idea is to get a bunch more of these bulbs, only thing is they are $59.99 for each additional bulb. Yeah they are a bit expensive, but if you are building a network and just want a piece of mind, maybe then the cost is not an issue for you. I want about 3 more in the living room and then 1 in each of the kids rooms. When its homework time, they have a preset mood setting called homework and concentrate. Both offer a lighting solution that is very easy on the eyes, a kind of a soft light with a low brightness and reading a book with it flat on the table as kids do, I think its a good lighting solution for them to not have to move the books all the time just to get a good reading angle. It would be cool to set their timers for the times that they do their studies and in room activities.

     The best thing about the Hue is that when you do add more lights, you can add up to 50 light bulbs to one hub (the disc bridge thing) and mix and match with a bunch of different mood settings. Now I don't want you to think of these as glorified light bulbs, because there are a lot more ideas you can come up with when using these light. I have a setting on the app for when we watch movies. Lights are at about 15-20% brightness and if its scary movies, a reddish like tint and for other movies, we use blue. When I play PlayStation in the living room, I use all blue and Xbox is at a bright green. Its actually a cool ambience. The Wii U has only been used once out here in the living room (where I am working at now) since I have had these lights and I used the Wii U's blue color to set mine at their blue color. Now if your wondering how I got to use that sky-bluish color, well here is the thing. When you set up a new mood setting, you set it by picture, either pictures within the app or pictures from your own camera. If you don't have anything on your camera roll that you like, then snap it right then and there. Once you do that, you move the color selector to the color you want it to be within the picture. If not that, then there are basic colors off to the side.

     If your still wondering why you should spend $200 for a set of 3 lights, then these lights may not be for you. They are not very practical, but they can be used that way and in that way very well. You don't always have to use and app to turn off or on the lights, you can flick the switch just like normal on and off and it will still work. Having a diner party, add some light to the party. Having a house party with music and all, add some color to the mix. On Android, there is an app called Hue Pro that adds even more fun to the hue lights like lava lamp and pulse to music. Its real nice, almost better than the real app but it doesn't work as smooth but when it works, it works real well (both actually). If there was anything else to say about these awesome light bulbs other than, you should buy these, I am at a lost for words because when I seen the demo of these, I was had at the first sign of color. If you are interested in these and you wonder where you should buy this at, I got mine from the Apple Store. I seen that Best Buy is now selling them (awesome) and Amazon sells them as well. Overall these lights are worth it to me. There are more lights from Philips that are out there now as well (Friends of Hue and the light strips) and I think I am more interested in the one more than the other. But this again is the first step into my home automation because I love tech a lot and a connected household is the future for me and this family. Next up will probably be some sort of cameras or the Nest thermostat systems/smoke detectors. Then it will be the door lock and so on and so forth. Home automation is here and I find it as the beginning as the next step into the future.

     Well this was the Philips Hue Wireless Lighting System. I didn't talk much about the geo-tag feature were when connected to your phone sense's where you are (well tracks your phones geo location) and when your close to your house or whatnot, your lights can cut on or set it up the way you want. I haven't talked about it because I have not used it yet and honestly probably not. But it is a feature that maybe you can try out and tell me how it works out. Thanks for reading.

Coming Soon: AOC 23" Full 1080P monitor; PS4, Xbox One, Games for next Gen, and thinking of switching to Windows or Android or iOS for full time use.

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Google Nexus 5

Nice Box Presentation (my box opening tool on the side aka Hercules)

 I know it has been awhile for me to post things, but with Christmas shopping out of the way, PS4/Xbox One releases have come and gone and there were some personal issues within life that always like to get at you when you least expect it, I have finally been able to put out my review of my Nexus 5 smartphone by Google. So with out further delay, here is the Google Nexus 5.

 

     So, I cannot stress this enough, this phone feels great and is very light for it being a 5 inch phone. Off of first impressions, this phone is very comfortable and light. Of course this phone is being shipped with Android 4.4 KitKat and right now most Nexus 5 owners have KitKat 4.4.2 (I have it on my Nexus 7 but not Nexus 5 yet). And I don't want to talk to much about 4.4 KitKat, but you can tell Google is on to something here and I like the way it looks on the phone for that overall appeal. Anyway, the Nexus 5 is everything you love about Android phones with not all that extra crap on there that carriers and manufacturers put on there. It felt good opening up the phone and not see AT&T blasted throughout the phone or a very lag-tastic Samsung start-up screen. What I got was pulsating Google logo and setup screen, and then after that(after the set-up) you turn it off then on again and the same thing occurs but right to the phone. The process to go from full off to home screen takes about 10-15 seconds, its beautiful. My Galaxy Note 2 took about 30-35 seconds and my Droid about 25-30 seconds.

     The design of the phone is very nice and comfortable to hold. The back is coated in a nice soft gripping rubber like material and he front is protected by Gorilla Glass 3. The phone doesn't feel to big in the hand, its almost like 4.9" or 5.0" is the sweet spot for phones. if you are coming from and iPhone, you are going to be pleased with the screen and the extra real estate. If you are coming from something else, this will either be right at home for you and hit that sweet spot again or it will just a shade under what you are used to. The camera on the back is a small circle with and LED flash under it, and just for those who love cell phone cameras or what to become the next great photographer with this phone, please look elsewhere. The camera is not bad.....but then again its not good either. I know its a 8 megapixel camera (8 MP), but this camera is just missing the full use of those 8 megapixels somewhere. I can't put my finger on it, but its just missing something. Again, the phone is light, about 4.60 ounces light and I cannot stress that enough. The way the phone is, it just feels so good.

   The display of the phone is NOOICE! (shot out to Key & Peele) Sorry if you are not in the know, it means its a nice screen, about 445 ppi to be exact. It is a 1080 x 1920 inch display that can produce just about 16 million colors on screen. What that mean to you is that the colors pop and the sound that goes with those beautiful colors just don't add up. The speaker grill which is located at the bottom of the screen, is ok and its loud, until you go out into public and realize how crappy your speakers really are. But for the price of a Nexus 5, you can't complain. This is a top of the line phone with specs to match. On board is 4G LTE, 16/32 Gb of storage (no add on), 2 Gb of RAM, 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac (yes AC is on board and if you have it...it is screaming fast) wifi, Qualcomm MSM8974 Snapdragon 800 processor, Quad-core 2.3 GHz Krait 400, Adreno 330, wireless charging (Qi standard) and more. All of that for $349 (16Gb) or $399 (32GB).....oh and the best part, NO CONTRACT!! They have these phones on contract but why would you do that?

   Anyone that knows me knows I hate contracts and think they are the worst things for us as people to buy when there are so many alternatives. 2 years with the same phone and plan? I can't do it. Give me a service that I can pay when I want and have more control over and get the same benefits as others with LTE (or better with unlimited this and that) for less money. Sign me up! I think that is why the Nexus community loves Nexuses so much, high end phones with low end prices and I agree, it just makes sense. The one bad thing I will say about this phone other than the camera is the battery life. The battery life on this phone is not good at all. When I mean not good, I mean maybe a recharge throughout the day.....and that's everyday. The battery already is a non-removable Li-Po 2300 mAh battery, and if you know anything about batteries, you know that is not that good. However, if you are thinking about getting this phone, don't let that scare you off, because depending on what time you start your day and what time you end it, the battery life of the phone may be just good enough for what you do. For what I do, the battery life is just that, good enough. Again, its not a Droid Maxx or an HTC One or an iPhone as far as battery life goes, but it is good enough for me and it may be for you as well.

     There are always plus and minuses when it comes to new phones and even new software/OS'. This phone has both. Its good because it is a top of the line phone without all the gimmicks (looking at you Samsung and look away SMH) and bloatware, its just straight phone and all its simplicity. However with that high praise comes the other factor that sucks, not everything you download or want to download may not be compatible. Example, my Time Warner Cable app (or TWC app) didn't work on my Nexus 5 for about 2 weeks. That's because, TWC had not optimized their app for Android 4.4 and because of that, I was unable to watch TV on my phone for a few weeks. As for other things like games, some of them just don't work at all and will not work like Amazing Alex. Not a big deal to some and not even to me, but there are those out there that play this game and love it but can' play it on this phone (as of yet). This is also one of the big differences between iOS and Android as well. Amazing Alex works on iPhone/iPod and also on iPad/iPad Mini. I know some of you may say who cares, but for some people that is everything. If this doesn't work, what else doesn't work? I haven't found anything else but there are some things on Android  that are like that though.

     All of that other stuff aside, I have had this phone for over a month ( I ordered it the day it was available) and all of the tech talk and things like that aside, this phone is really good. One of my favorite phones of the year, if not top 3. When talking to people, the calls sound good, and dialing people has never been easier. When people call in and they are not in your contact list, Google finds out who it is and puts picture to the number, its really cool. I got a call back from the Best Buy headquarters and the picture that popped up the Best Buy ticket. It was really cool. Other feature of the phone that I like is the almost Google Now feature like on the Motorola Moto X. Key word there was "almost". The Moto X works when the screen is off when you say the phrase "OK Google". The Nexus 5 is just like that but it only works from the home screen. Its a really cool feature and Google Now works like a charm. I hate to hear people say its way better than Siri or Siri is way better. Look people they have two different functions. Just because you talk to the does not mean they do the same thing. Siri is real good at hands off activity. For example, ask Siri to remind you "watch Scandal at 10pm on Thursday". She confirms what you ask and then prompts you to reply. All you have to do is say yes and there it is. One button operation. For those of you who do not have a Nexus 5 but use Google Now, you know it is a few button presses and then confirm. But on a Nexus 5 (from the home screen) same command, "remind me to watch Scandal at 10pm on Thursday" and then it wants you to confirm it, but right there is where you have to hit the remind me at this time button at the bottom to confirm and then it saves. For some that is not bad, but you HAVE to be at the home screen to work that or in the search. With Siri you just hold the home button, phone off or on. The music commands on both are worlds apart, but Android is coming around. When trying to navigate with Google now while talking with music playing, Google now was unresponsive. The best thing however about listening to music on your Nexus 5, is when you look at the beautiful full screen music art on the lock screen.


     What else can I tell you about this phone? I know other writers out there may tell you how something is but only after a few days of messing with something. A good example is a Galaxy Note 2, a Galaxy S4 (my buddy knows lol sorry for your phone bro) or a Nexus 7 2012 edition. Those phones and tablets are awesome for the first few weeks and that is how these reviewers tell it. But most of these guys or some girls, don't use their device longer than the few days that they have it, that would be crazy. I write about these things because I live with these things and use them everyday and know that after a few months (some after the first 30 days) the performance starts to dip a little and then a lot. My Note 2 started to crawl after 2 months of use and for a flagship phone, to me that is unacceptable. I usually don't bash a lot of good tech, but my experience with Samsung products have been very lackluster experiences. But that is neither here nor there and this phone, the Nexus 5 made by Google and LG, is a phone any android user would love for years to come. My final thoughts for this phone after using it non-stop for a little over a month, this phone is a great piece tech goodness. If you are looking for a phone and want to pass on contracts but want a high end phone, go with this one. I use this phone with Straight Talk and pay way less than what my buddy pays for his S4 (in terms of cost of phone, monthly data/minutes, and still have updates and Android goodies before him) and his contract. Trust me I am not bashing him, I hope he would know that, I am just simply telling all you out there that if you want a high end phone, you don't have to pay those outrageous prices and don't have to settle for an "Okay" phone in the process. If I have enlightened you as a reader, then my job is done and I would hope you all got something out of it about the phone or contracts in general. But if you want to know more about the phone or anything else I write/talk about hit me up on:

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Google+Carlos Washington




    

 

My PS3: The Last Days

     This is my last day/time actually taking the time out to comment about my PlayStation 3. As I have moved on form the PS3 and on to the PS4, I can remember a time when I didn't want anything to do with Sony and their PS3. But that was way in the beginning and since then I fell back in love with my PS3. Sony makes some very good first party games like (Infamous) (God of War) (Killzone) (Uncharted) and lately (The Last of Us) and (Beyond Two Souls which didn't do so well but to me the story of the game was unbelievable). Even though there are more games that Sony makes as first party, there is no question that they make some of the best damn games out there and because of that, I went with Sony and their awesome first party of games.

    

     Before I was a PS3 man, I was and Xbox 360'er. I stood outside in 2005 and got my Xbox (the Arcade Edition) with two buddies of mine and we all went home and just didn't look back at the PS2 or the original Xbox. It was all about the new system. When they announced the PS3, I looked at it and kind of laughed at it and said well I will own it one day, but that machine looks terrible. There was also the thing of what the hell is a Blu-Ray disc? Why would anyone change the format of the disc or why would they not adopt (HDD)? (Sorry Hdd players around the world).

    

     Anyway, as time went on around February of 2006, my Xbox died! The first encounter (and not the last) I had with the dreadful red ring of death put me in a state of pure and utter piss-itivity! (I know its not a word but that is a shot out to my old drill sargent!) I replaced it and went on to enjoy my new one. As time went by, PS3 had came out and was announced at a price of $1 Billion dollars!! Well not really, but when it came out, that's what I heard as far as price goes! So because of that, I didn't even give it a shot, at least no until 2009. When the end of 2009 came, around November or December, I went out and picked up a PS3 because it was time to see what Sony had actually been doing and since I loved my PS2, I wondered why in the hell would they make a system so expensive? It must do wonders?! Well when I went to Gamestop and picked up a 60gb backward compatible PS3 (a fat boy).

    

     That was one of the best decisions of my life! I didn't care for how it came on (and still don't) but the interface was cool and changing the backgrounds was awesome. There were even moving parts to it! The problem I had was that all of my friends at the time were on 360 and none of them really wanted to jump ship (as they called it) but I had to because I had become bored with my 360 and it's little nagging "red" problems. But that's neither here nor there. I picked up a little game called Killzone 2 and played it and thought it was okay. I never was a real big online player but I gave killzone 2's online a shot and most of the friends I have on PSN right now, came from that same game (shotout to you guys)! I played Killzone 2 online like everyday! The sounds of the killings and ambient noises left me always wanting more and more. The time I had a kill streak of 8 kills in a row (4 of them came back to back to back to back) set me off into a world of elite status (in my own world that is).

    

     As I started to die down from that game, I picked up God of War one day and again....mind blown! I don't know what they were thinking (Santa Monica Studios) when they made that game but thank goodness you guys were on whatever you were on in that creative studio. God of War was a game that made killing awesome all over again for me. Since I am a fan of Greek Mythology I though it was cool to see the time period get some love (last game I played like that was Battle of Olympus on NES, loved that game). After that game I believe I got a PSP 2000 and then upgraded to a PSP Go. Got some God of War games on the PSP and everywhere I went my PSP went with me.

    

     I played other games and other systems (I had all 3. Wii, 360, and PS3) and enjoyed them with my girlfriend at the time. We alternated a lot between the Wii and PS3. After awhile I got into Uncharted and when I first played that, it reminded me of the first time I played Tomb Raider and it felt good to play. Nathan Drake is a character, and a funny one at that. The story with that game is awesome and the dialouge is what really gets me, the banter back and forth. One day out of the blue, I found out you can swith out hard drives and put a bigger one in. I thought that was awesome and did some research on which ones work and don't work and I took a chance and picked up a 500gb laptop hard drive. Durring that same time, modding was real big and I was hip to j-tag Xbox's and buddy of mine clued me in to what you can really do with a PS3! Tinkering with my system one night, I bricked my system! My 500gb hard drive I just put in....wasted by my tinkering. I was pissed and all kinds of other things. But for some reason I didn't throw the system out.

    

     My fiance can tell you and anyone else who knew about  my modded PS3 (if you guys didn't know, the modded PS3 was the one that was bricked) that thing was awesome. Wait, I forgot to tell you yes some way I unbricked my PS3 and back then that was unheard of. When my screen finally came back on to the debug screen I woke her up at about 4:30 or so in the morning telling and screaming!! I had to see if what I did was real and later that day I went to a buddy of mine who was real nice with making Xbox and Wii's "much better" than what they were (sorry he moded them lol). He had about three or four PS3's that were bricked and all but one came back to life. I then learned about how to mod PS3's and tinker with them and ran Java programs on them and different little utilities. Put different OS on some of them (those that could) and found a great way for meeting PS people. Xbox was so cool for bootlegging things and and it had its moments but the PS3 was capable of SO much more once you really went inside of it. I don't recommend it fat PS3's are the best by far!!

  

     I got out of my modding phase and eneded up selling that particular PS3 to a guy and then I bought two slim ones (the one I have today, the other was stolen) because I wanted one for the living room and one for the bedroom. I switched both hard drives form the 120gb to a 320 and another 500gb. Time went by and more games just kept coming and coming. I lived in the 3 ecco systems of Wii, 360 and PS3, but I would always buy more for my PS3 because that was my system of choice. We all have that system of chooice and there is nothing wrong with that. Xbox had a better online experience and because I didn't do a lot of online gaming (I did but not a lot), that was not the best choice for me. I love Mario and the only place to get that is on Nintendo, so in a sense I buy Nintendo just because of Mario and their first party games. They are always fun. Which brings me to Sony and the PS3. I was into their first party games even though their online service was not as good as Xbox Lives. But When PlayStation Plus dropped, why would you want free game? Who cares if you ever play them or not, they are free and you might find one you really like *cough cough "Hotline Miami" *cough cough.

    

     Anyway, in the final days, which really started in this year in September, I wanted to stop playing PS3 all together and get ready for The PS4 that was coming out in November. The problem was GTA V was coming out and deep down, I really wanted to play it. I caved and bought the game and played GTA V hardcore everyday (even after beating it 6 days later) up until GTA Online came out. After Online came out, I played it maybe once or twice after that, three times at the most. I kind of said I was not going to play anything else, but there I was playing NBA 2K14 on the 1st of October. GTA took a back seat to NBA 2K14, Hotline Miami, and Battlefield 4. It's not like GTA V was not good, because it was great, but I just moved on somehow and I became enamored with looking at how Battlefield and 2K would look differently on next gen systems. (And they do impress a lot) So this writing is dedicated to the era of the PlayStation 3 and the games that lived on it (and the ones that I will not get to play [Batman Origins]) and the ones that still survive today.

    

     Games like Demon's Souls (2009), Metal Gear 4 (2008), The Uncharted Series (2007-2011), Heavy Rain (2010), God of War Series (PS3 versions 2009 & 2013), Gran Turismo 5 (2010), both Batman Arkham Asylum (2009) and Batman Arkham City (2011) (did not say the latest release because did not play it Batman Orgins 2013). Let's not forget Killzone, and Mass Effect, The Last of Us, The Walking Dead and all the rpg's and Portal 2, Ni No Kuni: Wrath of The White Witch (which is so freaking sweet, pick it up if you can), MLB Baseball (any of them, can't go wrong), The Puppeteer, Dragon's Crown, and any other game I missed....I am sorry if your favorite was not mentioned. But do a search for the best PS3 Games and you will find something for sure. I do miss the PS3, but for me (as the type of gamer that I am) it was time to move on to next gen, where I am sure Sony will have more classic first party games in store for us and with over 180 games in development for the next gen PS4, how could I not move on?

 

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Thank You to all those around the world (here is looking at you England) who support my site and people everywhere that read tech/games from my point of view or experience.

 

Coming Soon:
Nexus 5 review: after almost a month with the phone, how does the Nexus 5 and Android KitKat 4.4 stack up, check back here soon.
Sony PlayStation 4 (PS4): its been 7 years since Sony released a console. What did they follow up with and is it worth sitting in your living room for at least another 7 years? Check here soon.
Microsoft Xbox One (X1): Not my first choice for a console.....or is it? Did I convert over to X1 as my console of choice for next generation? Find out soon.
And other content as well.