[Amazon.ca] Warm: Philips Hue Play HDMI Sync Box (All time low) $288.21

I have this along with the hue gradient lightstrip mounted to my LG CX. It's pretty neat IMO, some content is very cool. I'm heavy into the hue ecosystem though with two hubs running basically max capacity.

As much as I want this the absolute max I'd be willing to pay is like half this ATL and that's if it supported HDMI 2.1.

Not shipped/sold by Amazon so I’ll pass.

Wow I got nauseous just watching the demo for this thing



I know that technically what it's doing is impressive (decoding HDMI stream, sampling pixels, controlling light), but does it actually enhance the watching experience? Maybe there's a reason TV manufacturers haven't included this kind of backlighting in their TVs? (I think samsung did in a few models but I think they stopped) I think if I had the option I would turn it on just to try it but mostly prefer to have it off


Edit: looks like Phillips had this in their TVs starting in 2002 but got discontinued around 2008:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bias_lighting
https://www.avsforum.com/threads/what-h ... s.1058436/

Neo_ZX wrote: ↑ As much as I want this the absolute max I'd be willing to pay is like half this ATL and that's if it supported HDMI 2.1.

I know eh!?! I want one so bad but there’s no way in hell I’d pay this much for an HDMI splitter. Ive had this sucker added to cart for over an hour, but now I’ve got a couple of errands to run. Lol.

This thing should’ve dropped significantly in price by now but the fact that it hasn’t yet shows that a reasonable number of customers are biting.

Truth be told the only time I bought a Hue product at full price was my first kit. After that it has always been on clearance from places like Home Depot/Walmart. They’re definitely outrageously priced otherwise.

SomeGuyNamedBob wrote: ↑Wow I got nauseous just watching the demo for this thing

I know that technically what it's doing is impressive (decoding HDMI stream, sampling pixels, controlling light), but does it actually enhance the watching experience? Maybe there's a reason TV manufacturers haven't included this kind of backlighting in their TVs? (I think samsung did in a few models but I think they stopped) I think if I had the option I would turn it on just to try it but mostly prefer to have it off

Some content is definitely better than most. Tetris connected on Xbox series X is pretty cool along with some other games that I've tested (I've only been using it for a week). Movie scenes with lots of fire and explosions look really cool too, also underwater scenes where depth and shade of blue/green vary.

It's a party gimmick that you will use exactly ONCE

SomeGuyNamedBob wrote: ↑ Wow I got nauseous just watching the demo for this thing



I know that technically what it's doing is impressive (decoding HDMI stream, sampling pixels, controlling light), but does it actually enhance the watching experience? Maybe there's a reason TV manufacturers haven't included this kind of backlighting in their TVs? (I think samsung did in a few models but I think they stopped) I think if I had the option I would turn it on just to try it but mostly prefer to have it off

I think it is Philips who has/had it patented and we have one of those tv's in my parents house in the Netherlands. It is actually quite nice and enhances the experience imo. Idk, best way to describe it would be when you are watching a sport like football (soccer) and it feels more like you are in the stadium with the colors on the wall.

one of the reviews:


A really expensive, short lived, eventually annoying toy to impress guests
Reviewed in Canada on July 8, 2020
Verified Purchase
When i first saw this demo’ed i was blown away and thought it was so cool. When i could buy it, i jumped right on it.
But then.... You find out only certain Hue Color lights can work with it — not all of them. You find out it still to this day — even with the so-called updates — has trouble with the black 16:9 bars at the top and bottom of movies unless they’re formatted a very specific way — this makes the “top” and “Bottom” lights unreliable and usually off. Then you find out that when the Hue Sync Box is active, your other “room lights” in that Specific room group dont react to the Hue being On and Syncing.,. So for example, if you are syncing 5 of your 10 lights in that room group, only 5 will do what you want them to; like turn on and display the color and brightness you want. So every time i pause a movie, half my room is dark because those Synv’d lights wont do what the rest of the group is being told to do. Open the app (Yes yet another separate app for this ughh) and turn off. Then lights work as they should.

But after all that.. and after you have it all looking cool and awesome.. a few weeks later you regret this insanely expensive purchase. The Sync box doesn’t have the ability to adapt to faster or slower moving scene in a movie. You can only set one setting in the app and it stays on that. So a movie with some intense action scenes you’d want the light setting to update quickly, and slowly dialing scenes you’d want them to blend more slowly.. nope. It’s one or the other; which got too annoying to eventually use for daily use. Now, if it adapted to the speed and color changes on the screen, then that would be awesome.

I rarely turn this on anymore. Ill keep it, but I’m not adding to it.

AlexJosh wrote: ↑ It's a party gimmick that you will use exactly ONCE

Yup, but it will be so cool that one time.

I’ll wait for the $100 clearance

For those of you who aren't afraid to get your hands dirty and have a spare raspberry Pi, give Hyperion open source bias lighting controller a shot.

It's a fraction of the cost of this. Another huge advantage it has over the Phillips solution is that it supports individual addressable led strips instead of just solid colors of the hue.

Here is a video tutorial on how to setup.

discoblues wrote: ↑ For those of you who aren't afraid to get your hands dirty and have a spare raspberry Pi, give Hyperion open source bias lighting controller a shot.

It's a fraction of the cost of this. Another huge advantage it has over the Phillips solution is that it supports individual addressable led strips instead of just solid colors of the hue.

Here is a video tutorial on how to setup.

Is this able to match the speed (or lack thereof) of any action on the screen? How does it do with black bars below/above the film?

Yeah, this is just absurdly priced.

One of my buddies got a Govee(?) which is basically the same setup but instead of using an HDMI splitter, it bypasses all of that by mounting a tiny camera above your tv that monitors what colours are being displayed on it. And it costs something like half this price.

My first thought about it's camera setup was: "inelegant", but the more I thought about how much a pita HDMI versioning and copy protection and splitting was, the more elegant the analog loophole seemed.

End of the day though, this still seems like something of a gimmick. I love my hue lights, and do think that the light quality you get out of then is generally worth the cost of admission over something like tradfris, but I can't see how the tv could possibly be worth it. In all honesty if you're thinking of this, consider just giving that money to charity instead.

Penguin Warlord wrote: ↑ Yeah, this is just absurdly priced.

One of my buddies got a Govee(?) which is basically the same setup but instead of using an HDMI splitter, it bypasses all of that by mounting a tiny camera above your tv that monitors what colours are being displayed on it. And it costs something like half this price.

My first thought about it's camera setup was: "inelegant", but the more I thought about how much a pita HDMI versioning and copy protection and splitting was, the more elegant the analog loophole seemed.

End of the day though, this still seems like something of a gimmick. I love my hue lights, and do think that the light quality you get out of then is generally worth the cost of admission over something like tradfris, but I can't see how the tv could possibly be worth it. In all honesty if you're thinking of this, consider just giving that money to charity instead.

I did see the govee thing and I hate it! Looks like you have a speculum hanging from top of your TV. I’d rather NOT have bias lighting.

Yes the more I read the comments here the more the word gimmick echoes. I’ll pass unless I can get one for like under $100. Lol

It does seem pretty silly/gimmicky but let's be honest, so is most of this coloured light stuff we're doing, it'll probably be laughed at in 20 yrs. I admit I think it's kinda neat at times but I also believe that future generations will see most of our coloured lights obsessions the way we see tacky 70s stuff. I have been thinking of trying the Raspberry Pi thing ha , mostly just to see it work.

Gimmick? Sure! But it’ll make those Apple TV screensavers that much cooler!!!

I found something similar while researching a DIY solution. RGBTwist.com hasn’t arrived yet but it wasn’t too much so hoping it works