Solving Problems

There’s never before been a better time to ‘level-up’ your life. With some of the coolest tech we’ve ever seen coming to us through smart devices, now really is the time to start living a fuller, more productive life. Get on it!

Don’t we all? Especially in winter when it’s dark outside of the window and cold outside of the covers.

If you want to wake up gradually, naturally, without the horrendous blast of an alarm, you can have your smart lights mimic the rising of the sun. Very groovy. Philips Hue have a super-cool app that lets you completely revolutionise your morning routine. Your lights will start to slowly come on from whatever time you set. So you can gently stir from your slumber, just like nature intended. If you’re like me though, you need something a little more energetic – you can set your lights to come on immediately, at full whack. The lighting equivalent of someone shouting “get up!”

Having smart heating like Nest means you can sync your boiler to come on whenever you need it to. So, let’s say you need to be out of bed for 6:30am (eugh), you use your app to set the heating to come on at 6am, warming your home to a nice, pleasant temperature. So getting out of your duvet cocoon will become just that little bit easier.

All hail the smart kettle and smart coffee machine. These are beautiful things. Smart coffee machines have wake up modes that kick in to fill your entire house with the divine smell of fresh coffee. If tea is what it takes to get you up and about, then smart kettles can turn on from your bedside too.

There’s nothing worse than watching your pet look up at you longingly as you close the door to get to work. It’s even worse if they peep out of the window to watch you back off the driveway. That stuff stays with you all day! But, never fear – the Nest camera is here. This clever piece of kit can be positioned in your living room, or bedroom, or wherever your pet likes to chill during the day. What’s even better is that you can activate audio and call your pet’s name!

Picture this. You order a new jacket. A snazzy little thing that’s going to be perfect for going out tomorrow night. You get it on next day delivery – and it’s going to arrive at your house between 4 and 6pm. But then a meeting overruns at work, you’re late home, and your new Snazzcoat is sat in a depo somewhere miles away – undeliverable. We’ve all been there right?

The solution? A smart doorbell. These cool little devices have cameras built-in, so you can see exactly who is at your door, from your smartphone! Brands like Ring have an amazing feature that allows two way coms between you and whoever is at the door. “Hello there delivery person, if you’d kindly drop that package over the side gate, I’d be really grateful!” Boom!

Converting cups into grams and or millilitres is a chore at the best of times. So when you’re halfway through your bread recipe, you’re covered in flour, and you realise you need a very specific amount of something – things can get tough. And as a result, so can your loaf. Google Home can make all your dough dreams come true though. Whether its kilograms to pounds or pounds to dollars, it’ll instantly work out any conversion you ask.

The dog needs a walk, there’s a mountain of ironing, I have a huge presentation due Friday, my hair looks terrible, I need to attend parent’s evening, it’s my brother’s birthday this week… sound familiar? Modern life can be totally relentless. You think you’ve got an evening off and then bang! You forgot you’d promised to take your dad for new golf clubs.

Google Home has a cunning plan though. As and when your tasks accumulate, tell Google to add it to your to do list.

You went in for toilet paper, you come out with a new dinner service, a mop, and 24 packets of cheese and onion crisps. Your shopping list, you left at home, along with a pile of bags for life.

We take our phones everywhere, so it’s really handy to have a shopping list that you can guarantee won’t be left behind. The moment you realise you’re low on milk, shout it over to your Google assistant to add it to your shopping list. No more impulse buying for you!

Philips Hue provide some of the coolest technology for indoor lighting, in the world, ever. If you have guests over and fancy having a bit of a boogie, you can connect your light bulbs to the Google Home. Simply call out the colour of your choice, and you have the perfect ambience for a house disco. Groovy.

In more realistic terms, Philips Hue light bulbs can be dimmed too – so you can lower the light if the baby has just gotten to sleep, without leaving the sofa. You can optimise the light for reading too, or create something perfectly serene for your morning yoga.

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