LED Lighting strip controlled by Alexa

kungfuman

I'm looking to put some LED lighting strips in for my new kitchen so I've been looking at what I need to wire them up and preferably looking to control them via Alexa through my Echo Dots.

So I believe I require a standard driver unit that is sized for the the appropriate wattage which is wired to a controller unit and the strips are wired to that.  I've got a few questions to make sure I understand it correctly:

1. I've seen dimmable drivers but I think I only require the standard ones as the strips are controlled via a separate controller unit.  The dimmable drivers are only required when dimming from the light switch?
2. I've searched controller units that are compatible with Alexa and seen a few that use the zigbee protocol, but I think this is strictly for the Echo Plus and not the Dot?
The only controller that I've found that states Alexa compatible is this one:
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        LIGHTEU®, Mi-Light 5 in 1 WiFi LED Strip Controller, Amazon Alexa Voice Control Remote and APP Control, Compatible with Single Color, CCT, RGB, RGBW and RGB CCT Output Mode, DC12-24V, YL5: Amazon.co.uk: Lighting                                                                                                        LIGHTEU®, Mi-Light 5 in 1 WiFi LED Strip Controller, Amazon Alexa Voice Control Remote and APP Control, Compatible with Single Color, CCT, RGB, RGBW and RGB CCT Output Mode, DC12-24V, YL5: Amazon.co.uk: Lighting                                                                                                                                                                                                        www.amazon.co.uk                                                                               
There seems to be mixed reviews whether it actually works with the Alexa app so wondering if there are any other alternatives?

Lesmor

Hi how you doing?
I have my cinema room LED's connected to this
WiFi LED Strip Controller Alexa RGB Tomshine [Energy Class A ]

by Tomshine

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        Loading…                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                www.amazon.co.uk                                                                               
voice controlled by Alexa and a Echo Dot using the Magic Home app

mushii

Plenty of Zigbee LED controllers on Amazon that will work with the Philips Hue app. If it works with HUE, it will work with Google / Alexa. You will want to use a separate, suitably rated (non dimming) PSU to power it.

I use the Dresden Elektronik Zigbee Controllers

Wireless electronic ballast FLS-PP lp with Power PWM interface for RGBW and RGB lights (12/24V LED/LED stripes), ZigBee certified product: Amazon.co.uk: Kitchen & Home

I use these PSUs

JnDeeTM 12V 6A 6 amp 72W AC/DC POWER Supply ADAPTER Transformer ## Great For CCTV, LCD Monitors, TVs and Powering LED Strip ## (12V 6A): Amazon.co.uk: DIY & Tools

They are pretty robust and reliable.

And I use this strip

BTF-LIGHTING 16.4ft 5M 5050 RGBW 4 in 1 RGB White Strip Mixed Color 60LEDs/m IP65 Waterproof in Slicone Coating 300LEDs Ribbon Lamps Multi-Colored LED Tape Lights: Amazon.co.uk: DIY & Tools

Jamie

Funnily enough all 3 of those Amazon listings show a "last purchased" banner when clicked. I've got the exact same setup in my lounge. Great minds think alike @mushii

A couple of comments from my own experience, the Dresden exposes the white channel and the RGB section as separate controllable lights in the Hue app rather then combining them into a single light. Personally for my lounge setup I'd prefer it the other way but in my kitchen I actually use it to my advantage and have separate white over the worktop and colour strips on too of the cabinets colour washing the ceiling, controllable individually using the single controller.

Personally even if you have an echo plus with ZigBee built in I'd still recommend adding a Hue bridge, especially if you might want to add extra lighting later.

Finally if you do end up going down the Hue rabbit hole there's a couple of limitations when using none genuine bulbs or controllers. Firstly only genuine Hue stuff will be exposed to Apple Homekit, I'm not an apple user anyway so Meh.

The second limitation is if you want to use Hue Entertainment to sync lighting to music or video, this again requires genuine Philips Hue to function. Not a problem for a kitchen or most rooms.

kungfuman

Thanks for the replies so far.
So just to confirm, if I get anything that’s zigbee certified then that should work with the hue bridge and thus controllable through Alexa (with my echo dots)?

And one more question, are the rgbw ones going to be less bright in white than say just going for a only white strip?