At a glanceExpert`s Rating Pros Petite, unobtrusive hardware Wi-Fi connectivity and interconnected features work well Very affordable Cons Doesn’t detect the presence of carbon monoxide No battery backup on the hub; any power outage means no push notifications We encountered a minor operational problem during testing Our Verdict This three-alarm smoke detection system offers seamless, long-range interconnectivity and Wi-Fi support, giving you extra layers of fire security. Price When Reviewed This value will show the geolocated pricing text for product undefined Best Pricing Today Best Prices Today: X-Sense XS01-M Interconnected Smart Smoke Alarm (model FS31) Retailer Price $109.99 View Deal Price comparison from over 24,000 stores worldwide Product Price Price comparison from Backmarket The trouble with smoke alarms is that one alone usually doesn’t provide enough protection, even in smaller homes. An alarm that goes off in one room might not be heard in the rest of the house, obviating the entire point of the technology. Interconnected smoke alarms offer a solution: If one goes off, they all go off. But the technology either means having dedicated wiring installed or standardizing on a wireless interconnectivity platform and hoping your mesh of alarms are all in range of one another. Specifications The new XS01-M Interconnected Smart Smoke Alarm smoke alarm system (X-Sense model number FS31) gives the wireless interconnect concept an upgrade by putting a base station in the middle of the mesh. That station doesn’t just coordinate the satellite smoke alarms (it should be noted that these alarms will not detect harmful accumulations of carbon monoxide), it also connects to your home Wi-Fi network (2.4GHz only) and relays information to the X-Sense app on your smart phone. The X-Sense FS31 system worked exactly as promised, despite a wealth of interfering walls, floors, doors, electrical wiring, plumbing, and metal electronics between its three satellites. The satellites are modified versions the X-Sense XS01-WT smoke alarm I reviewed in the spring of 2021, bearing the model number XS01-M. They look identical to the standalone XS01-WT, with the only real difference being the addition of an internal 915MHz radio that’s used for inter-alarm communications. Three satellites come with the base station in the box (a 5-station model is also available for $140). A maximum of 24 satellites can be supported on one network, with add-on detectors priced at $30 each ($20 each at Amazon at press time). The unobtrusive hub of the X-Sense XS01-M Interconnected Smart Smoke Alarm system.Christopher Null/Foundry The base station, smaller than you might think at just 3.5 inches square, is powered by a USB-C connection. Note that it doesn’t carry a battery backup, so if the power goes out, your mobile notifications will go dark; consider plugging the hub into an uninterruptible power supply just in case. Each satellite is powered by an included (and replaceable) 3V lithium cell. The preinstalled batteries promise a 5-year operating life, and the alarm itself boasts a 10-year operating life before it must be retired. Installation and setup Setup is a multi-step affair, and the process is not immediately obvious, as the X-Sense app instructs you to scan a QR code on the back of the manual to begin registration. But that didn’t work for me, and eventually I stumbled my way through the app to find a screen for adding the smoke alarms directly, based on their model number. Again, the app doesn’t indicate how to add the base station but attempting to add an alarm prompts you to first onboard the base station by scanning a QR code on its underside. Once the base station has been added to the app, you can proceed to add the alarms, one at a time, by activating their respective batteries and pressing a pairing button on the side of each device. I encountered no trouble with this part of the process. Performance You can add up to 21 additional X-Sense XS01-M smoke alarms to the FS31 system, but be aware these do not detect the presence of harmful levels of carbon monoxxide.Christopher Null/Foundry The X-Sense FS31’s big selling point is of course the alarms’ interconnectivity, so I tested the devices by placing them in the furthest corners of my house, and then using the X-Sense app’s test feature to trigger an alarm that should, in theory, cause all of them to sound off. Sure enough, the system worked exactly as promised, despite a wealth of interfering walls, floors, doors, electrical wiring, plumbing, and metal electronics between the three satellites. X-Sense claims a 500-meter (1,640 feet) maximum range in open air, and though my home is not nearly that large, the system appeared more than capable at blanketing my entire house with coverage. The sirens are very loud and piercing, and three different siren styles are available, so you can customize different alarms with different sounds if desired. The volume of the alarm on the base station can be set, but all siren alarms remain at maximum volume regardless. Each satellite alarm can also be configured to send a variety of different notifications to your phone, including when alarms are triggered or end; when a device is silenced, tested, or malfunctions; low battery notifications; and offline notifications. Push notifications were successfully sent to both my phone and my email inbox. The X-Sense app gives you an at-a-glance look at all your alarms’ status and displays push notifications if the system goes into an alarm state.Christopher Null/Foundry I also tested the alarms with simulated smoke and found they alerted quickly when exposed to the hazard and stopped sounding promptly when the smoke cleared, with push notifications (and an email) being pushed out in seconds. Finally, I also tested the alarms with the base station disconnected. When one alarm was exposed to smoke, each of the other alarms still activated, even without the central hub to coordinate them. The only difference being that push and email notifications were not sent (with the app showing all devices offline). The absence of battery backup on the hub seems like a missed opportunity. The X-Sense app gives you moderate flexibility in how the system works, including the option to silence an alarm by pressing a button on the base station. (With this option off, an alarm can only be silenced by the app or by disconnecting the power plug.) These options are all very straightforward and self-explanatory. I had no trouble with X-Sense’s system until at one point, one of the satellite alarms dropped offline without warning, disconnecting from the network. X-Sense offers no real troubleshooting options for this event—suggesting only that you should just move the alarm closer to the base station—but even when I put them a few feet apart, the alarm stayed offline, despite force-quitting the app and power-cycling both the alarm and the base station. The only fix I was ever able to find was deleting the troubled alarm from the app and re-adding it through the onboarding process. It has remained connected ever since. For the price of a subscription, you can connect the X-Sense system to a third-party professional monitoring service that will dispatch your local fire department should smoke be detected.Christopher Null/Foundry In the U.S., X-Sense offers a subscription service called the Protect+ Premium (that’s the company’s footnote marker at the end of “Protect”, although there’s no footnote on the page I’ve linked to). The service will automatically dispatch first responders if one of its alarms is triggered. The service, administered by the third-party monitoring company Noonlight, takes steps to avoid sending a fire truck based on a false alarm, starting with a written message. If there’s no response within 20 seconds, a phone call is initiated. If there’s no answer to that call within 60 seconds, a fire truck is dispatched. Protect+ Premium costs $5/month or $50/year. There’s also a $3/month, $30/year Protect+ Basic plan, which requires you to request a fire-engine dispatch by pressing a button in the app when one of the smoke alarms sounds off. Neither plan is something I’d invest in, but you might feel otherwise. Should you buy an X-Sense XS01-M Interconnected Smart Smoke Alarm Despite the lone operational hiccup, the X-Sense FS31 system worked well in my testing, the various hardware components are petite and unobtrusive, and the price—on sale at Amazon for just $70 as of this writing—is wholly reasonable. You’ll need some other means of warning residents of the presence of carbon monoxide in your home, but this interconnected smoke alarm system is a strong fire-safety tool. Read...

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At a glanceExpert`s Rating Pros I’ve never seen a lamp that can provide more types of lighting on a single device Easy setup and installation Massive number of preloaded scenes Cons Ripple effect can be polarizing Overall hardware design feels a bit dated Not cheap Our Verdict The Govee Uplighter Floor Lamp is nothing if not an acquired taste. The rippling uplight effect won’t be for everyone, but it can be dazzling in the right environment. Price When Reviewed This value will show the geolocated pricing text for product undefined Best Pricing Today Best Prices Today: Check today’s prices Do-it-all smart home outfit Govee seemingly will not rest until every square inch of your home has light cast upon it. Its latest floor lamp/torchiere joins at least four previous freestanding lamp designs, along with two new floor lamps being launched alongside this one, the Uplighter. The name tells the story in part: In addition to providing task-based downlight illumination, the Uplighter is particularly designed with upward-firing accent illumination in mind, along with a third, side-lighting mode. Featuring lights designed with “enhanced RGBWWIC” LEDs (the acronym indicates there are discrete elements for producing red, green, blue, white, and warm white light), which Govee says “seamlessly blends dynamic color effects with practical white lighting,” the three lighting zones work like this: Downlighting: 1,000 lumens from warm-white LEDs to provide tunable, white-light-only illumination for use as traditional, downward-firing task lighting. Uplighting: This is really the main event. About 300 lumens of RGBWW lights fire upwards, painting the ceiling with a ripple effect (which I’ll elaborate upon in a moment). Sidelighting: Finally, a ring of RGBIC LEDs add a purely decorative accent element that can be used to complement either the down- or uplighting feature. There’s no luminosity spec provided, but this section isn’t bright. The Govee Uplighter Floor Lamp can deliver up to 1,000 lumens of downlighting with its dimmable warm-white LEDs.Christopher Null/Foundry All of these lighting components are contained in a single head unit, which is attached to the top of a metal pole that’s a little more than five feet long. The pole comes pre-wired, in pieces which are simply screwed together, sans tools. With the base and head unit, the system comprises a total of six pieces that must be connected, not including the standard A/C adapter. Things get wild with the Govee Uplighter’s upward-firing light; its task lighting function is largely traditional. Note that the head of the lamp can be tilted up to 30 degrees in any direction, which is useful for directing task lighting or, perhaps, for aiming the uplighting element, if you have a sloped ceiling. (Note, however, that it is difficult to make sure the head unit is level, as the ball-and-socket joint has no system for determining when it’s level with the floor.) Using the Govee Uplighter Floor Lamp A pair of buttons on the uppermost segment of the pole can be used to manually power the lamp on and off and cycle through lighting modes on both the up- and downlighting sections. A long-press on the scene button also switches uplighting on and downlighting off, and vice versa on the following press. The various presets for the scene button can be customized by the user. The Govee Uplighter sits atop a nearly 5-foot pole, which is prewired but you’ll need to make the final assembly.Christopher Null/Foundry As with all things Govee, the lamp is designed to work with the Govee app and sets up over 2.4GHz Wi-Fi. The app auto-discovered the lamp once I powered it on, and a single press of a button on the hardware was all it took to complete the connection to my network. As a task light, the lamp is solid, offering illumination that was more than bright enough for me to work under at full strength. (Even at about 20 percent brightness, I was still easily able to read by its light.) Color temperatures supported a range from 2700K to 6500K, providing more than enough variety for whatever mood you’re trying to set. While the task lighting function is largely traditional, the upward-firing light is where things get wild. First, it’s important to note the upper light is exclusively designed to showcase a “ripple effect” that looks exactly how it sounds. Wavy bands of color shimmer and dance on the ceiling, waving back and forth either in monochrome or with multiple colors, keeping with one color scheme or cycling through multiples. The Govee Uplighter Floor Lamp can project beautiful patterns onto your ceiling, but the effect becomes less pronounced the higher your ceiling.Christopher Null/Foundry It’s a bit like the effect of a swimming pool reflecting onto the ceiling at night; but not quite, especially since the ripple effect eventually stops and reverses, which is a little jarring if you happen to catch it happening live. It turns out the effect is largely mechanical, and you can see the bulb under the rippled glass physically rotating if you watch closely. A music mode that changes the lighting in time with ambient sound is also included and can use either the lamp’s microphone or your phone’s for its source, but the ripple effect remains. Lighting effects As is always the case with Govee, the user is given a seemingly infinite number of preloaded scenes to play with, whether you want your ceiling to look like it’s bathed in white moonlight, red flames, or chaotic graffiti (found under the “Funny” scene selections). Everything is displayed with that shimmering ripple effect. Of course, you can always DIY a scene of your own if nothing on the menu works for you, use Govee’s AI mode to ask for a bespoke scene, or check out the “Share Space” feature, where other Govee users can upload their own illuminated art. The sidelighting system includes another 8 segments of LEDs that you can play with to complement either the uplighting or downlighting modes—either as accent or contrast—and many of the built-in modes have preloaded settings to control the sidelighting as well. You can also control this lighting directly, even going to far as to address each of the 8 LED segments individually with their own color. You’ll find a dizzying array of lighting effects in patterns in Govee’s app. Christopher Null/Foundry What can’t you do with the Uplighter? The big limitation is that you can’t run both uplighting and downlighting simultaneously. While the sidelighting system can operate with either, Govee’s position is that task lighting and mood lighting are mutually exclusive. And to reiterate, there’s no color downlighting on the device, because Govee also seems to say that when you’re supposed to be working, you can’t be having fun. The height of your ceiling matters when it comes to the ripple effect. Beneath a low, 7-foot ceiling, the ripple is bright, commanding a tight area about 4 feet across. But cast on a 12-foot ceiling, the ripple spreads across about 12 feet of space, with its brightness significantly diminished. You won’t readily be able to alter this, of course, beyond adjusting the placement and brightness of the lamp. Power consumption The Govee Uplighter Floor Lamp offers a decidedly modern aesthetic.Christopher Null/Foundry Govee breaks down the power draw of the lamp by section: The downlight draws up to 9 watts, the sidelight 3.8 watts, and the uplight 17.8 watts, all of which seem reasonable. Support for Matter, Alexa, and Google Assistant are all also included – though as is common with complex lighting products like this, third-party ecosystems will greatly limit how much you can do with the device. That said, I had no trouble getting the Uplighter set up in each of them. This review is part of TechHive’s in-depth coverage of the best smart lighting. Should you buy the Govee Uplighter Floor Lamp? For $180, the Govee Uplighter might well be the most expensive torchiere in your home; it will likely also be your biggest conversation piece. The purchase decision, however, will almost exclusively come down to your thoughts about the ripple effect on your ceiling. 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