ÍøÆغÚÁÏ
Customer Review
- Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 24 February 2019I would definitely class myself as not a morning person and historically I used to really struggle to wake up in the mornings because I would keep spamming the snooze button on my alarm and often oversleep. This in turn would then lead to a state of panic trying to rush to get up and get ready which was never a good start to the day! Thankfully, that was a long time ago now and I've been using daylight wake up alarms for several years which have made a massive difference.
Up until now I'd been using a Lumie Starter 30 sunrise alarm which to be fair has been pretty good and not really let me down. My main gripe with that particular sunrise alarm was the alarm sound itself was quite a loud and aggressive beeping noise which defeated the object of being gradually woken up by the light! Also, this alarm had a filament light bulb inside it which meant the lamp got very hot after it had been on for a while.
I'd been looking around at replacement wake up lamps for a while and noticed the Philips Wake-Up Light Alarm Clocks. I added it to my wish list a few months back but at the time I felt they were quite expensive and didn't know if it would be a worthwhile upgrade over what I already had.
Recently the Philips Wake-up Light Alarm Clock model HF3531/01 (7 Natural Sounds & Radio Function version) popped up on ÍøÆغÚÁÏ's daily deals page considerably cheaper than normal and I simply couldn't resist and ended up purchasing one.
After unpacking the alarm clock it immediately looked and felt leagues above the Lumie Starter 30 than it was due to replace. Just the overall weight and finish of the product appeared to have a much better build quality than the Lumie. Philips generally make good quality products and this seems no different in that regard.
Plugging in and setting up the time and alarm was really straightforward and the instructions are easy to follow. The alarm has a lot of buttons on it (4 touch sensitive on the front, 1 touch sensitive button on the top section and 9 depressable buttons around the top/outside edge) so it is highly advisable to read the manual to understand what they all do. I generally like to figure things out myself and avoid reading manuals if I can but even I had to revert back to the manual after setting up the time on this one!
This alarm has 7 natural sounds varying from birds chirping to relaxing melodies.. there's even one with a cow mooing in the background! With very little effort I was able to find a video on YouTube with someone demonstrating the different sounds this alarm clock makes - I would highly recommend checking that out if you are considering purchasing one. I guess a lot of these sounds may not be to some people's tastes and because they are also very subtle I suspect that really heavy sleeper's may not get woken up by them.
There is a built FM radio on this particular model. I don't use that to wake up to but have used it a couple of times just to listen to the radio in the evening etc. It's only an FM radio though and for the price point it would have been really nice to have DAB radio on it as well.
It has a USB charging port on the back which is useful for charging devices such as mobile phones. I don't leave devices charging overnight myself but the option is there with this clock. It's only a USB charging port though and cannot be used to stream music from your device etc.
If I have one criticism with this device it's the buttons around the outside edge and top. Whilst it's nice to have lots of buttons to do various things it really ends up being a negative on this device, mainly due to poor placement than anything else. When the alarm goes off in the morning I want to be able to simply turn it off and get up. The problem with this alarm is that there are so many buttons and only one of them seems to properly turn the alarm off. If you touch the top of the alarm clock whilst trying to find the right button it ends up snoozing the alarm for 9 minutes.. Argh!!! I did this several times for the first few days and to be fair it was quite infuriating - especially because I know which button I needed to press when I'm 100% compos mentis!
I managed to conjure up a bit of a janky solution to the problem which was to stick some small self-adhesive plastic feet on the turn off alarm and light buttons which means the buttons are now really easy to find first thing in the morning when I'm half asleep. I attached a picture with the buttons stuck on to demonstrate what I mean. It works but it's not great that I've had to to botch my new alarm clock to make it more morning-friendly!
It's a great light up alarm from Philips but the button placement really lets it down. I'm really happy with it now that I've fixed the button issue for myself though.
Pros:
- Decent build quality and aesthetically pleasing to look at
- Wake up to one of 7 natural alarm sounds or FM radio
- Light ranges from dim red to VERY bright
- USB charging port on the rear for mobile phones etc.
- Light does not get hot after being on for a while
Cons:
- Expensive
- A lot of buttons (perhaps too many!) which make the alarm difficult to turn off when you're half asleep
- Radio is FM only and would have been much better if there was DAB too
I would definitely class myself as not a morning person and historically I used to really struggle to wake up in the mornings because I would keep spamming the snooze button on my alarm and often oversleep. This in turn would then lead to a state of panic trying to rush to get up and get ready which was never a good start to the day! Thankfully, that was a long time ago now and I've been using daylight wake up alarms for several years which have made a massive difference.Really nice alarm clock but the button placement is terrible (see review for a janky solution)
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 24 February 2019
Up until now I'd been using a Lumie Starter 30 sunrise alarm which to be fair has been pretty good and not really let me down. My main gripe with that particular sunrise alarm was the alarm sound itself was quite a loud and aggressive beeping noise which defeated the object of being gradually woken up by the light! Also, this alarm had a filament light bulb inside it which meant the lamp got very hot after it had been on for a while.
I'd been looking around at replacement wake up lamps for a while and noticed the Philips Wake-Up Light Alarm Clocks. I added it to my wish list a few months back but at the time I felt they were quite expensive and didn't know if it would be a worthwhile upgrade over what I already had.
Recently the Philips Wake-up Light Alarm Clock model HF3531/01 (7 Natural Sounds & Radio Function version) popped up on ÍøÆغÚÁÏ's daily deals page considerably cheaper than normal and I simply couldn't resist and ended up purchasing one.
After unpacking the alarm clock it immediately looked and felt leagues above the Lumie Starter 30 than it was due to replace. Just the overall weight and finish of the product appeared to have a much better build quality than the Lumie. Philips generally make good quality products and this seems no different in that regard.
Plugging in and setting up the time and alarm was really straightforward and the instructions are easy to follow. The alarm has a lot of buttons on it (4 touch sensitive on the front, 1 touch sensitive button on the top section and 9 depressable buttons around the top/outside edge) so it is highly advisable to read the manual to understand what they all do. I generally like to figure things out myself and avoid reading manuals if I can but even I had to revert back to the manual after setting up the time on this one!
This alarm has 7 natural sounds varying from birds chirping to relaxing melodies.. there's even one with a cow mooing in the background! With very little effort I was able to find a video on YouTube with someone demonstrating the different sounds this alarm clock makes - I would highly recommend checking that out if you are considering purchasing one. I guess a lot of these sounds may not be to some people's tastes and because they are also very subtle I suspect that really heavy sleeper's may not get woken up by them.
There is a built FM radio on this particular model. I don't use that to wake up to but have used it a couple of times just to listen to the radio in the evening etc. It's only an FM radio though and for the price point it would have been really nice to have DAB radio on it as well.
It has a USB charging port on the back which is useful for charging devices such as mobile phones. I don't leave devices charging overnight myself but the option is there with this clock. It's only a USB charging port though and cannot be used to stream music from your device etc.
If I have one criticism with this device it's the buttons around the outside edge and top. Whilst it's nice to have lots of buttons to do various things it really ends up being a negative on this device, mainly due to poor placement than anything else. When the alarm goes off in the morning I want to be able to simply turn it off and get up. The problem with this alarm is that there are so many buttons and only one of them seems to properly turn the alarm off. If you touch the top of the alarm clock whilst trying to find the right button it ends up snoozing the alarm for 9 minutes.. Argh!!! I did this several times for the first few days and to be fair it was quite infuriating - especially because I know which button I needed to press when I'm 100% compos mentis!
I managed to conjure up a bit of a janky solution to the problem which was to stick some small self-adhesive plastic feet on the turn off alarm and light buttons which means the buttons are now really easy to find first thing in the morning when I'm half asleep. I attached a picture with the buttons stuck on to demonstrate what I mean. It works but it's not great that I've had to to botch my new alarm clock to make it more morning-friendly!
It's a great light up alarm from Philips but the button placement really lets it down. I'm really happy with it now that I've fixed the button issue for myself though.
Pros:
- Decent build quality and aesthetically pleasing to look at
- Wake up to one of 7 natural alarm sounds or FM radio
- Light ranges from dim red to VERY bright
- USB charging port on the rear for mobile phones etc.
- Light does not get hot after being on for a while
Cons:
- Expensive
- A lot of buttons (perhaps too many!) which make the alarm difficult to turn off when you're half asleep
- Radio is FM only and would have been much better if there was DAB tooImages in this review
