Philips SmartSleep Wake-up Light, Colored Sunrise and Sunset Simulation, 5 Natural Sounds, FM Radio & Reading Lamp, Tap Snooze, HF3520/60

The Truama of Being Blasted Awake is Over!
I’m not a morning person and I love to sleep, so waking up and getting out of bed has always been a challenge for me. Plus I hate to wake up when it’s still dark outside. It just feels cold, lonely and depressing. And when the alarm starts blasting it always feels as if I’m being jarred awake and jerked out of something pleasant and wonderful and I have hated that for 45 years, so when I saw something that could potentially make waking up less traumatic I was intrigued. I had to try it.I am happy to report and pleased to say that this light has changed how disconcerting and difficult waking up is. It has significantly reduced the trauma level that goes with being dynamited out of a wonderful and pleasant sleep.Dare I say, it is at times – amazingly enough – actually (gasp) PLEASANT to wake up!When I now wake up, it’s light in my room, and because of the light I can set my iPhone alarm to half the volume I used to need. So no more waking up in the dark. No more being jerked from a pleasant sleep in a terribly unpleasant way. Now I seem to be close to the surface when my iPhone alarm goes off, and I drift upwards into wakefulness, rested and un-traumatized from the waking process.I actually find it pleasant to wake up and have the light shining in my bedroom.All in all, I will say that the trauma factor of waking up is now about a third or less of what it was before my new Wake-Up Light. I no longer dread the screaming morning alarm because now there isn’t one. I no longer have to wake up in the dark. I have a much easier time waking up.If you need to reduce the volume level of your alarm due to family member considerations this may also be a good answer to that problem. People in other rooms can’t hear a light, and if you need to use an alarm clock in conjunction with the light the volume can be significantly reduced while still being effective. I find the combination of a light alarm and a sound based alarm to be both effective and significantly more pleasant than a sound based alarm only.The light is relatively easy to set up, the documentation on how to do so is correct and easy to follow, and once you set the alarm once or twice the process on how to do it easily remembered.There is an alarm #1 which I use during the week and an alarm #2 which I use for the weekend.The clock face brightness can be dimmed so that it’s not intrusive in the dark. In the dark I have to look directly at the clock to even notice that the clock is lit.The light that you wake up to can be varied in intensity, and the hue of the light changes also. The light begins to illuminate weakly about 30 minutes before the alarm time that you have set and increases in intensity over the next 30 minutes, so it very gently and unobtrusively begins the process of waking you up in plenty of time to have a gentle ramp-up to wakefulness. I have it set at the halfway point for final brightness, which in daylight doesn’t seem bright at all, however at 5:00 AM it’s bright enough without being overpowering, and the shade of the light is like a nice morning sunrise.The shape is a nice round-ish shape with a flat section on the bottom to hold it upright, and it leans slightly back to keep it from tipping over. It feels very solid. I would take care not to drop it, but if it were dropped on carpet or a heavy rug it would almost certainly survive I would think. I would not want to drop it on a harder surface though. The cord is long enough so that the electrical outlet doesn’t need to be directly behind the nightstand. Mine is about 3 feet away approximately and the cord is long enough that it connects.I highly recommend it if you’re looking for a more pleasant (or just less traumatic) way of waking up.Good luck, and happy sleeping!

A good way to wake up
I got this product to see if it could do what they aren’t allowed to claim it does, help with sleep problems. It is not a cure-all but does have a noticeable effect that I think can play a part in helping. I have both insomnia and a non-24 hour sleep shifting, irritated by allergies :(. With this alarm clock, I notice that something in my brain is activated that isn’t without it. It isn’t enough to magically make me function on 4 hours of sleep, but it is a nice way to way up when I have gotten enough sleep and I think can be useful in combination with other things in helping with severe sleep issues and might be more helpful for people with less severe sleep issues.I was hopeful that the sunset simulation would help me get to sleep, but it doesn’t have any direct effect. I still find it very pleasant and like it for that reason. I would personally find it more useful it it had 90 and 120 minute settings and I could quietly read for a while before it forces me to put down the book. I could at least read on full bright and set an alarm for when to start the sunset simulation; the alarms are easier to change time than most alarm clocks, but still is less convenient than it could be for me. I suspect most folks will find the provided settings to be fine.I tried positioning the clock two ways: 2-3 feet above me just past the foot of my bed and just above my head and a little behind. I just moved it to the second position a few days ago after two and a half weeks in the first position; so far it seems like both positions work similarly for everything.I like that it gives you a chance to change the alarm time when you set an alarm and that you can turn off the alarm sound or light per alarm if you want, making it possible to use in combination with wake up watches or cd alarm clocks or to help find the optimal combination for two people using it at different times. I find the alarm sounds to be much nicer than most alarm clock sounds.I dislike that the touch sensitivity for the snooze feature is very low and I end up tapping it several times to work (although this could be seen as a feature, needing to wake up that much more to have it stop chirping for a few minutes). The touch controls for the menu and time adjustment work perfectly, but you can’t use them to snooze. Also, the brightness buttons are right next to the lamp off button and I occasionally bump them when turning off the light (which affects the initial brightness used for the sleep countdown feature). It doesn’t really matter, it just happens to annoy me a little bit.The only major disadvantage is the price; with the colored light and leds I think they have a good design that will hopefully be rolled out more widely at a lower price. I think it is much closer to my ideal alarm clock than any other that I’ve tried.I once purchased a similarly expensive Zen Alarm Clock, based on the excellent idea of a similar gradual awakening, only with sound instead of light (in theory, with really nice sound). That alarm was so ridiculously low quality with obviously little or no testing that fifteen years later I’m still bitter over how much contempt they must have for their customers to charge so much money for such a poor quality product (even though they at least let me send it back for a refund). I mention this here for two reasons: one, this product is not like that. It is expensive, but there was obviously a lot of design work and refinement to the product. Secondly, I think that a really good gradual sound alarm that could play occasional soft sounds over hours to help you wake up gradually is the main addition that would make it even better. Still, the light side of things is good and it gives you the flexibility to work with other alarms that focus on the sound side.

Muy buen producto, si ayuda a despertar, pero es necesario tenerlo cerca de la cama. Buenos sonidos, buen nivel de luminosidad, y buena calidad.Tiene dos alarmas, yo una la uso para días laborales y la segunda para fines de semana.Las rayas en el video no se ven en persona.

I was a little bit nervous about ordering this item because of the price but, in the end, I was glad I did. I’m not a morning person and I’ve woken up, every morning I’ve used this, with no problems at all. I use this as a radio, a light in the dark, and as an alarm clock. This is a great product and you get the quality you’re paying for.Pros:Alarm clock works very wellSunrise alarm, and sounds can be used together or aloneLots of customisationVery bright at full power, but dimmableGood sound quality on the radioLooks greatCons:Rolls easily if you try to slide itMenu takes a little bit of getting used toNo battery back upI had mixed feelings when I took it out of the box but I plugged it in and ran the test mode (If you hold the alarm button (1 or 2) it will give a 90 second demo of how your settings will be (this helps you to see the settings you used for the brightness and volume). I didn’t know if the extra money was worth it for a few extra features and light colours. Now that I’ve been using it for a while, I know it was worth it.I love having 2 different preset alarms. I use one for work days and the other for any other time I need to get up. Some people find that they don’t wake up at the time they set but that’s not the case for me. I instantly wake up when the birds start singing (my audio alarm sound). I do always set my phone alarm in case there is a power outage or in case the alarm doesn’t wake me for some reason (It’s waken me up with only 3 hours and 5 hours of sleep though). I tend to set the light and volume buttons lower, and angle the light a little bit so that it won’t wake my wife. Although that doesn’t work, she would wake up to a regular alarm clock anyways.The sunset feature to help you fall asleep is great! I set it to 10 minutes and I’ve only ever had one issue…. I’ve never seen it the whole way through! To be honest though, I do think it’s great. The different shades represent the sunrise/sunset beautifully and sometimes I’ve set the sunset just because of how nice it looks.The radio has great sound, and since we don’t have a traditional radio, we use it all the time. We get clear crisp sound, and get all the stations without any issues. Since there are no presets, it takes you a little bit of time to change the channel but this is primarily an alarm clock. Adding buttons for the radio feature would take away from the simplistic look of this light.It has a great and simple look to it. The rubber feet on the bottom provide great grip to keep the alarm clock still. The rubber feet are also an issue though. If you’re trying to slide it over with one hand the feet will grip and the alarm clock will want to roll. This is not a normal issue but something to keep in mind if you’re holding something in one hand and try to slide it.All in all, this was a great buy and well worth the price (even though it is expensive for an alarm clock). Even knowing that there are cheaper and older models out there, I would buy this one again in a heartbeat! If you’re on the fence about buying this give it a chance! You won’t regret this purchase.