Every day I bring you an item on Amazon that I personally use or has been purchased by many members of the audience and I have researched enough to recommend.
Today’s TSP Amazon Item of the day is the Syantek Remote Control Light Switch Kit. These things are just awesome and for under 30 bucks they provide a lot of convenience. The set comes with two remotes and 5 individual switches.
They are pretty intuitive but here is how they work. You plug one of these into an outlet, then you plug in what ever you want to control remotely into it, you just installed it, you are done. Now if it was unit one, when you push “on” for unit one, what ever is plugged into it comes on, when you push off, it goes off.
I know some of you are thinking, oh gee another gadget so people can sit on their ass and not even walk across the room to turn on a light. Now hold on, here are a few uses that make a lot of sense.
For one we have a floor lamp that is behind the couch, to get to it you have to walk around the back and contort yourself in an odd position to get to it. It isn’t a huge deal but it is a pain in the ass and it is also the best place for the lamp. Install one of these and no more contortionist activities to turn on the lamp.
When I first found these our grandson was too short to reach the wall switch in the bathroom, so I installed a small light, popped in one of these. No more, “I’m scared to go to the bathroom alone” stuff. Ended the excuse cold and he learned to see to his own needs. He also enjoyed using a remote to turn on lights.
I shoot videos at my desk and I have some pretty heavy lights that make the room work well for that. Say I want to shoot a video on the fly, push a button they come on, then off. Not a big deal but when it comes to my work with as much as I do I try to be as efficient as possible.
A few years back I put some really nice string lights in the rafters of my main shop building. The outlets were powered them with are for the garage door openers. I popped in a couple of these, each switch runs two sets so I have zoned mood lighting now. Nice for TSP Workshops and movie nights out in the shop, etc. Basically any time the LED shop lights are just over kill and too bring.
How about your annual Christmas lights? For us our tree is one of those pre lit jobs. Dorothy has some weird form of OCD around lights on Christmas trees, (okay honestly she is a Christmas tree Nazi, really) that is unsettling. So I got a pre lit job to end it! After that she started building her annual “Christmas Forest” (seriously check out that link it is really cool). She has like 30 of those small tinsel trees she wire tied lights to and a bunch of other small trees. It really is beautiful but it is almost impossible to get to the wall and shut it off. Not with one of these, I just hit 2 and 3 when we go to bed and the forest is dark.
How about a shop with a light on the far end? Some of you likely have older parents with mobility problems, hey less than 30 bucks to make their life a little easier right? I put two cheap box fans in the roof of my back shop and can just turn them on for circulation in warm weather with a button push. I mean those cheap ass box fans that you can get for about 10 bucks BTW.
Okay you electric Nazis that hate phantom loss of electronics that are plugged in but not on. This can really add up, but if you put one of these in the connection and test it with a Kill a Watt, you will find they draw 1/10th of a watt in standby which is almost nothing. Over a year that would cost about 10 cents in electricity, where some devices can cost 20-30 dollars a year in “vampire draw” or even more. With that alone they can pay for themselves.
So if you have any lights or other electronic devices you would like to be able to turn on and off as easily as you do a TV, check out the Syantek Remote Control Light Switch Kit today. I do use my nifty mechanical timers a lot too but sometimes on demand is what you really want.
Remember you can always find all of our reviews at TspAz.com
P.S. – If you are thinking didn’t Jack used to recommend something like this from Etek City and doesn’t Jack love Etek City? You are correct on both counts. And if Etek still made something like this I would still be recommending them. This year when Dorothy broke out the Christmas stuff we could not find her outlets (likely because some Jerk reappropriated them for other things). So I was like, I will just order more. Welp, nope! Etek stopped making them. So I read reviews, etc. and found that these by Syantek are well thought of (4.6 stars with over 700 ratings). I ordered a set and put them though their paces. They work just fine so they are my official replacement recommendation.
