Livingcolors Gen 2 WILL work with Livingcolors SmartLink
Correction :
Die hard nerds know this all along : don't trust the manual. I tried this out in a big store and Rde in the comments pointed this out as well.
In a previous post this was still unclear, now it's sort of confirmed : the Gen2 remote wil work just fine with the SmartLink lamps and adapters and the Livingwhites Smartlink remote will work with the plain Gen2.
So now it's clear there are only two generations and protocols : The Gen1 and the SmartLink.
The picture in the manual for the LivingWhites Starterpack adapters is still pretty confusing:
LivingColors remotes, Gen2 no Smartlink
The one on the right could be the Gen2 remote but also the Gen1 remote.
Philips adds new models to LivingColors product line.
In a clever plan to keep their customers permanently slightly confused, Philips has added new models to their LivingColors product line. The boxes and lamps are virtually the same, the remote is different. Both versions are labeled as "Generation 2"
LivingColors Gen2 but no SmartLink
The new buzzword is "smartlink".
LivingColors Gen2 with SmartLink
According to the manuals, both the old ( 69143 ) and the new version ( 69171 ) of the Gen 2 lamps use IEEE 802.15.4.
So now we have the "Generation 1" which does not work with the "Generation 2", and there is the "Generation 2 smartlink". Gen 1 and Gen 2 will not work with each other and i'm pretty confused about mixing "Gen 2" with and without "smartlink".
The original LivingColors was pretty over engineered of what it did and it gave me the impression that Philips had bigger plans for these lamps. Apparently they do now with smartlink, but the original LivingColors was more of a prototype.
smartlink is interesting and promising. Philips was one of the founders of the Zigbee name and concept and they used some of the concepts and protocols of Zigbee for the smartlink enabled LivingAmbiance lamps.
For now, I'm stuck with two incompatible lamps.
Paperbacks of recent english books.
I read a lot of english books and was excited to see Niel Stephensons new book :
at 
.Niel Stephenson is know for books like Snow Crash
, Cryptonomicon
It is really annoying they only have a hardcover edition though. Hardcover is a reason for me not to buy a book. I live in the Netherlands and I can just as well buy from Amazon Germany and there they do have the paperback english version of Reamde
The paperback version from Germany is more expensive (14.95 EUR) than the hardcover from the UK (9.49 GBP = 11.0352 EUR now). However, for the Dutch, Luxemburg and Belgian customers shipping is free for books from Amazon Germany so the net result is still a pretty good deal.
The paperback from BOL is, as usual, way more expensive (20.99 EUR !) and has a 1.95 EUR shipping fee.
ITead Studio Foca and RDM360-UART
Just in from China :
The ITead Studio Foca V2.1 USB to serial converter and the ITead Studio RDM360-UART 125kHz RFID tag reader.
FT232RL board with RDM630 RFID reader
Together with the female connector wires from DealExtreme you can quickly build a test setup and read 125kHz RFID tags.
One complication : The datasheet for the ITead Studio Foca V2.1 is WRONG !
The incorrect connection diagram of the ITead Studio FT232RL board..
The wiring diagram does not correspond with the board. The correct pinout is on the rear of the board, the wires goes on top. Strange and clumsy.
The rear of the actual ITead Studio FT232RL board.
With the correct pinout the setup works like a charm.
Serial Arduino and CC2500
Recently I built a one-off serial Arduino with a CC2500 for someone wanting to control a couple of LivingColors and through an external system.
This is what Patrice has built with it. It seems like a big setup (compared to most Arduino projects) and I'm pleased it works.
Control Living Colors by Beckhoff SPS
Nice setup !
The serial Arduino is useful if you want to control LivingColors lamps from a system without USB.