They say that a way to a man’s hear is their bellies. We respectfully disagree. The way to any person’s heart is their bellies these days. Eating, in Malaysia at least, is a big part of our lives. Anywhere we go in Malaysia, the discussion of food never stops and is always something that anyone can chime in on.
But food is not just an important part of Malaysians, it is so for any families. Most of your family meeting or gathering happens in the kitchen or the dining room, which is right next to, or connected to your kitchen. There is one big thing in the kitchen too, to make it a kitchen; a fridge, which is what Family Hub is.
Regardless of the name, a fridge is truly a hub for the family. It is the one furniture that is shared within a household and used from day to night by every single person in the family. The Samsung Family Hub fridge lives up to that name and turns itself into a smart hub and assistant for your family. But it is more than just a fridge that is connected to your other electronics, it is a little more than just a fridge with a display too.
The Samsung Family Hub refrigerator is not technically a new product name. The product has existed for a while now. It was also one of the most interesting concept fridges when it launched. Especially, when they managed to fit a Harman Kardon speaker to the unit in 2019.
For 2020, The Samsung Family Hub got smarter in terms of software. Of course, it is a better fridge as well. But if you already have the older Family Hub, there is no need for you to go out to buy a new fridge. Still, new things are always nice; we know.
So Clever
Samsung says that this is the cleverest refrigerator that you will see. Then again, it might be the only fridge you see in your house. Why you need two large fridges in your home is beyond me.
Still, this is a very clever refrigerator with an intelligent screen and more within the screen. You can plan out your week’s worth of meals if you want to. It even helps you prepare meals with easy access to recipes that you can work with, according to what you have in the fridge.
Because it sort of knows what is in your fridge, you can even plan out what to buy in the groceries to ‘stock up’. If you forgot what to buy, you can always ‘View Inside’ the fridge to know what you have or not have inside the fridge, I know how many times I forgot to bring out my shopping list. Even when I do bring them out, I will have some missing things.
Family Center
As its name suggests, the Family Hub is meant to be the centrepiece of your family. Okay, maybe not a centrepiece sculpture, it is just a big storage box after all; how good can it look? It is where your family gathers.
We stick everything on the fridge too. You might stick your kid’s drawing, your shopping lists, your notes for your mother, your notes for your father, your notes for your kids, your husband, your wife, you name it. That will kind of clutter your fridge though. What if your fridge magnet decided not to be a fridge magnet anymore? You lose your notes.
With Family Board though on the display of the Family Hub fridge though, you will not lose your notes to the bottom of the fridge. It even has a built-in calendar to put on the screen for good measure. This means that you only need to pin whatever notes you need to put on the Family Board and it still stay there until you take it down or whoever it was intended has seen it. You can even take a family photo on your smartphone and load it to the fridge to pin it on Family Board.
Fun for the Whole Family
There is still a speaker on this new Family Hub though. With Connected Living, the Family Hub with its speakers is even better. It is a Tizen device after all.
The Family Hub can access your favourite music apps still. You can access Spotify, or Deezer, or Joox, or whatever your favourite music streaming app is and start playing music when you are preparing your meals. If you prefer to keep yourself updated with the latest trends in Malaysia, you can access the radio stations too, or open your favourite news aggregator to do more reading while preparing breakfast.
What if you want to catch up on your daily shows on Netflix? Oh yes, you can do that too, thanks to the brilliant display. You can even go on YouTube to get your short video fix if you really want.
SmartThings with Bixby
The Samsung Family Hub is a Samsung device with Tizen OS anyway, which also means that it has built-in assistant. Well, it is Bixby.
But thanks to Samsung’s SmartThings, the Samsung Family Hub is even cleverer. You can control the rest of your home with the fridge now. You can turn on your TV, your air conditioning, air purifier, your washing machine, and your vacuum cleaner too; all from your fridge. Provided, they are all Samsung devices too. You can even answer your calls from your fridge too if you need to.
Price and Availability
The Samsung Family Hub starts from MYR 8,999. It is quite a large refrigerator though for that price. Do make sure that the fridge can fit your kitchen or design your kitchen around your fridge. It is now available from Samsung’s authorised retailers from across Malaysia.
