I'd bet that you wouldn't be saying never had you bought a top quality LED light and not overpriced crap
Lol. I think everyone misunderstood my use of that sentence (I would never try to replace my hps....). It's just that everyone always asks "so how many watts of hps does that replace? ". Unfair question. I don't want my leds to perform like hps, I prefer the tight internode spacing, short and bushy plants coated in trichs that led lights produce.
I wouldn't call my lights "junk" either. My evaluations of them are this.... The Stealth Grow is awesome. It's about 30 pounds of solid, well built lighting. I would prefer a bigger light footprint and more output though. Stealth Grow just disappeared overnight, I don't know what happened to them, so no warranty or repairs.
The Ion 8 is giant! Covers a massive area and has plenty of output. Separate variable controls for bloom and veg, can even run it on two separate timers if say you wanted to add more red at some point during veg but not all the time. I really like the flexibility. However, once I opened it up and took a look inside. ..I'm a bit disappointed now. There's 10 drivers, the layout looks well thought out, the heat sinks look adequate, and the fans are a nice size, but man it looks cheap in there! The drivers do look like junk, cheap Chinese junk. I'm very happy now that I got mine for almost free. I called Lighthouse to ask about the drivers, since one has a melting case...A guy answered, sounding like he was just waking up at home, no driver for me. Short, blunt, no help. I called back a few days later in the afternoon, same guy, same responses. Wtf!
So this has led me to start looking for a new led light that is not "junk" and honestly I don't see one on the market unless I spend $3000. I want a good ol' made in America unit. Any suggestions? ??