Yes. 100%. I know a few people growing with BlackDogs, and I wouldn't say their bud is "on another level", or anything like that. Blackdogs are great lights. And they can grow some insane quality. But 2 growers of equal skill, one using a BD and one using a QB, is going to be a tough match. Not a blowout.
I think of LEDs like Stock Cars (am I saying that right?). Like the NASCAR cars?
All the "good" LED lights are all the stock cars. Are there some a little faster/lighter/better handling? Yes. Does the car that wins, win by and hour? No...they are all within seconds. Because the race companies know what works and they all do it. Like LED companies.
Someone still wins (has the best bud), but that is down to his skill WAY more then his car. A better car helps, and is VERY helpful in aiding the best drivers in winning, but we are talking seconds here, not hours.
If it was that simple, as buying a BlackDog, everyone would just save up and buy one. They are pricey, but they arent THAT prohibitively expensive that we could live without them if they were a literal game changer. And, would professional growers ever buy anything else? Probably not. It's just really not that simple. A BD light could be a factor in having awesome bud, but the grower who grows the awesome bud could probably do close to as well (or as well) with any other lighting system. Even older ones.
Light type, quality, and amount are huge factors. But, of THE QUALITY BRANDS...and of the KNOWN GROW LIGHT TYPES...brand X vs Y isnt a deciding factor to the level most people think it is. Having enough of, and the right type of, light is a equal percentage with grower skill, environment, genetics etc...
The thing is, for some of these Amazon LEDs...the ones people call "useless", you can do a lot of very interesting research to understand why they are called useless.
For me, there are 2 categories of "useless" LEDs. So I dont try to regurgitate technical info that I'm not qualified to use, I'll use the NASCAR analogy again. But, these comparisons are based on the layman's understanding I have of the Chinese blurples.
Example "A") These are the worst kind of useless. This is a shell of a NASCAR. It looks like the car pros use, but the guts are a joke. It goes 30mph, not 150mph ( meaning the spectrum is almost useless for growing plants, especially in flower)
Example "B") It will go close to as fast as a NASCAR! Which sounds great! But the handling is shit, the brakes dont work, and no pro would get in one. Could you make a KIA look like a NASCAR? Yup. Could you make it go 150mph? Yup. Would it cost $1,000,000 like a NASCAR? Not even close! But it would also be useless in a race, and would probably stop working after 1 race. The reason? You are getting performance out of it, but you are doing it by pushing something not designed to perform that way harder then it should be pushed. So it's not going to last very long, and it's missing some relevant factors that make it similar to the "pro" version.
TL;DR...for LEDs, you really get what you pay for. To a point. Past that point, paying more doesnt make that huge a difference. Buy once, cry once.
