FCSoldier
Well-Known Member
CFL lights and High Intensity Display (HID) are the two main lighting that growers use, CFL come in 3 flavors to you plant Soft white, which budding stage likes, daylight which veg likes and another one but it isn't that usefull to you plant. HID come in three varaities High pressure sodium, which uses the best light to a plant. Really if you're going to spend money on a system for HID I don't see a point in looking at the other two types anyways.
HPS(high pressure sodium) is best for flowering...MH (metal halide) is better for vegging...Just like the 6500k cfl's are better for veg and the 2700k are better for flower. HPS is higher in red light MH is higher in blue light...
Blue light mimics the earlier stages of summer(vegetative growth) and red light mimics the coming of fall(flowering)
Many people use switchable ballasts(like the one that came with my MH) so you can switch from MH to HPS without 2 seperate ballasts.
Just so you can see the point of why people use other HID lighting...