i agree with most of what you said.......but now i just look at led labeling like cfl's
the 100watt bulbs are only 42watt...i know plenty of ppl that still find still cant figure that out lol
the 240 is what it is equivalent to in hps obviously........kinda misleading, yeah..but not really
and for the record im the guy that buys electronics and never purchases the extended warranty on anything...no matter how much it costs......learn how to take care of your shit and it goes a long way......the standard one year manufacturers warranty that all electronics have is good enough for my led
and if what your implying about companies and warranties are true, and it is somewhat, then hyundai and kia must have the best cars on the road...10 year 100,000 mile warranty...........what are you guys driving??
speaking of driving we should be talking about mpg......that misleading sticker on my car has been killing me these days......whats up with that shit??? 4.26 a gallon wtf
I've got a Hyundai car, SUV and a Toyota truck. Was a GM guy for 20 years (cars and trucks) and even used to race GM (drag raced using a 455 Buick). After paying through the ass at the service counter (especially the last ten years) gave up on em. I mean seriously how can a truck with off road suspension (I had two Z71's) need a new front end every 18 months driving on pavement and gravel roads. My 05 Tundra has gone 5 years and still only needs shocks. When I gave up on GM I checked out JD Powers ratings for reliability and bought the vehicles I did and I'm happy. I wish JD Power would rate LED Panels and save us all some grief
I don't buy extended warranties on electronics either
Blackstar does get a bit of a bum rap but I can't say I'm surprised. If a new vehicle came out tomorrow and the manufacturer announced that it didn't have a radiator and just a 2ft aluminum pipe cause that's all you for heat dissapation how many people would trust it?
I think one of the big misunderstandings with LED's is the heat generation. The LED's in all of our panels aren't actually more efficient than HID. With the exception of some prototypes and the latest round of CREE (which aren't available in the spectrums we need yet, just white) HID are marginally more efficient at producing light than LED. The big difference is that LED's don't produce as much light as they only produce light in the spectrums needed. Although they are slightly less efficient they produce less heat because they are using less power by not wasting it producing unusable light.
Short version is that as a rule of thumb 250watts of LED give off pretty much the same heat as 250watt of HID. Big difference is that 250 watts of quality LED will replace 500 watts of HID IMO so thats where the heat savings is.
The other issue is that HID lights radiate heat from the light source (filament) so right off the front of the light. LED's generate heat at the junction so the back of the diode. This is why LED's generally seem cooler as they don't "shoot" heat out the front, they store it in the back. If you don't un-store that heat properly (heat sink) their life span is dramatically shortened. If you want some great reading I can post links to engineering blogs discussing the importance of heat management in LED's
The kicker is that even a dramatic shortening in life span still means they are probably gonna produce light for a year. Blackstar is fairly new, as are many of the manufacturers, so we are a ways off seeing how their engineering will hold up.
I don't consider pointing that out hating on Blackstar. It's just one factor in the decision to buy a particular light. Another factor is definately cost and BS is winning lots of fans in that area.