My teklight T5 was the best lighting I ever had. That being said, it's hard to drop $200 on 6 lights after about 6-8 months.

It's a huge flaw unless you are loaded or don't care about how you spend money.

The D120 LEDs I have are great. My RBTA even bubbles now.

And as another mentioned, I needed to control the heat. These literally run cold. I never feel any heat dissipating from them.

I would never drop for radions or the like, as I feel they are a tip
Off with gimmicks. Like lighting. Weee. *insert sarcasm*


I'm happy I switched, even with the knowledge that my T5 lights grew everything. Super well.

Cost of bulbs was my deciding factor.

Try touching the heatsink; I dare you ;)

The thing is, both LEDs and MH "runs" hot but MH "dissipates" heat (and light) omnidirectionally (since its a round bulb) and cannot be fitted with heat sink to take away the heat. On the other hand, LEDs dissipates heat bidirectionally but emits light unidirectionally and so can be fitted with heat sink on the opposite side with heat sink to take away the heat. And hence the "runs cooler" market hype :razz: If some sort of technology comes which allows MH to be fitted with heat, that market tag line is going to be buried.

I'm not sure if I'd say it's 50%, but definitely high on the 'pros' list for LEDs. To me a greater benefit to switching to LEDs would be the elimination of the need to replace bulbs. That would be #1 on my LEDs 'pro' column. To me, neither energy savings nor heat savings is much of a factor. During a heat wave my house is still going to get super hot. During the winter my house is still going to get super cold during the day, which will results in my heaters kicking in more often. Today I rely on my halides to warm up my tank during the cold winter days :lol: I haven't done the calculations but it's probably cost neutral or cheaper to use the halides as heaters.

Another huge benefit that people see with LEDs would be their controllability. A lot of people love being able to program their LEDs to the exact specs that they want. This isn't really a selling feature for me either though. I'm okay with lights ON and lights OFF.

At the end of the day LEDs have a lot of benefits that can be realized by the hobbyist. It's up to the hobbyist to decide if those truly are benefits to them are not. A benefit to one hobbyist might not be a benefit to someone else.

+1

2010 called and wants its thread back.

I do miss 2010 tho!

These threads are fun. It's pretty much the only thing worth talking about in reefing these days. Or those days too. And probably days to come.

Can't believe all the LED haters!!! Did they buy the wrong LED's, or use the wrong program/mode, or wrong intensity for their tank? Or maybe the the LED's are a good excuse for other problems in their tank?

I had T5's before, and you couldn't pay me enough to ditch my Radion LED's (have both Gen 1 and 2). I am very happy with the fast growth and colour of my SPS. And not to mention all the other benefits, including economic with the low power, low heat and not having to keep replacing bulbs.

Well, at the least should be lots of cheap used LEDs available in the next little while. Then next year, they will be switching back to LEDs...

But hey, what do I know... I am still a neophyte reef keeper.

denial....denial:)

I ran 110W VHO from 1999-2001

I ran 400W radiums from 2001-2008 with VHO supplements

I ran T5's from 2009-2010

I purchased T5s for my last aquarium as my goals had changed......I used them for one month after seeing a Vertex Illumina in person then sold the fixture.

Today, for a mixed reef I would go LED, for an SPS tank I would go with 400W 20k halides with VHO supplements, or perhaps LED supplements as a second choice.