@hchavers Outside of a few niche applications like oven lamps, LED bulbs have come far enough that there aren’t a whole lot of compelling reasons to keep using filament bulbs. The biggest downsides to incandescent lighting are the much higher energy consumption, followed by the additional heat and the shorter lifespan. About the only advantage remaining for incandescents is they’re dirt cheap…but LED lamps last so much longer on average that their higher initial purchase price is more than offset by how long they last. I do wish the quality control on many of the LEDs was better, though…often they will fail before they’re supposed to.
There is something to be said for the simple, warm glow of a filament, though…especially from real antique carbon filament bulbs!
@hchavers@PooltoyWolf Everything but the last paragraph. I bet you guys need vinyl too. My LEDs are plenty “warm” when I want them to be, but they can also be many other things and they consume less energy and last a lot longer.
(I’m not mad at vinyl. I don’t know that I’m mad at standard filament either, but I judge it at least a little.)
@hchavers@joelmw I added that purely because I know there ARE people who appreciate the appearance and essence of a glowing filament from time to time. I’m one of them, especially when that glowing filament is inside a vacuum tube!
@hchavers@PooltoyWolf I hear what you’re saying, and I like it. But… that’s theory. LEDs are designed to fail and quickly at that. Dubai has the actual theoretical long lasting LED you are taking about and those bulbs sure aren’t sold anywhere else that I can tell.
@hchavers@qazxto Even if that wasn’t a borderline conspiracy theory, the average LED bulb lasts ten times longer than the average incandescent bulb. The technology has been here for a while now and has matured to the point where it is no longer practical to continue using incandescent lighting for practical purposes.
I’m not sure why anyone would argue for continuing to use filaments in lighting in the 21st century. I sure do love steam locomotives but I also know they’re wildly impractical for modern railroading.
@hchavers@PooltoyWolf You are correct, it is a conspiracy and I’d say it’s pretty borderline ethical behavior but the lighting industry/cartel has a history of such cartels[1].
Modern cheap leds can fail very quickly due to cheapening out on power supply and heat sink. They are very sensitive to heat and many of them explicitly state cannot use in enclosed (or recessed) fixtures. This wasn’t the case in the past and apparently it’s not the case on Dubai [2,3]
Then there is the issue of color rendering and CRI, flickering, power sensitivity, dimmer incompatibility.
The Phoebus cartel existed to control the manufacture and sale of incandescent light bulbs. They appropriated market territories and fixed the useful life of such bulbs. … The cartel tested their bulbs and fined manufacturers for bulbs that lasted more than 1,000 hours.
Edit: sometimes you get luckily sometimes you don’t. I’ve had many LEDs quickly fail and I’ve had some go 24/7 for years. I’ve since moved on from buying cheap light bulbs… as I once cleaned out a Walgreens that had a hundred boxes of 4 packs for 30 cents a box. Don’t think any of those have failed yet But after this giant batch of light bulbs I’m done with cheap LEDs… unless I find a really good deal. Cheap LEDs are fine for certain applications but the harder to change an area is or lighting/color rendering need (bathroom, kitchen) or heat concerns (bathroom kitchen , enclosed fixtures) or the big PAR ones, I go for more quality than price.
@hchavers@PooltoyWolf@qazxto Part of why one would argue for using filament bulbs rather than LED bulbs is that they give off far less “blue light” that affects you in many ways such as your sleep (disrupting your biological clock), they damage your retina (substantially increases the odds of developing macular degeneration - which leads to center vision blindness), eye fatigue, in some people they can cause migraines (due to flickering from electric current flickering as they react to that more than other kinds of bulbs), also it is more damaging to kid’s eyes as their eye lenses are clearer than adults ones are so block/filter less of it…
Now to avoid some of those problems you have to be pretty picky about the color temperature of the bulb. You want 2700-3000k LED’s to try to cut down on that. OLED’s also give off blue light but the wave lengths are a bit longer which makes them a bit less damaging. Halogen bulbs are usually round 3000k.
I also remember reading that it’s the turning off and on that shortens the life span of LEDs? Is that true? I have to say that I haven’t had great luck with LEDs…some have been ok, but a lot have failed in about a year or so. So much for the 10 years listed on the box, lol! But maybe we buy the cheap ones…
@HankB33@hchavers@PooltoyWolf@qazxto I found stuff at NIH (as you did) and another couple behind the paywall in peer reviewed medical journals (of which I have access) - although I had already researched this a while back as I am down to 4 filament bulbs and needed to buy more of something so I am not sure I can find the exact references I used at the time. I took what I posted above from notes I took and took a photo of so I would remember it while in the store looking at what was available.
@hchavers@k4evryng@Kidsandliz@qazxto Not sure about LED bulbs, but I do know that rapid power cycling absolutely kills CFL bulbs. Aside from the mercury inside the bulb itself, the on/off cycles causing them to fail prematurely was a major driving factor behind the CFL’s decline in the market.
“Why the color blue?”
“Because I’m blowing this opportunity with a woman who’s way out of my league and I’ll be going to sleep with BLUE balls yet again!!” That’s why!
I learned an important fact after ordering the 24-pack of smart wifi bulbs that were on here a couple months ago. It turns out a standard wifi router can only support up to 32 devices on the 2.4GHz channel at once. I already had five or six wifi bulbs, some Googles Home, and a handful of other devices that only work on the 2.4GHz wifi, so when I tried to smart-ify two chandeliers (a 6-bulb and a 9-bulb) in my 103-year-old house I ended up pushing well past the limit of my router. Oops.
@HankB33@The_Tim I have an AirPort Extreme I picked up cheap when Apple dropped it. I have it attached to my Router from my fiber provider via Ethernet and it provides a stable network with both 2.4 and 5 for all my Apple devices. According to Apple it supports 50 wireless devices (not very extreme) BUT in Bridge mode the limitation on the number of devices is the Router which I have no idea since I am at a bluegrass festival
@HankB33 these use the geeni app (or tuya if you’d prefer to use that). There’s no subscription fee. The iHome smart items you saw in that article are different than these ones as they were manufactured by a different company.
I have a bunch of Geeni smart bulbs and sockets. They work fine to this day. You need the servers up to use them with a voice assistant like Google, but during maintenance, a voice assistant will fail, but you can still use the app.
@craigthom I switched toTuya’s Smart Life app and Google Assistant works. Switching was easy: as soon as I removed a light from Geeni it went into pairing mode.
I got mine, set up with the geeni app, did a duckduckgo search and unlinked from geeni and connected to Tuya. It has more cloud services you can connect to, and the linking to Alexa actually worked. It’s mostly the same app, the Geeni is just a rebranded one so it isn’t updated as often. (Plus the Tuya app can also do SmartThings and IFTTT)
One thing I will complain about, (since I got these as I can’t use a smart switch because the house is old and it’s literally one wire to the switch, no neutral or ground) is that they stay on, ever so slightly, as long as power is applied. About half the brightness as a glow in the dark star sticker you’d apply to a child’s ceiling, but it’s noticeable. I confirmed by flipping the switch, I wasn’t just seeing things.
The music mode is a joke, it uses your phone’s mic, poorly.
Specs
Product: 4-Pack: iHome Smart Dimmable Lighting
Condition: New
Model: IH-BW246-999
Model: IH-BW247-999
Model: IH-BW240-999
Model: IH-BW439-999
Model: IH-BW438-999
Works with the Geeni App
What’s Included?
OR
OR
OR
OR
Price Comparison
$45.53-$91.06 for 4 at Home Depot
Edison ST19: $59.66 for 4
Edison G25: $59.56 for 4
Flood PAR38: $91.06 for 4
BR30: $53.20 for 4
A19: $45.53 for 4
Warranty
90 days
Estimated Delivery
Wednesday, Jul 19 - Friday, Jul 21
Stupid smart bulbs!
I prefer standard filament lights. Do I need to explain what that is?
@hchavers likely to some
@hchavers Like these right?
/image LED filament bulb
@hchavers Outside of a few niche applications like oven lamps, LED bulbs have come far enough that there aren’t a whole lot of compelling reasons to keep using filament bulbs. The biggest downsides to incandescent lighting are the much higher energy consumption, followed by the additional heat and the shorter lifespan. About the only advantage remaining for incandescents is they’re dirt cheap…but LED lamps last so much longer on average that their higher initial purchase price is more than offset by how long they last. I do wish the quality control on many of the LEDs was better, though…often they will fail before they’re supposed to.
There is something to be said for the simple, warm glow of a filament, though…especially from real antique carbon filament bulbs!
@hchavers You don’t need to explain what that is, but I’m certainly curious why you want it.
@hchavers @PooltoyWolf Everything but the last paragraph. I bet you guys need vinyl too.
My LEDs are plenty “warm” when I want them to be, but they can also be many other things and they consume less energy and last a lot longer.
(I’m not mad at vinyl. I don’t know that I’m mad at standard filament either, but I judge it at least a little.)
@hchavers @joelmw I added that purely because I know there ARE people who appreciate the appearance and essence of a glowing filament from time to time. I’m one of them, especially when that glowing filament is inside a vacuum tube!
I realized a couple of years ago that the ONLY incandescent lightbulb left in my house is in a lava lamp that I bought my kid a year or two before.
@hchavers @PooltoyWolf I hear what you’re saying, and I like it. But… that’s theory. LEDs are designed to fail and quickly at that. Dubai has the actual theoretical long lasting LED you are taking about and those bulbs sure aren’t sold anywhere else that I can tell.
@hchavers @qazxto Even if that wasn’t a borderline conspiracy theory, the average LED bulb lasts ten times longer than the average incandescent bulb. The technology has been here for a while now and has matured to the point where it is no longer practical to continue using incandescent lighting for practical purposes.
I’m not sure why anyone would argue for continuing to use filaments in lighting in the 21st century. I sure do love steam locomotives but I also know they’re wildly impractical for modern railroading.
@hchavers @PooltoyWolf You are correct, it is a conspiracy and I’d say it’s pretty borderline ethical behavior but the lighting industry/cartel has a history of such cartels[1].
Modern cheap leds can fail very quickly due to cheapening out on power supply and heat sink. They are very sensitive to heat and many of them explicitly state cannot use in enclosed (or recessed) fixtures. This wasn’t the case in the past and apparently it’s not the case on Dubai [2,3]
Then there is the issue of color rendering and CRI, flickering, power sensitivity, dimmer incompatibility.
I have LEDs in my house.
[1] See also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoebus_cartel
[2]
[3] https://hackaday.com/2021/01/17/leds-from-dubai-the-royal-lights-you-cant-buy/
Edit: sometimes you get luckily sometimes you don’t. I’ve had many LEDs quickly fail and I’ve had some go 24/7 for years. I’ve since moved on from buying cheap light bulbs… as I once cleaned out a Walgreens that had a hundred boxes of 4 packs for 30 cents a box. Don’t think any of those have failed yet But after this giant batch of light bulbs I’m done with cheap LEDs… unless I find a really good deal. Cheap LEDs are fine for certain applications but the harder to change an area is or lighting/color rendering need (bathroom, kitchen) or heat concerns (bathroom kitchen , enclosed fixtures) or the big PAR ones, I go for more quality than price.
@hchavers @PooltoyWolf @qazxto Part of why one would argue for using filament bulbs rather than LED bulbs is that they give off far less “blue light” that affects you in many ways such as your sleep (disrupting your biological clock), they damage your retina (substantially increases the odds of developing macular degeneration - which leads to center vision blindness), eye fatigue, in some people they can cause migraines (due to flickering from electric current flickering as they react to that more than other kinds of bulbs), also it is more damaging to kid’s eyes as their eye lenses are clearer than adults ones are so block/filter less of it…
Now to avoid some of those problems you have to be pretty picky about the color temperature of the bulb. You want 2700-3000k LED’s to try to cut down on that. OLED’s also give off blue light but the wave lengths are a bit longer which makes them a bit less damaging. Halogen bulbs are usually round 3000k.
@haydesigner I think if you put an LED bulb in a lava lamp it becomes an igneous lamp.
@hchavers @Kidsandliz @PooltoyWolf @qazxto I’ve read about the flickering issue too. It would suck to get a headache because of that!
I also remember reading that it’s the turning off and on that shortens the life span of LEDs? Is that true? I have to say that I haven’t had great luck with LEDs…some have been ok, but a lot have failed in about a year or so. So much for the 10 years listed on the box, lol! But maybe we buy the cheap ones…
@hchavers @Kidsandliz @PooltoyWolf @qazxto
Got a citation for that? I find
Will blue light from electronic devices increase my risk of macular degeneration and blindness?
@hchavers @Kidsandliz @PooltoyWolf @qazxto
Searching a little more I find
from the NIH
@HankB33 @hchavers @PooltoyWolf @qazxto I found stuff at NIH (as you did) and another couple behind the paywall in peer reviewed medical journals (of which I have access) - although I had already researched this a while back as I am down to 4 filament bulbs and needed to buy more of something so I am not sure I can find the exact references I used at the time. I took what I posted above from notes I took and took a photo of so I would remember it while in the store looking at what was available.
@haydesigner What about your oven lamp? If it has one?
@haydesigner @macromeh Or a solid wax lamp. LOL
@hchavers @k4evryng @Kidsandliz @qazxto Not sure about LED bulbs, but I do know that rapid power cycling absolutely kills CFL bulbs. Aside from the mercury inside the bulb itself, the on/off cycles causing them to fail prematurely was a major driving factor behind the CFL’s decline in the market.
How noisy are these?
@rjquillin A great question-- mind boggling how things that are supposed to make light make sound
@caffeineguy @rjquillin
Einstein proved this a century ago:
E = MC^Hammer
@caffeineguy @Hanky @rjquillin I say we test this theory. Let’s get it started.
@caffeineguy @Hanky @rjquillin @yakkoTDI
WhoWhat are we going to line up to hammer?@rjquillin website say 300db squeal sound for 30 seconds once turned on.
“Why the color blue?”
“Because I’m blowing this opportunity with a woman who’s way out of my league and I’ll be going to sleep with BLUE balls yet again!!” That’s why!
Anyone know if any of these work outdoor conditions? Exposed, not recessed.
@seraphimcaduto not from personal experience, but the Model: IH-BW240-999 is listed as
Weatherproof indoor/outdoor
That’s the PAR38 bulb.
@seraphimcaduto The PAR38 floodlight, probably. The others I wouldn’t count on.
I learned an important fact after ordering the 24-pack of smart wifi bulbs that were on here a couple months ago. It turns out a standard wifi router can only support up to 32 devices on the 2.4GHz channel at once. I already had five or six wifi bulbs, some Googles Home, and a handful of other devices that only work on the 2.4GHz wifi, so when I tried to smart-ify two chandeliers (a 6-bulb and a 9-bulb) in my 103-year-old house I ended up pushing well past the limit of my router. Oops.
@The_Tim humble brag? I’ve got a lot of light sockets in my house too. I don’t feel inferior.
Guess that’s why they made bridges
@The_Tim Maybe time to upgrade your router. From https://www.lifewire.com/how-many-devices-can-share-a-wifi-network-818298
“Many individual wireless routers and other access points can support up to approximately 250 connected devices.”
@HankB33 @The_Tim I have an AirPort Extreme I picked up cheap when Apple dropped it. I have it attached to my Router from my fiber provider via Ethernet and it provides a stable network with both 2.4 and 5 for all my Apple devices. According to Apple it supports 50 wireless devices (not very extreme) BUT in Bridge mode the limitation on the number of devices is the Router which I have no idea since I am at a bluegrass festival
When I searched for iHome I saw articles that described shutting down their servers. I’d look into that to determine if
@HankB33 these use the geeni app (or tuya if you’d prefer to use that). There’s no subscription fee. The iHome smart items you saw in that article are different than these ones as they were manufactured by a different company.
@mandirose Thanks for doing my homework! Good to know that basic operation does not require the Internet.
@HankB33 they do need wifi and app setup but can be used on the geeni app or the Tuya app as well
I have a bunch of Geeni smart bulbs and sockets. They work fine to this day. You need the servers up to use them with a voice assistant like Google, but during maintenance, a voice assistant will fail, but you can still use the app.
have you guys thought about purring the types with the pics so one knows what to order?
/giphy disgusted-huge-art
I got mine. I’m pleasantly surprised. They were ready to set up, even though my Nest wifi has 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz with the same SSID.
I’ve got three in a lamp pointing to the walls and ceiling. Unlike other cheap Chinese lights, white is bright enough to illuminate the room.
The colors aren’t as bright, but they are better colors than other cheap Chinese bulbs. When I tell Alexa to set a color I don’t have to fudge it.
I haven’t been able to link the bulbs to Google Home yet.
@craigthom I switched toTuya’s Smart Life app and Google Assistant works. Switching was easy: as soon as I removed a light from Geeni it went into pairing mode.
I got mine, set up with the geeni app, did a duckduckgo search and unlinked from geeni and connected to Tuya. It has more cloud services you can connect to, and the linking to Alexa actually worked. It’s mostly the same app, the Geeni is just a rebranded one so it isn’t updated as often. (Plus the Tuya app can also do SmartThings and IFTTT)
One thing I will complain about, (since I got these as I can’t use a smart switch because the house is old and it’s literally one wire to the switch, no neutral or ground) is that they stay on, ever so slightly, as long as power is applied. About half the brightness as a glow in the dark star sticker you’d apply to a child’s ceiling, but it’s noticeable. I confirmed by flipping the switch, I wasn’t just seeing things.
The music mode is a joke, it uses your phone’s mic, poorly.
I need replacements for my window In Amsterdam. Nice that I can change it from RED to BLUE or PURPLE at the touch of an app.