led bulbs .. anybody here tried any of them yet ??

[frenchy]

ok so maybe this ain't the sexiest subject i've ever come up with but its somethin to think about .. after all we all wanna try and save the enviroment as best we can don't we ?? but are some of the offerings really worth it ?? i'm sure by now most of us have tried the fluroecent bulbs that have hit the market in the last 15 years or so and while they're not the same as the old incandescents we're all used to in some ways they are much better .. they last a lot longer for one thing .. and they use a lot less watts for another .. if you use your ordinary 60 watt bulb as a reference its in the 800 lumens range for lighting output .. ( lumens is how bright somethin is .. the higher the number the brighter ) and your ordinary 60 watt bulb will burn of course 60 watts while the flourescent counterpart that puts out roughly the same lumens 800 or so will burn 13 to 15 watts .. plus they burn a lot cooler too so they don't put out the same amount of heat as the old 60 watters do .. no big deal in the wintertime but in the summer who needs the extra heat ?? and because the wattage is so much less you can use more fixtures and spread them out around the room to get better light in some areas that might otherwise be in the shadows and still not use 60 watts .. i have a few track lights i put up and the flourescents work great in them and you can aim them where you want them to go .. one of the things i noticed about the flourescents tho is they don't get to full brightness right off like the old incandescents do .. it might take em a minute or so , so they don't appear to be as bright but if you make a trip to the bathroom in the middle of the night i'd kinda nice that they don't hit you with all that light BAM RIGHT IN YOUR EYES  when all you wanna do is pee and go back to bed .. 

so now they have the leds .. they're the new thing .. supposed to burn brighter still and give off even less heat and use less watts .. so far it sounds good right .. but when you look at the price ? well i'm not so sure there will be a rush right away to buy em .. and some of them the watts are not that much less than a flourescent .. they will last about twice as long tho .. ( or so they say but none of them have a warranty longer than 10 years and most flourescents have a 7 year .. or at least 4 anyway ) and a lot of the led bulbs don't go past 5 years .. and then last but not least , and this is either a good thing or a bad thing , but we're all used to what an ordinary light bulb looked like .. most of our old lamps are setup to use that shape bulb and even the flourescents try to mimic that shape we all know .. but the newer leds in order to throw that light around have come up with some crazy lookin shapes .. and if you're into that new kinda crazy cool picaso lookin like bulbs ( i say that cause picaso could do some crazy lookin paintings where nothin seemed to line up, like he was on lsd or somethin yet some thought it was great ) then you might love some of these led bulbs .. but with a cost of anywhere from 4 bucks up to 24 bucks apiece and if they use 10 watts instead of 15 for the same 800 lumens ?? and don't give you a better warranty ? why would you wanna buy some of these ?? now maybe in time the price will come down and they'll make em better and get it more perfected so it might be more worthwhile..  

http://www.cnet.com/pictures/leds-that-shine-a-light-on-design-pict...

if you look to your right you can click on each bulb and get a better idea what they're all about ..

so what do you guys think ?? worth the cost or will you wait till they get it a bit better ?? 

[frenchy]

here's a bit more to red if you're interested ..

http://www.cnet.com/products/philips-slimstyle-led-bulb/?ftag=CAD9f...

http://www.cnet.com/products/cree-connected-led-bulb/?ftag=CAD9f89b...

[blithe spirit]

I have a couple of the LEDs ...just to you try out. I question that there is much difference in heat to make much difference in the cooling or heating your home..if they save some energy, I suppose that can be a plus long as the manufacturer doesn't require more energy than it saves.

[frenchy]

yeah but if it only saves About 4 or 5 watts ?? and only gives a 5 year warranty ?? what good does sayin it will last for 25000 hours if the warranty runs out long before that .. don't get me wrong i was all for flourescents when they first came out cause who don't wanna save money on their electric bill ?? if you figure out how many bulbs you have in your house and then figure how many hours a day you'll use them and then come up with some kinda average at 60 watts and then at 15 watts you can see it makes a difference .. but then at 10 watts its not so much .. and then when you figure it can be up to 22 bucks a bulb for an led and about a buck and a half for the flourescents if you buy em in a 4 pack .. and the flourescents carry a 7 year warranty or 10 years for some of em .. you'll never get your money back at 22 bucks a bulb .. even if it does last for 10 years ..

ok i just did a real quick survey of all the lights in my house and i came up with 46 bulbs .. all of em have flourescents with an average of 15 watts each . there may be some that are 13 and a few that are 14 and maybe even a couple that are 16 or 17 .. but i used 15 for an average and it comes out to 690 watts . i did it again and used 10 watts each as an average for an led bulb and it came out to 460 watts .. so thats a savings of 230 watts .. and who don't wanna save that much .. but .. who uses all their bulbs all the time ?? so in real life at the end of the day you'll probably save way less than half of that amount .. 100 watts don't look like its all that much .. and its really not .. especially when you consider your average toaster will draw anywhere from 800 to 1500 watts all accordin to how efficient it is ..and thats a 2 slice . make it a 4 slice and you can double that figure ..  we all wanna save but who looks at the wattage a toaster draws before they buy one ?? do they even put that on the box anywhere .. you ever see a green toaster ? and i don't mean the avacodo green ones they sold to match your fridge in the 70's .. and you can go on and on .. microwaves ?? anywhere from 800 to 2000 watts for one of them humungous ones.. or a coffee maker . they draw about 800 watts and some people leave theirs on for half the day .. or an electric fryin pan ?? 1000 watts .. same for a waffle iron or a regular iron .. they all heat by resistance and thats costly .. i could go on but you get the idea ..

my first impression of the led bulbs was they were gonna be about 2 or 3 watts each , last closer to 20 years and have a longer warranty .. i really didn't know what the cost would be but i did figure they would cost more because they were new and would use less power and last longer .. but they don't use that much less power and they don't have a longer warranty than most flourescents .. in fact their warranties are only about 5 years .. if you figure out the watts a 60 watt would draw if you had 46 bulbs like i do ( 2760 ) it makes sense to spend a buck and a half to get the flourescents and save over 2000 watts and have em last 7 years or at least close .. but even if you got the leds for 5 bucks each they still wouldn't pay off in the end .. even at 2 bucks each and only a 5 year warranty its still iffy to me .. i try to be green where i can and save money where i can but the leds don't look all that much greener and you certainly won't save any money with them . unless somebody gives em to ya for free ..