I've just got a new catalogue from a sound/light supplier that features alot of their own brand kit...although I think that a lot of re-badging is going on.

Anyway...amongst all the usual bits'n'pieces were a small selection of lighting effects that dont use lamps or light bulbs....

They use an LED light source.

Now in the last year or so...LED's (Light emmiting diodes) have been brought out in outstanding brightness's for their size, with the added advantage of lasting for 20,000~40,000 hours. They also use only one twentieth of the power consumption of regular bulbs, and generate almost no heat.

Recent applications have even shown LED's being used in clusters in Traffic lights and also car and domestic light sources.

Im curious, and I guess I'll find out at Plasa, just how good, or bad, these Disco LED lights are. So far, I've seen (in catalogue) a Moonflower effect, and a Aqua projector-type effect.

For DJ usage, LED bulbs (If they are bright enough and offer sharp enough focus) could give us plenty of advantages. Such as:

*) Cheaper running costs - no bulbs to buy every 4 months.
*) Smaller transformers needed inside lighting effects, meaning the effect can be smaller. This means better for transit, setting up, and using multiples of effects.
*) virtually no heat generation, so no cooling fan needed, and smaller casings possible as forced convection cooling is not needed.
*) No more "standing-on-a-chair" mid-function to replace blown bulbs.


The downsides? well, a replacement LED bulb could cost a lot more to buy eg: not just a fiver, you could be looking at £20+ (but thats still only a pound for every 1000 hours use.)

Chris? have you seen these LED projector effects in action yet? any good?

LED Technology is still in it's infancy so I think I'm going to wait and see the result before passing comment. LED's are indeed very bright these days, however in increasing the intensity also means decreasing the viewing angle. This means that to get an intense brightness of light - you sacrifice the actual spread fo the output.

When comparing light output - they may currently get close to a 50W or 100W Halogen lamp, but I would suggest that they would struggle to get close to the light output of Discharge or metal halide lamps, or even the Humble A1/259 250W used in the majority of popular effects.

Lately they have taken to replacing Car Dash backlighting with White (Vauxhall) and Blue (VW) LEDS - however there is a big difference between substituting a 1.2W filament lamp and a 250W Halogen.

Rumour had it, that a certain Car Manufacturer invested £M in researching LED Technology for use in vehicle headlights as are already used in brake / fog lights etc - however the output fell far short of the 55/60W required so instead they turned to those nice dazzling Discharge lamps you swerve to avoid .

Pulsar, are already using LED's in colour changing downlighters, again however they are only replacing 50W lamps with this unit, so until I see these new effects working and compare it to a similar 250W effect I reserve judgement on how bright these will be .

Cost...again £20 for a LED "lamp" sounds very cheap...a Single white led from R.S would cost you £3.20! - given the fact that around a cluster of 100 would be required to produce 20W of light sounds like a good deal...again lets see how bright they are at the Plasa.

This reminds me of the old VHS vs Betamax debate!