There is a huge amount of LEDs available on the market today. They are made by a number of companies, have different characteristics and quality. Although LED lights are generally better than incandescent or fluorescent alternatives, knowing the distinction between different LEDs will help you choose really high-quality products and forget about replacing them for years. What to consider when choosing between high and low quality LEDs?
Here are 6 questions to ask and consider when shopping for LED lighting to help you determine the difference between a quality LEDs and a cheap LEDs.
1. Weight
This might be weird but this is true, You can’t get good quality in very low weight product. As all LED lights require good heat dispassion, It can’t be accomplished without good amount of aluminum. Thin heat sink can provide more area in less weight, but it can’t transfer enough heat for the removal. Only active (fan based) cooling provides solution to this. Some china based producers provide 12-20W lights in very low weight that feels like plastic body. These products won’t perform well even in small span of time.
2. LED Chip
The quality of LED light depends on a LED chip. The best chips are made by the USA and Japan based manufacturers (such as Cree, Nichia, Citizen, Bridgelux, Toyota Gosei, etc...), yet in these latter days some of the largest Chinese and Korean companies (Epistar, San'an Opto, Seoul Viosys, ETi, TongFang) also produce good-quality LEDs. The material of the chip as well as its size makes the main difference. Cheap and small led chip provides less light and stability, larger chips (COB) are brighter and more stable, they live longer, but obviously are more expensive.
3. Power supply (driver)
This is the heart of LED lightings. LEDs are kind of semiconductor that needs to be driven with carefully and according to ratings. Led needs to be driven with constant current DC supply for longer life.
What makes LED driver unreliable? Low quality components and low life capacitors makes them unreliable. Non-branded LED driver use regular capacitors which work for only 1000 hours at elevated temperature.
4. Light quality
Another costly thing in LED lights is rare earth phosphor. Cheap producer use low quality phosphor to lower the cost. If you see spot light with little different colors of white, it might be sign of low quality. Maintaining same colors in white is challenging task for LED producers. Color rendering is also point to be considered. Cheap LED lights generally don’t have good CRI, As good CRI also requires high quality phosphor.
5. Optics
Many people choose LEDs as a new trend in interiors. They really don’t consider what kind of lights they need. Most of the cheap LEDs have same optics for multiple requirements. A spot light can’t make enough illumination in drawing room. Opaque cover is not always for good lighting. It might be used to hide cheap components in Lights.
6. Construction
Finally all together, how they construct LEDs is also important. Design, look, feel and strength need to be checked at time of choosing LEDs. If paint or powder coating is not applied well, there might be good chance that inside construction are also cheap. Many manufacturers produce large amount of cheap products to compete price. Fast & careless production might not last longer.
