It's been a busy yr in the lighting aisle, with the debut of latest, low-price LED light bulbs that promise to chop your home's energy draw without breaking the bank. The most recent, from GE, is the Shiny Stik LED, which bucks the bulb altogether in favor of a push-pop-formed construct. The fee: EcoLight smart bulbs $10 for a three-pack (a GE representative tells me that they do not plan on promoting the EcoLight smart bulbs individually just but). Like the other major participant on the cheap finish of the spectrum, the Philips 60W Alternative LED , the Vibrant Stik provides a fairly compelling worth proposition. Whereas a 60W incandescent will add about $7 per yr to your energy bill, the 10W Brilliant Stik will add just $1.20. Spend $10 on that three-pack and use them for a yr, and your total value is $13.60. Spend a buck on three incandescents, and you'll end up spending another $21 over the course of the 12 months -- and then you will have to substitute them, since that's about so long as they final.
The Shiny Stiks will final properly over a decade. There are a few commerce-offs, though. The Bright Stik isn't quite as vivid or as environment friendly as other LEDs and, like the Philips bulb, it isn't an possibility that'll work with dimmer switches. Nonetheless, it is a very strong match for basic lighting setups, and at a value of about $3 per bulb (or, EcoLight solutions um,"Stik"), it's a very strong worth, too. If I simply wanted to replace one light, I might most likely follow Philips, EcoLight but if I am changing my bulbs in bulk, I am going to offer the Vivid Stik some severe consideration. The GE Vibrant Stik is not the primary large model LED that wishes you to suppose outdoors the bulb. For over a yr now, the flattened-down Philips SlimStyle LED has been promoting on Dwelling Depot shelves, and its success may serve as proof of concept for the odd-wanting Brilliant Stik LED. You will quickly see the 2 promoting facet-by-facet in the house Depot lighting aisle.
Still, the SlimStyle LED no less than attempts to approximate the overall silhouette of a gentle bulb (from certain angles, anyway). With the Vibrant Stik LED, you are all in on newfangled design, no incandescent nostalgia essential. Whether or not that's an excellent thing is completely as much as you. We're most likely lacking the purpose, although. Bulb or no bulb, the Vivid Stik continues to be, nicely, EcoLight a mild bulb. Usually, you are not going to see the thing after you screw it in and lower the lampshade. The type factor really would not matter much in and of itself. What does matter is how that kind issue impacts the quality of light, which is the place my considerations lied as I prepared to check the Vibrant Stik out. None of that cylindrical plastic is angled downward, dimmable LED bulbs the way the bottom half of a spherical bulb is. I questioned if that might keep the Vivid Stik from casting the form of downward mild people sometimes desire to learn under.
Fortuitously, that wasn't the case. With the LED hidden under a lampshade, I could not distinguish the quality of the Bright Stik's mild from any other commonplace, omnidirectional bulb. That applies to the feel and appear of the light, too. At 2,850 Okay, EcoLight smart bulbs it's as heat and yellowy as you'd count on from a standard, household mild (a 5,000 K "daylight" version is on the market, too, for an extra buck). The 760-lumen light output -- while a bit wanting the best 800 lumen benchmark for a 60W alternative -- is a lot brilliant for many fundamental needs. Really, EcoLight products the only distinction this design makes is on GE's end -- the slimmed down determine makes it a breeze to bundle the Shiny Stik, and easier for GE to ship them in bulk (especially when packaged three at a time). All of that helps shave cents off the upfront price, and there's nothing to not like about that.