The New Light Bulbs Lose a Little Shine (The "Greens" and Libs destroying America)

wall street journal ^ | 1/19/2011 | By REBECCA SMITH

[SeeSac]

Downside is that the GIMP is still 8-bit, not 24 (32?) bit like Photo$hop, but I get excellent photos regardless. Also, the GIMP has the world's worst user interface. It's difficult to learn; I had to buy "Beginning GIMP" to learn how to do some operations.

24 bit is actually 8 bit x 3 colors. GIMP outputs 8(24) bit for normal processsing. It will also output 16 bit for photoshop.

[Greysard]

I think you just made that up!

It's true nevertheless. It all depends on how you test and what you test. Most claims of this sort, unless they come with a specific test procedure, are worthless. Even if you compare a CFL to a box of incandescents that are used one by one, you need to specify how often they are turned on and off.

This is exactly why many bulbs in my house are still incandescents, and I can't replace them with CFLs - by the time they'd warm up I'm already out of the area; and while I'm walking through the place their light would be too dim.

LED lights don't have this problem, but they are insanely expensive and usually very directional. Many are not dimmable. I'm buying one (different) LED bulb every couple of months to see how they behave, and so far I'm not that impressed. A 60W floodlight, for example, is very bright indeed, but the light spot on the floor is about 1 foot - what I'm going to do with that? Yesterday I bought a couple more different types, still expensive, but I'm looking for one that works well.

[Chode]

just don't break one in your house...

[bboop]

Hardihar, great statistics. Thanks.

[upcountryhorseman]

What tests, Something run by the big “O” administration?

[Paleo Conservative]

Another reason is that the bulbs are burning out faster than expected.

I'd make an even stronger statement. The "expected" bulb life is a lie. They just put out a bogus high number to justify the policy.

[SteamShovel]

The box says, “1 CFL lasts as long as 8 incandescent bulbs”.

It has been my experience that incandescent bulbs on average last very short lives when compared to the life they got 25 years ago.

I think they were cheapening them up with more oxygen remaining in the bulb than used to be acceptable and less or lower quality filament material (thinner etc). The incandescent bulb had been perfected to the point where they were engineering them for short life to increase sales and reduce costs.

The new CFL bulbs probably do have an 8x life (on average) compared to the incandescents of today but only if left on until they fail.

Bulb life and useful bulb life are two different things.....

.....Incandescents pretty much burn the same until they burn out.

.....Fluorescent bulbs begin to reduce light output after a while and taper off well before they "burn out".

So, if you compare a CFL light bulb and call it "burned out" when the light output has tapered off to say 75% while it is in frequent on/off service and then compare it to an incandescent bulb as it should be (and used to be) manufactured for long life, I think incandescents win hands-down.

[sionnsar]

You’re correct on the color — I was just using the convention in which I’d seen it written. I didn’t know about outputting 16-bit though.

[a fool in paradise]

We have to SAVE electricity so we can charge up electric cars that need to be babysat every 8 hours...