Why is there no sticky differentiating all these different Lighting Systems???
 

I am oblivious to the differences and I need to know before i try to buy.

Yeah! What are we paying for here?!

Whaddya wanna know?

If you google, you can find bookoo sites comparing lighting types.

Right now I am curious of the differences between PC and CF

PC (Power Compact) and CF (Compact Fluorescent) are the same thing. :)

Where things get interesting is when you start comparing PC/CF, VHO, T-5, and ODNO systems. That'll keep you up to your ears in reading material for a week! :icon_lol:

I am writing up someting like that for my local club (GSAS). The meat in table form:

blueram, your columns are reversed for the spiral and power compacts..you have 55 lumens at 4600 watts :)

The power consumption of ODNO part is kind of misleading. It consumes nowhere near 4x electricity when doing 4x ODNO, just over 2x, see actual measurements in the ODNO thread in FAQ. It would be nice if we can do more measurements with different ballast configurations, to provide more data points. I am getting a kill-a-watt myself off ebay right now.

malkore:

Yes, this is an old draft I had handy (saved as a PDF --> gif in paint!) . I can do a better job tonight. :mad:

shalu:

Yes, ODNO is a mystery to me as I am not ODing anything. I was trying to show that T12 (NO, HO, VHO) and T5 (NO, HO) are varients of the same bulb that are "factory" OD. I would love to dig through that OD thread and get some better values as (googling) ODNO is really not all that well explored. I look forward to any further data you would like to supply. :icon_bigg

For the spiral compact, is that total output lumens, (including all that restrike loss in the spiral) or is that usable lumens (as measrured from the outside of the bulb)?

All are quoted as total lumens. Skip the reflector and get less than half!

Edit:
Note that 1250/20 = 62.5 for spiral compact

Draft available for comment. Please PM if you would like a copy to proof. :icon_bigg