LED bulbs are the latest and greatest in terms of energy savings and they should offer the following benefits,
- Very low energy use 80% less than an incandescent bulb and 40% less than a compact fluorescent.
- Mercury free
- Instant on
- Longer lifespan
- Some Recyclable components
We have been holding off trying LED bulbs until the prices had come down a little and there were some positive reviews around. After hearing good things we decided to order 2 of the latest Philips Master LED light bulbs.
These are a replacement for 2 dimmable lights in our house that we hadn't found a suitable low energy alternative for.
LED bulbs have definitely come on recently. Often the wattage of the LED bulbs was so low that you could not get any useful light gains or they were too far into the white/blue spectrum so the light was too cold. I'm thinking here of some of the GU10 fittings that B&Q sell relatively cheaply. I can really see how they could put people off changing to energy saving bulbs and especially LED.
However, this article is going to look at the next generation of bulbs specifically the Philips Master Glow LEDbulb MV. Yes that rolls of the tongue.
Here are the specifications
- 8W (40 equivalent)
- Dimmable (leading or trailing edge dimmers)
- 470lm
- 2700k (this is warm white colour)
- 25,000 hour lifespan (around 15 years)
- Instant on
First impressions on opening the box is that this looks just like a standard bulb with the addition of a fancy finned piece of metal near the bayonet fitting. This is probably a heat sink. I never thought I would describe a light bulb as beautiful but Philips have obviously put a lot of thought into the aesthetics of this bulb, not just its performance. As this bulb is the same size as a normal bulb you won't have any problems directly replacing your old bulb. We were replacing a 50w incandescent.