That story explains why I dislike led lights
Interesting article but not agreeing with OPs sentiment which sounds like a grumpy old guy that thinks the government is evil for outlawing energy-wasting - especially given that the articles explains in-depth that it’s not about LEDs in general but different types of LED especially on the cheaper side being the problem
LEDs in general aren’t good for your mental health either. Unless it’s an organic screen (OLED), you’re getting too much blues in your lighting and it will make you crave sunlight. They’ve known this for decades. In the winter, get outside more, not less, you need the full spectrum of the sun.
i thought i read something about a new blue oled (pholed) that was supposed to bring it into some parity with the other 2 in the oled space… so that may not be a source of ‘less blue’ in the future
I looked into it, thanks for the heads up. https://www.digitaltrends.com/home-theater/what-is-pholed/
My guess is that companies want to call themselves OLED and charge those prices while giving an inferior light source. People will spend the money and not get the value from it, the gorgeous colors they can’t get to.
OLED is for better contrast and refresh rate than LCD . There is nothing about the technology that makes its blues “better” than a blue LCD filter.
Thanks. I was just reading about the flicker of different LEDs this morning due to my similar distaste for the lack of warmth with current Christmas lights.
Oh, and direct link to article here. https://www.npr.org/2023/12/22/1198908957/led-lights-flicker-headache
The lack of warmth is the color of LEDs, they are based on blues and no reds because of cost and efficiency. In places where you get a lot of sun in the US (Arizona, Southern Cali, etc.), I bet the blues are loved.
I don’t think you understand the basics of lighting fabrication from that statement and those color temperatures are misleading.
My reds on my Christmas lights are not comforting either… Oh, and I live in the South with plenty of sunlight…
This article seems sus to me. It describes a bunch of ways to observe high-frequency flicker that, IME, just aren’t a problem. Personally I find flicker stops being a problem above about 60 Hz. I’m sure the threshold varies for different people, but I can’t fathom how anyone could be bothered by a 2000 Hz flicker as the article seems to suggest.
Also, for reference, back before first screen TVs, TVs all flickered at 50 or 60 Hz depending on what country you were in.
I love how you decided it doesn’t exist because you personally don’t notice. Lighting design is a thing.
This is like those people who don’t get headaches and nausea when they watch 3D movies telling people who do get headaches and nausea from watching 3D movies that “it’s not that bad!”
They stated “IME” and “personally”, understanding thresholds vary per person… but you gloss over that just to try and create an argument. I bet you have blue hair.
The upthread comment says:
but I can’t fathom how anyone could be bothered by a 2000 Hz flicker as the article seems to suggest.
What does this part of your comment mean?
I bet you have blue hair.
Personally I find flicker stops being a problem above about 60 Hz.
The standard AC frequency in the U.S. is 60 Hz, so…
Even a 2kHz rate can be a problem when the implementation is cheap and you get weird harmonics that distort the PWM and might create lower frequency flicker. I’m thinking interactions between cheap power supply voltage/current ripple and LED PWM. I personally don’t know enough about this kind of LED implementation to say what could or couldn’t be happening.
You can too often see the same thing in LED car headlights and tail lights. The most obnoxious of these flicker noticeably all the time. Not much better are the ones that seem to be on continuously when viewed in the center of your vision, but flicker in your peripheral vision. The later I find really distracting
I can’t recall seeing any legal head or tail lights that have flickering issues. We will hopefully see this issue less and less as people are no longer allowed to buy the illegal retrofit kits from places that sell headlights. We’ve seen a lot less people running the Sylvania super bright off-road lights now that you’re not allowed to buy them from the headlight section of an auto parts store and online stores are not allowed to sell them without off-road use popup warnings.
I really wish that instead of useless trash like drunk driver checkpoints midweek we would start seeing headlight inspection points or other vehicle inspection points to check for safety issues like these; if we’re going to keep having these checkpoints for no reason.
