# New Cree LR4 LED lighting - 540 Lumens !



## matrixshaman (May 23, 2008)

I just saw Cree has this new offering on their web site posted May 22nd - it's appears to be for home and office lighting using 11 watts and producing 540 Lumens. Check it out here
From what I can tell so far I think the LR4 is a single LED. There's also an LR6 and an LR24. Sounds great for house lighting - not sure if they could be used in a flashlight but I'm glad to see this offering pushing the LED into reality for home lighting. Hopefully they are in a reasonable price range.


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## jtr1962 (May 23, 2008)

This basically sounds like a rebranded LLF fixture. Yes, I'm glad to see LEDs making it into general lighting, but IMHO they need to do way better than ~50 lm/W. And offering only two warmish color temperatures is a definite drawback as well. That leaves these out for task lighting, office lighting, most types of store lighting, and basically anyone who prefers cooler residential lighting.

The LR24 sounds interesting. It appears to be designed for dropped ceilings. If they can offer this with efficiencies >80lm/W and in cooler color temperatures, it would be quite viable for office, store, and kitchen/bath lighting.


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## Gunner12 (May 23, 2008)

I think warm LEDs can't match cooler LEDs in lumen per watt, IIRC 50 lumen per watt is pretty good for a warm white LED.

It might be good for replacing incan or warm florescent lights.


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## matrixshaman (May 23, 2008)

I didn't read up much on it but posted it wondering if anyone else knew anything about these. Agreed on color and effeciencies - could be better -- just wondered if this is some actual new LED itself or just a group of XRE's. LED's truly are making headway into home and office lighting though and it's too bad our government isn't supporting or in some way pushing these now instead of flourescent. I guess LED lighting still has a little way to go in terms of cost vs. flourescent but it will get there. If nothing else I think flourescent will lose out eventually due to the mercury issue.


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## jtr1962 (May 23, 2008)

matrixshaman said:


> just wondered if this is some actual new LED itself or just a group of XRE's.


From what I understand these are red, green, and blue LEDs with a proprietary color balancing circuit. This is why it would be trivial to offer these in other color temps besides 2700K and 3500K, or better yet a variable color temp fixture where the user simply selects their preference. Use of RGB instead of blue+phosphor is probably what accounts for the lower efficiency. We can get over 70 lm/W in warm white using blue plus phosphor but barely 50 lm/W using RGB.

I fully agree fluorescent is on its way out. It's just a matter of when. I'd say we still have 10-15 years to go before LEDs get inexpensive enough.


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## R33E8 (May 23, 2008)

jtr1962 said:


> From what I understand these are red, green, and blue LEDs with a proprietary color balancing circuit. This is why it would be trivial to offer these in other color temps besides 2700K and 3500K, or better yet a variable color temp fixture where the user simply selects their preference. Use of RGB instead of blue+phosphor is probably what accounts for the lower efficiency. We can get over 70 lm/W in warm white using blue plus phosphor but barely 50 lm/W using RGB.
> 
> I fully agree fluorescent is on its way out. It's just a matter of when. I'd say we still have 10-15 years to go before LEDs get inexpensive enough.



If they used RGB leds then there could be some weird color shadows unless they designed the light engine's optics to fix it. They could have used regular blue-phosphor dies with a red die to even out the color spectrum and create good color rendering. You might be right but with RGB shouldn't you have full black body emission?


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## PhotonBoy (May 24, 2008)

Hi Matrix,

I think your information and this previous posting are linked:

https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/181440

I'm sure that Cree is motivated to move into industrial, commercial and home fixed lighting due to the potential *huge sales* volumes to be enjoyed as incans are phased out.


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## matrixshaman (May 24, 2008)

Hi PhotonBoy, Thanks - lots of interesting info in that thread. I rarely miss any of your thread posts


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## Juctuc (May 26, 2008)

Its nice to see that those numbers are coming closer to reality. Its easy to say like 80lm/w or higher. Most of the manufacturers in China and Korea or whatever are telling the lumens from the led with 6500K, and they tell same numbers in warm colour as well. In this LR4 lumens are from the FIXTURE...which is different thing,than from the LED itself.

Nice to see what the price will be. Knowing the policy of pricing in CREE, it will be expensive. At least the LR6 is about 129usd each. The price is been the same for a allmost year now, so they must have good sales with it, beacuse there price is still same...well...there is not much competition at the moment.


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## PhotonBoy (May 26, 2008)

Since the US Congress has banned incandescent bulbs by 2014, things will get really interesting before then. Watch for rapid development, decreasing prices, more choices, competition, public reaction, etc. Long term the benefits will be reduced energy consumption and pollution from coal-powered thermal generating plants.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=59298


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