# Less Costly Alternative for Philips Hue with Good CRI



## Decidueye (Mar 17, 2020)

Good day! Just a newbie here who wants to get the most out of my lighting.


The Hues checked all my preferences except maybe the CRI:
Color temp (switchable): 6500k-5000k-3000k (anything near this range is fine)
Dimmable: Yes
CRI: 90+ (Hues are specced at [email protected], what about at 6500k?)


After looking at local (Philippine) and online stores I wasn't able to find such a bulb (waveformlighting is not loading for me). 

Is there such a bulb?


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## TheGiantHogweed (Mar 21, 2020)

I've had difficulty getting neutral or cool white lamps with good CRI, especially being dimmable too. Enough that I ended up getting an LED strip and making something myself. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/MARSWALL...White-5600K-55-65lm-LED/183168288260#shpCntId This may not be an option for you, and it isn't very cheap (although probably much cheaper than having to buy and install the Philips switch too), but if you can make it in to something yourself, the colour temperature of these LED strips is 5600k which is usually harder to get hold of. They are usually 6500 and have quite a blue tinge to them. The CRI is 95+ and from my experience with building my own daylight equivalent up lighter, the colour temperature with these is very nice indeed. It won't run on mains voltage, but 12v. What it does give you is more freedom on how you want to light your room. It can do a much more even job in fact. 2 metres of this for example would easily be brighter than a 5ft florescent tube for example. Led strips are also incredibly easy to dim and can be used with something as simple as this: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Single-C...926236?hash=item364383831c:g:OpUAAOSwM6FcHUqZ You may have to check if a similar item ships to your country. All this is just a possibility if you don't find the sort of normal household LED that would be ideal. I find these smart lamps are just too expensive really which is another reason why I tried seeing what I could do with LED strips.


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## JoakimFlorence (Apr 8, 2020)

Well, there is the LIFX bulb.

Although the two use a fundamentally different strategy of achieving their color control. Whereas the LIFX bulb uses an RGBW emitter approach, the Philips Hue uses a combination of amber, phosphor-converted lime (that is yellow-green), and blue separate individual emitters.

The RGBW approach used in the LIFX bulb gives it an average CRI of 88-89, peaking at over 92 between 3100-3400K. (This according to a comment from a representative of the company which was posted on Amazon several years ago)
The specs for the Philips Hue bulb says it has a CRI above 80 between 2000-4000K, and it has a CRI of 91 at 2700K.

I hope these specific statistics are interesting or helpful to you.


If you are planning to make your own multi-color emitter approach, very good results can be achieved by adding a small bit of red (650) and green (520) to normal white LED light. You can easily get to 95 CRI and above that way.
Here is one combination that was calculated with the free downloadable Osram ColorCalculator:

calculated 2985K, 98 CRI, 99 R9 (red saturation), R12 still only 83

2700K 275 lumens 
4000K 125 lumens
520nm 30 lumens
650nm 16 lumens​​


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## JustAnOldFashionedLEDGuy (Apr 13, 2020)

Except the red output will change large amounts as the LEDs heat up, so unless you have temperature or light feedback, this won't work. Big difference between theoretical in a calculator and practical implementations.


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## JoakimFlorence (Apr 30, 2020)

JustAnOldFashionedLEDGuy said:


> Except the red output will change large amounts as the LEDs heat up, so unless you have temperature or light feedback, this won't work.


That might be compensated for, to some extent, by the green also decreasing as the LEDs heat up. Instead of unacceptable tint change, instead you will get somewhat of a small change in color temperature. 
In addition to that, the ratios could also be adjusted to account for a slight shift after the LED has heated up, and some intermediate middle level could be selected. That is, the LED might start off very pinkish, quickly warm up to a white color on the blackbody color coordinate curve, and then finally, after a long period of time being left on, settle on a very slight greenish tint, which might not even appear entirely unnatural since natural sunlight is actually just a tiny bit more green-tinted than the ideal blackbody would be (due to effects of diffusion through the atmosphere). It might be comparable to sunlight filtering through a glass window (since all glass has a very slight green tint).


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