LED Lights Last Longer, Use Less Electricity

Replied Clark: “No, Aunt Bethany, those are Christmas lights.”

There were thousands of them — bright enough, no doubt, to be seen from outer space. And 20-plus years ago, they were all incandescent Christmas lights. A strand of incandescent bulbs draws about 40 watts of electricity. The newer light-emitting diode (LED) strands draw about 8 watts. A string of 200 miniature lights running five hours a day for a month will consume about $1.50 in electricity.

LEDs will cost about 20 cents. In addition, they generate less heat, and they last up to 10 to 15 times longer than incandescent lights.

Those attributes did not go overlooked by consumers. This past season, LED Christmas lights made a big dent in the sales of traditional lights.

Kim Pedersen, the CEO of online retailer 1000Bulbs.com, said his company noticed a big shift toward LEDs last year compared to 2010. He said 25 percent more customers picked LED Christmas lights over traditional incandescent Christmas lights.

“This is despite the fact that incandescent offerings on the website still outnumber LED offerings nearly two-to-one,” said Pedersen.He added that a poll on the company’s Facebook page found that customers who used the LED lights were overwhelmingly satisfied with them.”

Even the iconic ball dropped at midnight in Times Square has converted. The updated ball was created in 1999 by the Waterford, the crystal company, and Philips, the electronics company, to mark the turn of the century. It used halogen lights; LEDs were put in place in 2007.

In 2008, the ball was updated with 32,256 Philips Luxcon LED lights and 2,668 Waterford crystal triangles, said Jeff Straus, president of Countdown Entertainment, who has been involved with supervising the midnight ball drop for 17 years, The ball weights nearly six tons.

That’s a long way from the first Times Square ball drop in both time and size. The first took place 107 years ago. An iron ball, six feet across, weighted 700 pounds. It had 100 incandescent lights. They were 25 watts each — less wattage than that of a refrigerator light bulb. The LEDs used on the ball today use less than half that amount of power, but generate nearly three times the brightness, said Straus.

Free Software

This weekend is the last chance to get free software — a program that normally carries a $49.95 price tag.

The program is LotSoft’s Blu-Ray Ripper: It’s a program that decrypts Blu-ray DVDs and copies the contents to a computer’s hard drive. The movie can then be viewed using Windows Media Player, or put into other formats for viewing on portable devices. The company also notes the original DVD can be stored in a safe place; if the copy gets scratched or cracked, all is not lost.

A company spokeswoman said the program supports Blu-ray DTS/E-AC3 and MLP/TrueHD audio system, “and preserves original video quality. Even though the movie has been transferred from Blu-ray onto a computer, it still keeps the highest video/sound quality.”

The program can be downloaded until midnight Sunday from the LotSoft website link: www.bdlot.com/special-offer/

The giveaway is designed to introduce new users to company’s programs, and to generate word-of-mouth.

Once users are familiar with the company’s Blu-Ray ripper, they might find other products to purchase. LotSoft’s Video Converter ($30), for instance, lets users convert a DVD movie to a format that can be played on portable video devices, including the iPhone.

[ Lonnie Brown, who has been writing "Database" for The Ledger for more than 30 years, can be reached by email at LedgerDatabase@aol.com. ]