LED Light Review; TMC XG 1500, Maxspect, Double Bright, Blue Moon, AI Sol; More

This post/article is meant as a complement to LED Aquarium Lights, Lighting and to dispel the many anecdotal myths circulating about what many LED lights can and cannot do for your aquarium.

Reviews Include:
*TMC XG 1500 Ultima 9000K & Ocean Blue LED Tile
*Maxspect Aquarium LED G2
*Ecoxotic
*Marineland Reef Capable & Double Bright Aquarium LED Light
*TMC AquaRed Flexi-LED
*Blue Moon Aquatic LED
*Aqua Illumination SOL (AI Sol Blue)
*EcoTech Radion
*E.Shine (Stark LED)
*Other LEDs (Orphek, Boost LED, More)
*Summary

Updated 2/14/12

Overview

Which ever LED (if any) you choose, make sure you know what you are trying to achieve, such as Reef, Freshwater Planted, Nano Reef, Deep Freshwater Planted, etc.
Then know how to compare “apples to apples”.

Avoid placing too much emphasis on these attributes:
*Too much emphasis on PAR Meter Readings, as while this is certainly useful, a PAR Meter is not accurate in important light energy spikes WITHIN the 400 to 700 nanometer range (a PAR Meter measures the light within this range only). This is where the less easy to discern PUR is much more important.
See: Aquarium Lighting; Measuring PAR

*Beware of placing too much emphasis on “watts” as this is very inaccurate in comparing different lights to each other, EVEN different LEDs as there is a wide difference in output per watt and many poor quality lights make up for this in a shotgun approach of dozens of low output emitters and higher wattage, which IMO defeats one of the purposes of LED lighting: “lower wattage”.
See also my other article: Aquarium LED Lights, Lighting

*Finally, while my reviews may seem a bit harsh on many of these LED fixtures, I am only basing these reviews on currently known facts and well as professional use of many of these fixtures.
In fact most of these fixture listed here (with a few exceptions such as the Marineland Double Bright and a few not listed such as the Sky LED), will keep reef life or freshwater planted aquariums (if designed for this). Please understand that often my complaint is that these LEDs are marketed as the best when in fact a simple look at the facts of Kelvin, PUR (much more so than PAR), and emitter technology shows many to “wanna bes”; a good example would be the Stark, Aqua Illumination SOL, & EcoTech Radion. All of these three before mentioned LEDs can keep most marine life, but their capabilities are not the best, which if that is OK with the reader, all I can say is fine.

*Tropic Marine XR-G 1500 Ultima 9000K LED Tile

With the new XP-G wide angle Cree Emitter:

First I will start with the Tropic Marine XG Ultima 1500 9000K which was highly anticipated prior to its initial availability in the late summer of 2010. Part of the anticipation was for deep water aquariums, which is/was incorrect).
I later received one of these excellent LED Lights from TMC ahead of the general production and have run several comparison tests including a PAR meter and aquarium lighting measurement using a camera with a Kelvin filter.

The picture to the left demonstrates the differences (as seen by the human eye) of the AquaBeam 500 Reef White, AquaBeam 1000 Ultra, The GroBeam 1000 Ultra, & AquaBeam XG 1500 Ultima. It should be noted that the lights were all placed directly on the aquarium top, which is not the optimum way to utilize any of these lights.
(Please click to enlarge for a better view)

TMC later added to their XG1500 line with the AquaBeam Ocean Blue 1500XG.
This newest LED from TMC (as of the latest update to this article) combines the exclusive and patented Cree 9000K XG daylight emitters with the XR-E Blue emitters.
This is a much more advanced light than the seemingly similar Aqua Illumination SOL which uses older technology 6500K XG Daylight emitters and XP-E Blue emitters.

The TMC Ocean Blue XG 1500 is an excellent choice for aquarium keepers with tanks under 20 inches of depth desiring a very high output blue and daylight light combinations from a small footprint yet high output (high PUR) aquarium LED.
As well this is a COMPLETE LED for reef aquariums (under 20-24″) and does not require additional LEDs as does the high output XG1500 9000K which should be paired with Marine or Reef Blues for hard corals.

Another new product (for North American Release in early 2012) is the Power Control XG.
This is designed to increase output of XG emitters ONLY by 10%!
However this product does not change the fact that the kelvin temperature and wide angle lenses of the XG emitters are still intended for tanks under 24 inches (18 inches better yet), despite some anecdotal information already circulating on the internet.

Here are some important points as to what the XG 1500 series LED lights can and cannot do:
*PAR reading; The TMC XG 1500 has a lower PAR reading at 12 inches (120 PAR) than the TMC 1000 Ultra Reef White (210 PAR). This is in part for two reasons; the 1500XG emitters are a higher output, but lower in focused lumen output. As well the 9000K emitters do not have the depth penetration of the 14000K daylight and 50000K blue emitters utilized by the 1000 Ultra (Reef White).

*However the XG 1500 has a much larger area of light output from the same small foot print of the 1000 tiles and much less PAR drop offs when the PAR meter is moved around under the lighted areas than the 1000 tiles. The XG 1500 has a 24 x 24 inch light spread (with fixture at optimum 8-12 inches above tank), while the light spread is about 16 x 16 for the 1000 Ultras (except the GroBeam Ultra which is also 24 x 24)
It is also noteworthy that the XG emitter has higher PUR in Proportion to the testable PAR (PUR is the actual useful light energy). This is an important note, although not as easily verifiable with easily and inexpensively obtained equipment (such as a Light Spectrometer). There is simple, albeit not fully accurate equipment such as lenses that can display certain wave lengths to help with this determination.
The bottom line is many of the latest technology emitters such as the patented CRee XG and XR cannot be fully reliably tested via a PAR meter, but these PAR meters are still useful for ball park measurements!

The picture to the left shows the difference between the wide angle GroBeam 1000 versus the also wide angle 1500 XG using a camera lens (with ½ the emitters “on”). This shows the higher output of the XG emitter versus the emitter in the GroBeam 1000, however as per the previous picture, the 1000 Reef White has a more focused emitter that penetrates deeper water better.
(Please click on the picture to enlarge for a better view)

*The bottom line TMC XG 1500 line of LEDs are an excellent compliment to the 1000 Ultra for more light spread, especially in tanks under 24 inches. However for tanks over 24 inches the AquaBeam 1000 Ultra is still necessary, and most definitely this is not a light to replace a 400 watt MH for tanks of 36 inches or deeper as some have suggested.

This new XG 1500 is an excellent compliment to the AquaBeam 600 models (especially the Marine or Reef Blue) as well so as to add more light (about 200% to 300% more than a 600) from a smaller light fixture, even then the AquaBeam 600s still provide excellent lighting with easy to mount strips (the light spread from AquaBeam 600 is 24 x 11 inches with fixture at an optimum 6-12 inches above tank).

Another excellent application for the XR-G 1500 9000K or Ocean Blue is for smaller nano reef, hexagon or similar aquariums where copious amounts of useful energy light is required from a small foot print fixture.

*For freshwater, this XG 9000K LED tile can be an excellent compliment for more light in a larger area to compliment both the GroBeam 1000 and 500 for planted aquariums (especially Amazon River Aquariums).

Also see LED Aquarium Lights & Lighting for further LED information and as well for further information about the TMC AquaBeam 600 and 1000 Ultras.

*Maxspect Aquarium LED G2

The Maxspect Aquarium LED G2 is a capable aquarium LED with multiple emitters, although mostly older generation Semi LED (a Korean company licensed to use many Cree Emitters, but not their newer patents).

I have a couple of complaints with Maxspect; one is that their information is contradictory as to LED emitter wattage and total wattage; and two the claims of what their LED can perform, such as the replacement of a 400 Watt Metal Halide which it cannot.

That said, before I appear to trash these LEDs, rather I am pointing out what these Maxspect LEDs can and cannot do for your aquarium lighting. These Maxspect Aquarium G2 LEDs are among the better Chinese made LEDs you can buy, with only the TMC (and their proprietary licensed and latest generation Cree emitters) surpassing these Maxspect Chinese made LED Fixtures.
Still, PAR/PUR Tests have shown the MaxSpect to be a capable LED Aquarium Light, even with their older generation emitters.

*Ecoxotic:

The popular “Ecoxotic Stunner” is simply for additional lighting, not Reef or planted freshwater aquarium lighting. The LEDs are not of the output, wattage, or even the same generation technology as the LEDs used by the TMC AquaRay/AquaBeam or Maxspect.
As well the PAR output generally is below the necessary 50 mmol required for photosynthesis.

Ecoxotic Panorama Strips have 12 older technology 1 watt emitters (vs. the 2.4 watt high PUR emitters used in the AquaBeam 500 & 600s). More emitters are required due the lack of precision (useful energy output, etc).
That said, while the Ecoxotic Panorama Strips are not of the technology level of the TMC 500/600s strips these are still a big improvement on the “Stunner” and can be considered for Reef Tanks. A popular model is the Panorama Module 8000K/453nm Actinic Blue which consists of 8 white lights and 4 blue lights.

The newer Ecoxotic Panorama Retro 36 is closer to the higher end LEDs produced by TMC, even then the emitters are still not of the high output useful light energy bins.
Worse is Ecoxotic’s approach to patents for the emitters they are using is “go ahead and sue me”, not the kind of company I think any honest person should support. There is a reason that the better LEDs such as the TMC AquaRays are priced as they are; It is called licensing.
(See Orbital Technologies Corporation Statement; Patent Infringement)

*Marineland Reef Capable, Single & Double Bright:

The over hyped Marineland Double Bright LED lights from Marineland are also purely for highlighting fish only or complimenting other lights.
As with the Ecoxotic Stunner, these are much older “cheap” technology LED emitters of 1 watt each that do not come close in lumen, focused lumen and PAR output as the newer technology LEDs.

The so-called “Reef Capable” LED’s by Marineland, albeit much better than the Double or Single Bright, are still 2 generations behind the emitters used by the TMC AquaRays. These LED’s have a PAR reading, with the newer Apogee PAR meter, above 80 umol at a distance of 18 inches, but this is not the full story. Since it is useful light energy (PUR) that is most important and this Marine “Reef Capable” LED with its 21 inferior one watt emitters is severely lacking here (see the picture graph).
See: Aquarium Lighting; Measuring PAR

While the “Reef Capable” are what they say they are in being capable of keeping some photosynthetic reef life, their 21 one watt emitters are not of the best PUR available in the better newest generation emitters and yet the Marineland “Reef Capable” are about the same price as the AquaRay. This leaves me scratching my head as to why anyone would purchase an inferior LED fixture when a much newer and better generation LED is about the same price (this is about the same logic as purchasing computer technology two generations back and paying the same price).

See the picture/graph below which clearly shows the extreme short comings of the Marineland emitters. While there is a correct spike in the blue (which most older technology emitters have been able to achieve), there are not the two essential spike in the infrared wavelengths and in fact the vast majority of light output is in the useless green/yellow visible spectrums which will give the human eye a false sense of a larger volume of light energy when in actuality this is clearly not the case (See Aquarium Lighting; PAR).

Now compare this to the latest Marine White 600 & 1000 (Below):

For those “digging up” old pictures/graphs from TMCs poorly updated website or using image searches of old ftp files for older Marine White 500s, the spectrograph above is the most recent graph of the Marine White 600 and 1000 available.
While these are different types of spectrographs, one can still easily discern the difference as the second (AquaBeam Marine White 600/1000) has much more volume in the red spectrum and much less in the green/yellow.

*As another update to the Marineland LEDs, I met with one of my aquarium maintenance colleagues on Jan. 28 2011, and discussed the results further and re-examined this LED light in action.
After further examining of the low PAR output Chinese emitters used by Marineland as well getting further expert input that these lights are at best for fish only tanks. The Marine Single Bright had no more output than an 18″ 15 watt T8 Fluorescent aquarium light and should be sold/purchased as such!

*TMC AquaRed Flexi-LED;

While TMC is an awesome company, this product is primarily decorative and is mostly useless for lighting an aquarium as per the necessary light energy, especially needed by freshwater plants or symbiotic zooanthellic algae found in many corals, clams, & nudibranchs.
That said, TMC is not marketing this product for anything other than decorative lighting, however some misinformed aquarium forums and blogs (including a popular blog) are implying that this LED Light strip can add and improve on existing lighting which is simply incorrect.
The picture to the above/left shows the TMC Flexi-Red LED Light mounted on an aquarium both at night with only the Red LED “on” and in Daylight with a TMC GroBeam also illuminated (‘On’). As you can see in operation with the GroBeam this Flexi-Red only provides subtle highlights of red (which might be great for some tetras, discus, etc.), however at night by itself this Flexi Red LED does add an interesting effect in the aquarium.
Please click on the picture to enlarge

*Blue Moon Aquatic 90-watt LED;

This is another Asian import that utilizes older technology in quantity to make up for what it lacks in new emitter technology quality.

As you can see with the picture/diagram below, this LED light is much to heavily weighted in the blue spectrum of light for an accurate PUR (Useful Light Energy).
I would only recommend these LED fixtures as a compliment to 6500 to 10,000K light and even then if you get a great deal, otherwise for 1/3 the wattage you have a much better LED light in the TMC AquaBeam 1000 Ultras or 1500 Ultimas.

*Aqua Illumination SOL;

The Aqua Illumination SOL is similar to the MaxSpect Aquarium LED lights in that they use good quality, albeit older generation Cree XP-G 6500K and blue/royal blue XP-E series LEDs (AI does not have the patent “rights” to the newest CRee emitters).
This LED fixture is marketed more on features rather than what is important: Useful Light Energy (PUR), NOT PAR only as some reviews may claim (see: “Useful Light Energy; PUR”).
This said, the AI Sol LEDs have interesting and admittedly cool features include proprietary 40 and 70 degree lenses and feature rich controllers. However even the controllers fall short in that they do not have a UPS feature in that if your power even “burbs”, all your programming can be lost and this is not a “good thing” if you are at work or worse out of town and now your lights no longer come on as programmed even when power is restored.

These too are reasonably capable LED lights for many lower light reef applications with many reporting reasonable results in part due to the higher electrical wattage used to overcome the inferior older generation LED emitters and lower kelvin daylight.

I recently was reading forum posts and noted a lady (at Reef Central) had read a lot of information and despite the plethora of good information, went with the bells and whistles of the AI Sol Blue over the facts of newer technology LED emitters in better kelvin temperatures for reef aquariums??
Sadly this does not have the correct balance of blue and higher kelvin daylight, nor is the PUR of the emitters of the capability of the newest CRee emitters not available to AI.
This LED is essentially an older version planted freshwater light combined with older version blue emitters (not something I would place on my reef aquarium)
It appears to me that the bells and whistles won out over facts, but hopefully since she mostly has fish (from what I read), this will not present too many issues with the few softies corals she does have.
See: http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?p=19668733&posted=1

My point is that that while the Aqua Illumination SOL is a good and capable LED light for basic reef aquariums, at the price charged for an inferior LED light, there is little reason to pay more and get less in my opinion.
As well, do not let bells and whistles win out over facts in your important aquarium lighting decision.

*EcoTech Radion;

This is a very nicely built with lots of interesting features, however when it gets down to the important PUR (Useful Light Energy), this LED falls short.
I watched a video promoting this that missed a key point and that is he only used a PAR meter which does not show PUR, which is most important and requires a spectrograph tor show more correctly.
See: Aquarium Lighting; Measuring PAR

This video review did show the Radion can maintain corals, but it is using the “shotgun approach” versus a direct approach of better LED emitters.
By “shotgun approach” I mean the common way in the past of lighting aquariums with multiple lamps of poor quality T8 bulbs to obtain the necessary light energy for photosynthetic life

See the Spectrograph below to see why:

The EcoTech Radion, emits a significant percentage of its light in the green and yellow spectrums, this is in part because EcoTech uses off the shelf (non patented) Cree cool white emitters as part of their array.

The other misleading aspects are the completely useless RGB, dimming, and capacitive touch ‘features’. Controlling your RGB (Red, Green, Blue) of your light has little bearing on obtaining the exacting nanometer spikes necessary for photosynthetic life.
There is no benefit from the RGB feature and in fact, they’re stressful/harmful to coral. The reason is above spectrograph output only holds true when the emitters are run at the operating voltage and current that they were designed for. As soon as that simple voltage rheostat is used (“control technology”)or RGB is altered, the spectral output changes.

The bottom line is while this LED fixture may be able to maintain corals (as with the “Marine Reef Capable”), this is done with poor shotgun approach when vastly better PUR fixed patented emitters are available in newer LED fixtures.

*E.Shine, Stark LED

E.Shine is a large producer of LED Fixtures that are probably the nicer design and generally better quality LEDs coming out of China.
E.Shine does not sell directly under their name, rather they market to retailers and distributors for their own branding.

Stark LED (distributed by Sea Dwelling Creatures of LA) is probably the most common marketer of this LED Fixture.

While E-Shine has updated their emitter bins (as of late 2011), they remain behind the industry leaders as E.Shine still uses older generation Cree Emitters (not having patent rights the latest emitters sold by Cree). In fact even E.Shine’s own web site admits that the older generation 3 watt CREE XG used for their Daylight Aquarium LED Lights vary from 8000~10,000K; not the exacting emitters used by high end LED fixtures that target specific nanometer wavelengths.
These emitters used by E.shine do NOT maintain the peak PUR necessary for delicate marine life, and instead have much more wasted yellow and green wavelengths.

E.Shine does a great job “pushing” these LEDs on companies looking to sell a nice looking product at a VERY good mark up, as I know of a friend in the business that gets these LEDs constantly marketed to him at prices that would allow for much better margins (since the emitters are low cost generic Cree emitters) than products such as TMC that have smaller margins. However he has rejected these out of integrity to sell newer generation LEDs, even if the profit margins are lower.

*Other LED Aquarium Lights (such as the Boost LED, Orphek);

There are many other LED lights coming fast onto the market, occasionally excellent, many good, many not so good, some a downright rip-off!
Knowing about what makes for correct Aquarium Lighting is quite helpful in making an informed decision.
I would also stress that even among the more effective new LEDs hitting the market (such as the BoostLED), these all have to compensate for inferior emitters with high amounts of wattage used, which in my humble opinion defeats a primary reason to use quality LED lighting for your Reef or planted freshwater aquarium; lower electrical consumption per output of useful light energy!.
Using 4.5 times the energy (wattage) to produce only 30% more PAR (as in the BoostLED versus TMC 1000 Ultra) makes little sense to me or most other aquarium professionals seeking the best lighting for their clients. This “shotgun” approach to aquarium lighting defeats the reasons to use LED lights (energy savings), one might as well use a good 150 Watt Metal Halide rather than a 135 Watt LED. A Few decades ago, the “shotgun approach” is all many aquarium keepers of high light planted or basic reef tanks had, so using eight 48 inch 40 watt “cool white” T12 lights to light one 60 gallon aquarium was sometimes necessary, but this is not necessary with many modern lights; so why go backwards when the technology is here?

For an example of a newer “excellent” LED Aquarium Light is the “Orphek PR-156 Reef Aquarium LED Light”.
Everything about this LED Light was engineered by them, including the actual diodes. Orphek’s PR-156 120 watt LED light contains 60 LEDs in 90 degree lenses running at 2 watts each within a 24″x 6″ x 2″ housing.
This LED is quite expensive (over $800), however it is designed for tanks over 30 inches in depth (replacing Metal Halides). The overall color temperature is about 16,000k (which is fine for a deeper tank, but too high for tanks under 24 inches IMO). The spectral range is greater than the common Cree or Luxeon LEDs used in many LED fixtures (this does not include the patented emitters used by TMC), starting at just around 400nm (violet) and spanning all of the way to 750nm.
This is a top notch LED Aquarium Light for deep reef tanks, however I do not agree with a couple aspects of this design of this light and that is its emphasis on CRI (Color Rendering Index), as this is more important to what we see and not what the symbiotic zooanthellic algae within corals actually require. While I realize that the popular fad of fading/dimming LEDs for sunrise/sunset is simply that; a fad (there is no scientific basis that this aids corals), I also do not agree Orphek’s use of “blue” lights for moon light phase, which is also just a fad with no scientific basis in fact. So once you get past the hype, this is still an excellent LED for those with deep tanks that may otherwise use a 400 Watt MH, assuming you can obtain these LED Aquarium Lights

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LED REVIEW SUMMARY

Emitter bins used in LED Lights are improving rapidly, although I am sure at some point these will hit the technology ceiling.
In the mean time, one can be certain of one thing, the best emitters are going to be patented and one is not going to find these in many of the cheapie knock offs.
Another issue is that some companies are practicing patent infringement to close this technology gap. Purchasing these LED Aquarium Lights is not only a moral decision, but also many of these “stolen technology” LEDs are cheaply made and once these LEDs are legally closed down, the person who did not care about the moral issue, will likely face the problem of a light that fails to work long term with no customer support. This will result in these knock off LEDs being useless and not the bargain one might think when purchasing.

Finally, also realize the most important light measurement is “Useful Light Energy” or PUR and although I recommend the use of PAR Meters as a measurement of any aquarium lighting fixture, in the end this is still not 100% accurate, especially when one compares the best emitter bins to many of the older emitter bins used by the cheaper Chinese or similar LED lights. Often the “cheap” LEDs produce considerably more useless green/yellow light and are bottom heavy in the Blue Spectrum.
So consider whether your so-called “deal” of a LED Light is really a deal at all or look at it this way: would you use multiple LED Flashlights you can purchase at Walmart to light your Reef or planted Aquarium? Although this analogy is a bit exaggerated, it is still a reasonable analogy when one considers current technology advances and the costs of developing these advances.

For further Aquarium Lighting information, I strongly suggest reading this long, but in depth article:
“Aquarium Lighting”
While making recommendations; if your aquarium has a UV Sterilizer for Disease Prevention and Redox Balance, I recommend changing your UV-C Bulbs every six months for maximum performance and this and this is the place for premium UV Bulbs

Copyright 2011, By Steven Wright