Seoul Semiconductor squeezes 240 lumens into "brightest" LED

LEDs have been beating up on all the other little light sources in that little light sources school yard of theirs for a few years now, but Seoul Semiconductor just bumped the stakes and made those fluorescent and incandescent nerds look downright lame. SSC's new P4 LED product emits 240 lumens at 1A, and claims the industry's highest efficacy (fancy word for ratio of visible light to overall electromagnetic radiation, including heat): up to 100lm/W@360mA. In comparison, fluorescent manages 70lm/W and incandescent pulls a mere 15lm/W. The LED is designed for all sorts of applications, from flashlights to traffic signals, but we're particularly looking forward to this thing showing up in projectors and LCD backlights. Just to rub it in, Seoul Semiconductor has plans for 135lm/W by 2007 and 145lm/W by Q1 2008, so we'd start shopping for sunglasses now if we were you.

[Nick Nelson @ Dec 12th 2006 3:47PM]

I guess Seoul Semiconductor has a bright future ahead of them!

Haha, you see what I did there, get it? BRIGHT!! Oh man, that's rich.

[Chuckles McGee @ Dec 12th 2006 4:43PM]

And after seeing this bright future, I'm sure we'll say that Seoul Semiconductor has led the way in illuminating energy efficient options.


Ahhhha "LED" the way! "illuminating"! *nudge nudge wink wink*

[hickhamt @ Sep 21st 2007 3:50PM]

say no more, say no more..... HA!..
no really... say no more... i cant handle this comedy.. it's just too good!!

[Brian @ Dec 12th 2006 3:52PM]

That's not what efficacy means, generally.

[Andy @ Dec 12th 2006 5:47PM]

I was thinking the same thing. They may mean efficiency. Efficacy should be just how much of the job gets done no matter energy waste. Efficiency is some efficacy (not necessarily the highest) achieved with the least amount of work (energy) required for that particular task.

[stefan wolf @ Sep 21st 2007 1:02PM]

Efficacity/efficacy: Doing the right things.
Efficiency: Doing things right.

[CharlieX @ Dec 12th 2006 3:56PM]

Stuff like this is great for industrial lighting like street lamps, outside lighting.... too bad you can't get full spectrum light out of LED's - I'd fill the home and office with them.

[Gil @ Dec 12th 2006 4:08PM]

One red, one green, one blue. Mix them and you get any color you want.

[MattF @ Dec 12th 2006 5:19PM]

Well, technically you don't get the full spectrum from fluorescent lamps either, but those have started to spread into residential use.

There may be ways to simulate more of the spectrum by using many LEDs and integral controllers in a small lamp.

AFAIK, the biggest stumbling block to LEDs was widespread lamps was efficacy, and it looks like that is starting to crumble. And btw, I always thought of efficacy as the ratio of light output to energy required, hence lm/W.

[Nick Nelson @ Dec 12th 2006 4:04PM]

Sorry about that, but seriously this would be really awesome if they could pack in about 500 lumens and then a diffuser to spread the light around more evenly, all in a really thin package. Is that asking too much?

[David @ Dec 12th 2006 8:09PM]

Nope, that's called a backlight :D

Maybe not so bright, but it's the same thing, they have really sweet diffusers in them.

[Brandon West @ Dec 12th 2006 4:24PM]

When life hands you lumens, make lumenade ?

[Yem @ Dec 12th 2006 4:32PM]

How does this compare to Lumileds Luxeon series?

[mb @ Dec 12th 2006 9:33PM]

Brighter.

[Mario Mejia @ Dec 12th 2006 4:45PM]

Brandon West, you are my hero!

[andy @ Dec 12th 2006 5:29PM]

Biggest problem with LED's for residential use has been the amount of light they produce and the need for the DC transformer. The narrow spectrum bothers some people as well. You know, incandescent lamps aren't 'full' spectrum like sunlight either.

This is a good step in teh right direction.


I can't wait for a 1mil hour lamp on an LCD projector with inorganic panels (new panny's). The reduced power consumption, reduced heat, smaller package and lower cost of ownership will be an unbelieveable step forward.

[CharlieX @ Dec 12th 2006 5:30PM]

Exactly - we use those compact flo bulbs where we can - but in the design studio they are banned for obvious reasons.

I know Phillips has a line of LED bulbs that screw into the standard edison plug - and they've got "white" ones which are great for outdoor lighting, or in the garage, etc... not cheap per lumen, but the power draw is less than a comparable fluorescent.

[brock_samson @ Dec 12th 2006 5:29PM]

MY THOSE WOULD BE GREAT FOR GROWLIGHTS

[mystars99 @ Dec 12th 2006 5:57PM]

Actually, fluorescent tubes are greater than 100 lms/w. A single 28 Watt T5 (something that would be in an office) is at about 103 lms/w. It also puts out over 2750 lumens.

@Andy: The problem is that it's very hard to adapt old light fixtures to newer technologies. Where would you screw in an LED into a desk lamp? You could either create something that looks like an incandescent (A-shape lamp) or become even more efficient and create a whole new fixture. It's hard to convince people to swap out the incandescents for compact fluorescents. And (yeah right...) if everyone had solar panels, there would be no need for a transformer.

$MattF: LEDs have surpassed incandescent for years. The trouble is that the colors tend to shift at different rates and though they last for 5x a fluorescent, the light output at the end of their life is about half of what it was initially. Also getting the heat away is a huge issue (basically all other light sources like it warmer). Also, studies have been done that show that the same color rendering metrics on other sources can't be applied to LEDs (basically people tend to like what would be considered the worst).

[mystars99 @ Dec 12th 2006 6:20PM]

Another thing I just realized: It's 100 lm/w at 0.360A, but it produces the peak 240 lumens at 1A. I don't think that the LED would last very long at almost triple the rated current, and I wonder how much light it puts out at its most efficient current rating. The press release changes units part way through.

[Richard @ Dec 12th 2006 9:01PM]

@mystars99: (2750 lumens)/(28 watts) =~ 98 lm/W. The 103 lm/W figure for that bulb may be somewhat overstated.

[Mike @ Dec 12th 2006 11:22PM]

Richard,
google for Philips T5 Silhouette Brochure, they claim up to 104 lumens/watt and "Lumen maintenance of T5 Linear lamps is 95% at 8,000 burning hours (40% of rated average life)"

[trentblase @ Dec 13th 2006 1:48AM]

I know you were all wondering, so I looked it up. Ideal conversion to 555nm (green-yellow) would be 683 lumen/watt. So in terms of overall visible light efficiency, they are at approximately 15% (very rough estimate)

[Philip @ Dec 13th 2006 1:52AM]

Lest we forget our good friend the sodium vapor lamp, current monarch of lumens per watt. The closest balanced light in terms of visible spectrum, meaning more closely replicating the color bands of sunlight, is still the standard incandescent type, followed by metal halide and then fluorescent light. Led's, no matter if they are a mix of R, G, and B led's, cannot as closely replicate the spectrum banding of natural sunlight. For referance, light sources are most commonly categorized by their CRI rating or color rendering index. At least this is the case for architectural applications.


CRI wiki entry - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_rendering_index

Sodium Vapor Lamp - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_vapor_lamp

[craig @ Dec 13th 2006 8:12AM]

"You know, incandescent lamps aren't 'full' spectrum like sunlight either."

Yes, they are! Incandescent lamps are blackbody radiators with a CRI of 100, they just don't offer the same color temperature as daylight. High color temperature halogens are as good as you get for "full spectrum" artificial light (although there are specialized metal halides that come very close). Halogens ARE incandecent lamps.

http://www.fullspectrumsolutions.com/cri_explained.htm