HID/Halogen in the home? On the cheap?

[Mark_Larson]

So i followed a link to www.bulbs.com and like a good little Flashaholic, i immediately began to think of the possibilities of putting HID (Metal Halide, Sodium, Mercury etc) in the home - i can never have too much bright white light. Right now i use a Shoplite with the standard white tubes.

So anyone used HID in the home? Is it worth it? What about color rendition? Is it too harsh?

Could someone direct me to some basics sites that explain Metal Halide etc, what kind of color they produce (the yellow-orange ones are Sodium right?), and how to set up a HID or Halogen system. I talk about Halogen because its kinda cool to have a spotlight or two in the room. [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

[Willmore]

Start off at:
http://members.misty.com/don/

You remind me that I've always meant to put a low wattage sodium lamp in the bathroom. They take a nice 10 minutes or so to warm up, so the transition from dark to light won't be as bad as flipping on a light.

I've got some 70W HID bulbs that I need to make/find ballasts for. *sigh* Long term project...