FENIX's Next step after the Q5

[brightnorm]

They have introduced LEDs of increasing brightness step by step. I'm very curious to know what they are planning for their next presentation. Based on their history I'm confident it will be noticeably more efficient/brighter than the Q5, but I haven't seen any information about this, or perhaps I've missed a thread.

FourSevens, can you enlighten us?

Brightnorm

 

[WadeF]

We may see R2 Fenix lights at some point, but probably not until Fenix feels there is a large enough supply of R2's in the tint bins they accept.

 

[Hitthespot]

Q6

Seriously I think we will see R2's pretty soon.

Bill

 

[brightnorm]

Would R2's provide an increase over the Q5 proportional to the Q5's increase over its predecessor?

BN

 

[Hitthespot]

There is a list somewhere that gives the increase on each of the emitters. I'm sure with some searching you can find it.

Bill

 

[Hans]

Seriously I think we will see R2's pretty soon.

So do I. In fact, I heard from someone who should know that there'll be a Fenix with an R2 in the not too distant future ...

Hans

 

[StarHalo]

When it comes to the future of Cree bins, you have to take into account the amount of difference/gain in lumens between each bin. Let's take a look at the Cree bin guide:

So we're currently at Q5 (and in a few rare instances, R2) and the chart shows what we can expect in the future all the way out to the R4 bins. So here's the final net difference for the flashlight user - We know the Fenix L0D, for example, uses the Q4 emitter and is rated at 75 lumens, so what if we dropped a Q5 into it? According to the chart, the difference between the Q4 and Q5 bins is right around 7%, so extrapolating from that (7% over 75 lumens) the finshed L0D Q5 would put out 80 lumens, or five lumens more than the Q4.

"Is that good?" Well not really, and here's why - the human perception of light is logarithmic; meaning in order for you to perceive something as being twice as bright, it actually has to be *four times* as bright! So to make our example Fenix L0D appear twice as bright, it'd have to put out an unbelieveable 300 LUMENS! And that's not going to happen anytime soon off of a single AAA battery.

What if we took it to the extreme and went into the future to acquire a prototype R4 emitter for our L0D? Again going by the chart numbers, the R4 is 30% brighter than the Q4 (a long ways from 400%) which would give you a grand total of 98 lumens - not even enough of a gain for you to be able to distinguish between the two bins visually.

 

[BentHeadTX]

I hear Fenix L2D Q5 Service Pack 1 is being released this week.

 

[Kiessling]

StarHalo ... I really appreciate the reality check here. I think bazillions of CPFers are completely waisting their flashaholic energy with the hunt for the "bin of the day", not realizing how completely and utterly in vain this is from a realistic point of view.
Meanwhile, they might well miss more important flashaholic things than a 7% increase in brightness.
bernie

 

[Mike Painter]

What if we took it to the extreme and went into the future to acquire a prototype R4 emitter for our L0D? Again going by the chart numbers, the R4 is 30% brighter than the Q4 (a long ways from 400%) which would give you a grand total of 98 lumens - not even enough of a gain for you to be able to distinguish between the two bins visually.

But it would mean longer battery life for the same emmision or a wider hot spot and in some cases the difference between seeing something and not seeing it at a distance

 

[asdalton]

"Is that good?" Well not really, and here's why - the human perception of light is logarithmic; meaning in order for you to perceive something as being twice as bright, it actually has to be *four times* as bright! So to make our example Fenix L0D appear twice as bright, it'd have to put out an unbelieveable 300 LUMENS!

This explanation of logarithmic sensitivity isn't quite correct. What it actually means is that the eye is sensitive to percent changes in brightness rather than simple differences. So a change from 1 lumen to 10 lumens (1000%) is much more significant than a change from 80 lumens to 89 lumens (11%)--even though the difference in output is 9 lumens in both cases.

A doubling of brightness is quite noticeable and is generally perceived as a doubling. However, my experience is that you usually have to go to a 4X change or more before you obtain a difference in practical usefulness. This is one reason why simple 2-level lights with high/very low are surprisingly useful.

You are right, of course, that the real-world differences between the newest brands and bins of power LEDs (Cree, Seoul, Rebel, K2 TFFC) are small. (It's not small for these LEDs versus the old Luxeon I/III/V/K2.) The small percentage differences in advertised output are part of the reason. Another is that the regulator can make a big difference regarding the overall battery efficiency of a flashlight.

 

[brightnorm]

I read somewhere on CPF that people can distinguish a 20% difference in brightness level. I don't recall whether that was an AB comparison or in general usage but assuming it's a valid figure, 107 + 20% = 128.4. Considering that an increase from 107 to 114 is only +7%, it looks like I'll continue to get excellent use out of my Q5's (and Q4's and my brighter Seouls) for quite a while.

Brightnorm

 

[learnyee]

I hear Fenix L2D Q5 Service Pack 1 is being released this week.

Service pack 1? Is that somekind of Micro$oft product? Service packs apply to Flashlight too?

 

[IMSabbel]

"Is that good?" Well not really, and here's why - the human perception of light is logarithmic; meaning in order for you to perceive something as being twice as bright, it actually has to be *four times* as bright! So to make our example Fenix L0D appear twice as bright, it'd have to put out an unbelieveable 300 LUMENS! And that's not going to happen anytime soon off of a single AAA battery.

While the rest of your comment was more or less true, you seem to have no idea what "logarithmic" means, and neither a grasp on when it is relevant and when not.

Edit: Well, it has been explained by others how to really understand the "logartihmic" part.
Maybe you just thought about the r^-2 relationship to link throw to output?

 

[StarHalo]

StarHalo ... I really appreciate the reality check here.

TY Kiessling. A few days ago I came up with the idea of having a "form letter response" to those topics that keep popping up every few days, usually with such frequency that no one cares to respond in full; As is usually the case, someone asks an earnest question, and all they get back is a handful of short, unproductive posts, maybe a couple of links to "go read about it", etc. It would be more helpful to provide a thorough and concise single post, sort of like a study/cheat sheet, something that would give the reader a quick but solid understanding of the subject.

Another benefit of this method is that it could be refined over time - I think Asdalton and Brightnorm's brightness/percentage concept is more concise and understandable than logarithms, so I'll use that explanation the next time I post the "form". I also have a form for lubricants, and I'm hoping that there it might help to gather objective empirical data on how various lubes actually compare to one another, rather than the usual "I use Brand X and it works. The end."

you seem to have no idea what "logarithmic" means

I know what logarithmic means, thank you for your example of an unproductive post.

 

[glenda17]

Fenix doesn't need brighter emitters, they need LED's w/out rings. Hopefully the R-bins take care of this?

 

[BentHeadTX]

Service pack 1? Is that somekind of Micro$oft product? Service packs apply to Flashlight too?

Yeah, but they are a serious pain in the butt to install! Guess how long it takes to upload 41.2 megs of binary data when you have to twist on (1) and twist off (0)