<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by hotfoot:
I thought Lumileds upped the input current spec on the HDs to 400ma to get 30 lumen (vs 350ma for the LD). Does anyone have any definitive info here? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
Yes.
OK. OK. I will say a little. The HD parts utilize several improvments. One is EOS, which is the improved phosphor application. EOS is Easy tO Spot
. It is just an internal code name actually. But they are easy to spot compared to the non-EOS. The die has a much thinner coating of phosphor and it is only applied to the die, not the reflector. The pre-EOS where positively gooped with phosphor. The beam is much smoother and the color more even. No more greenish rings.
One potential downside is with the optics, the beam has a square and a circle pattern. This is similar to the colored LSs in appearance. This means we need to line the die square up with the lens circle during manufacturing. This is true for both the para optics and the nx-05 optics. A plus is that more of the output is concentrated in the center of the beam so it projects further and allows you to make out details at a greater distance. The general increase in output is nice too.
The beam now has a more "ideal flashlight" distribution to it. Meaning that more than half the output is in a tight center spot and the rest of the output in a soft but very useful peripheal corona. In application, this combination is very usefull.
I venture to say that some of the increased efficiency is a direct result of the thinner phosphor layer. But the die itself is also more efficient. The spec sheet say the average efficiency is 18lm/W, which is same as for the LD parts. The HD whites are obviously brighter than the LD parts so I expect the spec sheet to morph like the LD specs did last year when they first came out.
Maximum continous current is still specified to be 350mA and the maximum temp is still at 120 degrees celsius. The data sheets for this part are now available.
Of course, the million dollar question is always: when will these ship? Lumileds says that they will ship in a month or two, but I tend to expect things to take a little longer than that. We are projecting November for limited quantities. Price to flashlight will initially be higher, but should settle down after that.
Peter