New Xitanium Mains Dimmable Drivers

[Mash]

Just came across this press release, which is very promising.
Basically upto now I knew of only one Mains Dimmable Driver for LED applications. Ie you can dim your setup by conventional trailing-edge dimmers, on the mains input side. Ie no more complicated circuits, or wiring for additional pots etc.
Here is the press release:
http://www.ledsmagazine.com/press/17004

However the Philips website is a huge huge mess (ironically they have a user satisfaction survery on their site, which happens to crash on the second page of questions!), and Xitanium doesnt even show up in their searches, and the AdvancedTransformer site doesnt seem to have updated Xitaniums past 2004!

Hope this helps someone with their future setups!

 

[ManBearPig]

My house has some dimmable mr-11 outdoor accent lighting. The bulbs burn out too quickly and its a pain to get out the extention ladder to change them. So with this gizmo I could change out my mr-11's with leds and still be able to dim them?

 

[SafetyBob]

Let's hope they bring these to market quickly (I could use a few).

I did finally get a link (have it somewhere) that did work with actual part numbers for dimmers for the Xitanium transformers that were all expensive electronically controlled dimmers as part of a system from a number of manufacturers. Bottom line, all way to expensive and complicated for our use.

Anyone seeing these, please advise us.

Bob E.

 

[Hamburger]

And lets hope that they sell it at a resonable price too.
I mean those Osram LED electronic parts are way to expensive.

 

[Mash]

From what I seem to understand and have researched, all the previous dimmable drivers from all manufacturers (except the one below), needed either an external pot, or a 0-10V signal input, or a PWM circuit to control the dimming. Apart from one driver from Lumotech, which seems to do the same job as these new xitaniums.
The older drivers (especially Xitaniums), were mainly intended for use in public and/or serious installations, where you had computer, DMX, etc controlling, which supplied the dimming signal. SO they were unsuitable for more simpler home use.
With the rising interest in residential LED lighting, now they are moving to simpler setups and making products, where one switch can control the on/off as well as dimming, like the whole world is used to with incan setups. This way they can also be integrated much more easily in automated home setups, where the dimmers of the system can now just be connected to the new driver and voila we have an LED setup.

So for example in answer to ManBearPig's question, now he can remove all his incans, replace them with LED's (NOTE: you need to replace them with just bare LEDs, or LED spotlamps etc which are meant to run off drivers. For use with xitaniums etc, DONT get replacement MR11s with LEDs. These ones are meant to be used with existing setups, and have driver circuitry inside each module, so they can not be used with constant current drivers that we are discussing here.)

BTW did anyone tried navigating the Philips website? FInd anything AT ALL? I didnt find the xitaniums, but did find some very nice looking light fixtures here.