How Good Are These LED Flashlights

paulr

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Well, there's the reviewers' opinions, and there's other CPF'ers opinions, but the opinion that should matter the most to you is your own opinion. Also, if you've already bought the lights, it's a little bit late to start asking advice about buying them ;). Welcome to CPF and we hope you'll stay a while; just keep your hands on your wallet. This hobby gets expensive sometimes.
 

InfidelCastro

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Everyone likes the X5! Cool all around lights and good battery drainers. I've never heard of the other light, but it looks interesting.
 

Bowen

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paulr said:
Well, there's the reviewers' opinions, and there's other CPF'ers opinions, but the opinion that should matter the most to you is your own opinion. Also, if you've already bought the lights, it's a little bit late to start asking advice about buying them ;). Welcome to CPF and we hope you'll stay a while; just keep your hands on your wallet. This hobby gets expensive sometimes.

Well I ordered these lights based on the reviews I've read about them. No store carries these where I'm at so I have to go on research. I was going to get the Streamlight Propoly 4 but I see quite a few people have these things partially go bad or completely so I decided to stick with the X5 for quality and the Teknolite for decent battery life.
 

Bowen

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InfidelCastro said:
Everyone likes the X5! Cool all around lights and good battery drainers. I've never heard of the other light, but it looks interesting.

Cool, I look forward to getting it.
 

sniper

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Bowen: It looks like you made good choices, to me. Very rugged and useful lights. I would think Quickbeam's comment ..."sinks like a rock..." applies to most lights out there.
 

AtomicX

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Bowen... The Propolymer 4AA that uses 7 led's was the problem child. The Luxeon model ROCKS ! I don't know much about the xenon model. The one that recieves rave reviews from everyone (including myself) is the 1 watt Luxeon. Hope this helps clear up the mixup.... cheers and happy holidays !
 

pr5owner

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i have the X5T it really is indesctructable, its really well made but it doesnt really put out much light, it has horrible throw but the flood is good. i use it to work on my car in the dark.
 

greenLED

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I have an X5 HA; it's a really, really nice light (cosmetically). It works flawlessly, the beam is nice (and angry blue), good for draining old 123's dry, not a lot of "throw".
 

Bowen

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Thanx guys, it looks like I made good choices then. I wouldn't have ordered the X5T had I known the prices of 123A Lithium batteries cost $10 locally! I guess I can just order them online though. So far the cheapest prices I've seen for those are $2.50. If anyone knows of a reliable and cheaper place to get them from, that would be great!



I bought the LitePro Teknolite mainly for the good battery use. I realize it's output is not quite as good as the X5T but the battery use is far better, plus I have 3 sets of 2500 mAh rechargeable AA batteries that I had originally bought for our digital camera about 6 months ago so I at least have 6 batteries I can switch back and forth for the Teklite.



I needed at least one good flashlight. Currently we only one flashlight for the whole house and it's a incandescent Aluminum Energizer that takes 4 AA batteries which last about....oh 4 hours max, I'd say....maybe less. I'm talking 4 hours completely drains the batteries. It probably only has around 1 hour of good light. So as you can see we needed a good light.



I was going to get Streamlite ProPolymer 4-AA LED flashlight until I read so many reviews of them going bad. Had that flashlight been reliable, I would have bought that over the Teklite but as it stands now I think the Teklite is probably the best for output and battery use. I was going to get Lightwave before anything else and I know the battery life is even better but the output isn't as good as the Teklite and certainly less than the X5T.



Anyway it looks like in the near future the way technology is going, you'll be able to buy a LED flashlight that will be brighter than a D cell incandescent MAGlight, last longer than a Lightwave 4000 and have it only take 1 AA battery to do all of this! Yeah, I know, I may be new to this but something like that is the "Holy Grail" of Flashlights huh?



This is OT but I think the coolest looking LED flashlight I've seen so far is the Lumaray FL6. Nothing like having a flashlight that looks like a lightsaber. The Longbow lights look like sabers a bit too.
 

AtomicX

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Hi Bowen... you missed my last post, read back. ProPolymer 4AA "Luxeon" is VERY reliable and one of the best available for general use. The 7 LED model was the problem, not the Luxeon. Cheers! happy holidays.
 

carrot

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Bowen, I buy boxes of Surefire 123A batteries on eBay or Titanium CR123A batteries from Amondotech.com -- it's only $1 per battery, and shipping is a flat rate of $6 (even if you order tons of stuff from them). Amondotech ships pretty fast, I get my stuff within a week or a week and a half (I think).

There's also Batterystation, but I haven't bought any from them -- lots of other CPFers have, though.
 

Bowen

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AtomicX said:
Hi Bowen... you missed my last post, read back. ProPolymer 4AA "Luxeon" is VERY reliable and one of the best available for general use. The 7 LED model was the problem, not the Luxeon. Cheers! happy holidays.

No I did read your post, it's just that the Luxeon variant's battery life isn't so hot. If it was then I'd get that in a heartbeat! I'm looking for the best combo of lighting vs battery life. It's too bad the 7 LED had those problems because it would probably be one of the very best or best for the battery vs lighting!
 

Bowen

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carrot said:
Bowen, I buy boxes of Surefire 123A batteries on eBay or Titanium CR123A batteries from Amondotech.com -- it's only $1 per battery, and shipping is a flat rate of $6 (even if you order tons of stuff from them). Amondotech ships pretty fast, I get my stuff within a week or a week and a half (I think).

There's also Batterystation, but I haven't bought any from them -- lots of other CPFers have, though.

Thanx, I'll bookmark those sites! I think it's a load of crap for the local stores to have them priced so high, yet online stores have them so much cheap.

Oh and for the Inova X5T, does it use 1.5v or 3v CR123A Lithium batteries? I don't want to blow the thing by overpowering it. Thanx
 
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Anders

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Hi Bowen!

The x5 use 2x 3v CR123A but you maybe can use 17670 = 168S in that light?
I don't know because i don't have one, but i have T3 and protected 17670 from AW fit in the light now after that i made the batterytube little larger with sandpaper.
 

leukos

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Bowen,

You made fine choices. Neither will be a "wow" light as far as output, but I think you find them (especially the X5T) to be very practical hard working lights. Enjoy! :)
 

JDJ

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I think the X5 is a great light for flooding a room at night when investigating the leftovers in the fridge and as a good glovebox light. The flood is fairly even and the 123s last a long time in storage. It's bright enough for lots of applications, IMO -- if you don't agree, try staring into the beam. You will see five tiny dots for about 5 minutes thereafter.
 

Bowen

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Thanx guys, I'll have to wait until next week before they even ship them. I hope I get them next week too!
 
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