Headlamps vs. "clip on" 1 or 2 AA lights

I read the thread where Seaward explained that the most useful light during a recent camping trip turned out to be a headlamp. It seems that when battery conservation is important, a simple 1 AA flashlight with some sort of hat clip makes more sense. (There are even headbands that allow for a small light to be inserted into a sleeve, turning them into "headlamps")

One advantage of headlamps is that most are brighter than the average 1x AA flashlight. But that also usually translates into more batteries. A 1x AA won't be as bright as the average headlamp, but it only uses one battery compared ot the headlamp's 2 or 3 or 4 AAs. And headlamp runtimes are generally not as good as some of the longer runtime 1x AA flashlights (depends on which lights your comparing of course).

A flashlight clipped to a ball cap or worn in a headband may not be quite as useful as a headlamp for certain tasks, but you can still see well enough to navigate, and get 3 times the runtime on the same number of batteries. For me, that's the main drawback of headlamps. ...whatever, just gabbing

To your point I use my L1 red w/ beamshaper clipped to a baseball cap sometimes. I also have a Gerber triode which is a regulated single AAA headlamp which can also be clipped to a baseball cap. Four 5mm LEDS, decent throw, and two power settings to boot. Not bad for a freebie thrown in when I bought a Gerber camp axe!

A decent 1 AA or AAA headlamp might be more practical but they seem to be pretty scarce. Most seem to use two or more cells, though I haven't done a hard search on it yet.

paulr has been lobbying for a manufacturer to come up with a decent lightweight 1 AA headlamp for a long time. I agree and would love to see one with a nicely tinted mildly driven LED geared toward closeup work/reading/total dark navagation. An underdriven luxeon or cree xLamp would fit the bill. The key would be making the headlamp as compact and lightweight as possible so that it would stow easily and be comfortable with just a single soft head strap.

Somehow, I feel that the likely first makers of the single AA headlight will come from Fenix.

Those tiny clip on lights are very handy camping units when you just need the light of 3 or 4 leds to light up the path to the outhouse/kybo/latrine.
They may not be top level equipment but they get the job done when you need to get your job done.

Speaking of headlamps and baseball caps, i don't know if any of you have seen this, but last week at Target I saw - get this - a red and black baseball cap with four leds actually *integrated* into the hat itself. no kidding. there's two switches on the back, which activates led's on the front - one turns on the two white ones, the other turns on the two red ones. the red ones are spaced too far apart, in my opinion, so it comes out as two separate circles of light, but the white ones are close enough together to create a single beam.

but for $15, it might be fun just to pick up and play w/.

i don't recommend wearing it in the rain tho =D