LED Pars

[paulears]

Thomann do the Showtec 153 led PAR64 size versions and an other unbranded 153 led PAR56 size version - about £20 different in price.

 

I just ordered a dozen from Thomann for a project - the daft thing is that getting power to them cost me over £100. The Thomann stock has europlugs, so that means 12 new plugs, 12 short plug to sockets, a couple of small 6 way distros, and a dozen XLR-XLRs. (Thank you CPC - who delivered at 9.30 am, pretty good when I only ordered them at 6pm the evening before!)

[Tom Baldwin]

Thomann do the Showtec 153 led PAR64 size versions and an other unbranded 153 led PAR56 size version - about £20 different in price.

 

The PAR 56 one is also Showtec - their name is in the description, although not the headline, and having ordered one, I can confirm that what turns up is in a Showtec box...

 

I'd imagine they're the same in terms of performance...

[peternewman]

The PAR 56 one is also Showtec - their name is in the description, although not the headline, and having ordered one, I can confirm that what turns up is in a Showtec box...

Not always, during the last year I've purchased four Eurolite 56's from them. Although as always seems to be the way they appear to have stopped selling them, the black one isn't listed any more, and the silver one (here) is currently out of stock.

 

Interestingly the Showtec one looks very similar, although the Eurolite has 151 LED's (at least that's what the box says, I'm not counting).

 

It seems the mystery deepens, I've just checked the order codes, and the code for the first two I got (November 2005) now returns an error that the product doesn't exist on the site. The code for the more recent two (April 2006) takes you to the listing mentioning Showtec. The more recent two also have black coated PCB's, rather than the white of the original pair.

 

So a question for anyone with Showtec 56 LED's, do they have a dimmer channel like the 64's?

 

PN

[niclights]

A dimmer channel? Do the 64's have these? Channels for Showtec P56 LED are 1) Red, 2) Green, 3) Blue, 4) Combined colours, 5) Strobe, 6) Effects (ie. sound-light etc.)

[JamesRF]

I've read this post with interest as we have invested in LED fixtures from Pulsar, CK and ChromaQ.

My point would be that buying in 'cheap' brands from China fuels the problem of counterfeiting as a whole, there may not be much publicity for our industry, unlike that enjoyed by Football shirt makers and the like, but we all (I feel) have a responsibility to invest within our own industry, and not fuel what is becoming a 'grey' market. These 'cheap' alternatives are often poor quality (lets not even start on the subject of actual life expectancy for LED's!), but more than that they take revenues away from the companies who have invested a lot of time and money in bringing these types of product to market.

I can't tell you all to not buy this stuff, but I would ask people to think when buying that 'cheap' alternative.

Oh, and no I don't work for any of the above companies, and any opinions expressed here are just my own, and I'm not pointing any fingers at any particular company, just trying to raise a bit of an issue.

 

To quote:

 

"[/mini-rant]" ;)

[niclights]

Interesting point. I think the 'you get what you pay for' is taken as given here, but much as I can't believe how cheap the Chinese units are, I similarly can't believe how expensive some of the 'local' ones are! Maybe if the difference was less then supporting local economy would be more realistic.

[JamesRF]

The reason for the difference in price is exactly the same here as it is with anything: cost of labour followed by investment in R&D.

There is no doubt that 'you get what you pay for'; in this case put an unbranded LED par against a Thomas Pixel par and I'm sure you'll see the difference! And, yes, the difference in cost is just as noticeable!

Chinese labour is cheap (and again, let's not get into the moral discussion of China's politics!), and they are not spending large sums on R&D, so they can sell the product cheap.

It's not clear-cut, but certainly worth considering when making a purchase.

 

Anyway, it is Friday, and unless your at a gig you should be in the pub or you'll never get your RFL status ;)

[paulears]

A dimmer channel? Do the 64's have these? Channels for Showtec P56 LED are 1) Red, 2) Green, 3) Blue, 4) Combined colours, 5) Strobe, 6) Effects (ie. sound-light etc.)

 

The manual indicates 5 channels.

 

As for the price - I have no real problem with quality kit made in the UK, but I'm finding it increasingly amusing how when people suddenly discover a favourite item is made in a cheap labour country everyone gets upset. Shure mics switched to Mexico, Mackie have now gone 'overseas'. If labout costs here mean that value for money is not so good, I can live with it. I have a number of pieces of kit that are made in these dreadful places. Maybe I've been lucky, but I've had very few problems.

 

The thing I found rather silly was the cheapish Russian mics from Oktava - I have a couple of their large format ones - they are now being copied by a chinese company.

 

paul

 

a link to my thread on fixture writing for these units

[dbuckley]

... LED fixtures from Pulsar, CK and ChromaQ.

... but more than that they take revenues away from the companies who have invested a lot of time and money in bringing these types of product to market.

 

Yes, but everyone hates CK. No tears will be shed (is that the right spelling?) for them not making quite as much money as they wished.

[Light Console]

;) Hi Reecepro,

Without going too far off topic, many venues, and individuals need to look at the cost/quality ratio in that order. I bought 6 cheap LED units just for a show, which I was not going to get paid for, so cost was more important. The quality is not great, but the effect was amazing, and I have now managed to get most of the money back on paid hires. When I bought my modest PA in phases, I bought new high quality kit from a local guitar shop, having researched it on the net before.

I certainly do not like the idea that one company can spend years developing a product, only for someone to pinch the design and make it for next to nothing, however it does mean that everyone can get a go on some toys.

"There are none so robbed as those that get too much for their money!"

[niclights]

@Paulears: Nice manual. The paper version is one piece A4 photocopied! Either they changed it recently or it's wrong. Funny that it begins by stating that it is 4 channel, even when describing DMX addressing and then proceeds to detail the 5 channels on the same page. Doh! Anyway, my units are 6 channel.

 

@reecepro: I understood the reasons for the cost (up to a point), but the fact remains people will probably buy cheap. Don't get me wrong - I'm the first one to talk about false economy and would not consider using these imports in a live show situation - the more expensive units are significantly better in both output and control. I also have Pulsar fixtures which are great (apart from the control. Grrr!) and I am currently considering some SGM units. But in situations where I don't need such perfect output/control etc. I will always try to get the most for my money. It would be nice to support the local economy, but this just isn't realistic. I will consider cost against output, control, rigging, build quality, longevity, power consumption, maintainance and service/support but not where it's made. Sorry!

 

Anyway. This is horribly offtopic. As for the pub - I was pre-setup when I wrote that, though personally I can't think of many worse places to be on a Friday night....

[peternewman]

Anyway, my units are 6 channel.

Are yours still Showtec units?

 

I checked the Avo personalities, and indeed neither Showtec has a dimmer channel (although the six channel version includes a strobe channel, which is probably what I was remembering).

 

On a related note do any of the sub £100 units come with a built in dimmer channel?

 

PN

[niclights]

Yes. Definitely Showtec.

 

I'm not aware of any cheap units that support a dimmer channel. I did find a few manufacturers at Plasa that had implemented, but they weren't making this sort of product. I'm 99% certain that all these various labelled LED pars are the same units.

Also, before anyone asks, the strobe channel cannot be used as a shutter for on/off.

 

If you find any units that do support dimmer pls let me know! ;)

[Tomo]

It would be plausible to make a converter box that takes HSI inputs and changes them to RGB - some newer lighting desks have this as an option when patching RGB fixtures.

 

Might look into that - the conversion is computationally expensive as there are several divisions, but you've got lots of time to do it in during the break.

[niclights]

More valuable IMHO would be a box that takes 4 channels and outputs as three with one channel (ie. dimmer) multiplying the other 3 by x%. I have suggested this before. This introduces questions over how many groups of channels might a box like this convert, how channels are layed out, addressing etc etc. But the basic principal would seem to work.