Theres a decent 480w light in Amazon for 500$ brand name: Hyphotonflux. I got it for a bit cheaper and its not top of the line or anything but it’s been a good light for me so far.
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That’s pretty expensive.
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I would stear clear of brands like marshydro and spiderfarmer. They’ve been shown to have fudged their specs a bit and theyre overpriced IMO. Just my 2 cents 
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I have a mars so I’m biased.
Migro did a test of the specs of many different lights and the mars TS was rated 2nd best value for money in terms of output.
Not “the best” light but certainly does the job.
And the tech has improved since then too.
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The one I bought said 1500 but 153 out of wall
This one a friend made same coming out of the wall 153 also
Ill admit, I have seen marshydro and spiderfarmer grow some beautiful plants
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I have an HLG too and it’s much sexier but the mars is my workhorse.
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LEDs can get quite pricey. But there’s some high quality lights out there. I wouldve diiiiiied if I won that Photontek 
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U know I’ve had EXCELLENT success running even the cheapo Amazon and eBay lights. The Viparspectra vb1000 is prob my fav all around unit for a quantum 100w board and normal price is around 70 on Amazon for it and now comes with a remote control for it on the new units. I got mine on eBay sniping the auctions with 3 min left on em and was picking em up for about 50 a piece . Bloomspect is prob my next fav . Bloom plus got one too and somehow managed to snag it for 27 bucks and even though it does perform well the build quality isn’t quite as good side by side with the two but both turned on I can’t tell a difference in output
Reality with most of the LEDs regardless of manufacturer is majority are using the industry standard Samsung 301 diodes and a sosen or mean well driver. Don’t always need to spend hundreds on a light for it to be good. Mars hlg, spiderfarmer,timber ect are typically gonna come with a price but I’d take 4 of the vb1000 boards for around 200 over spending 400-500 on a spiderfarmer sf4000 all day long and should see the same light output
I tested a lot of different “cheapo” units last year, 10 to be exact, so I’d be happy to share any info I can with ya if u still got questions.
Just stay the fuck away from wish. Got burned in 100 bucks last year scooping up lil shitty 45 watt lights they were claiming 2000 watts, some were cheap plastic and some were license plates stamped with less but trying to return to wish for false advertising and they back their sellers not the buyers and wouldn’t let me return em so learn from my mistake on that one
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Yeah. There are deals to be found on alibaba but you really need to know what you’re doing.
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Dont sleep on Viparsprectra. I have 3 of their lights and I love them. Another comparable brand is Sayhon.
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Well I thought it was crap they let the seller false advertise and when u try to start the return on " what I received doesn’t match the description" they wanna sit and tell ya u got the right thing and the specs match and if u still like to return to China it’s on my dime.
Nope I’ll stick to eBay that backs it’s buyers and doesn’t let shadey sellers get away with that crap
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Shit man they tried to do that to me at Home Depot 
But I agree.
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Which one(s) in Viparspectra do u got? I also got one of their blurple viparled vl-150, unfortunately it’s the last one I fire up out of the 10 cuz it’s a power hog at 330w at the wall. Usually just run it only in veg channel to cut power in half if I do gotta use it but for 40 bucks on eBay it was tough not to drop that bid
I got one of their blurples as well, the TC600 and I use it the hell out of it. Then I got the XS1500 and the P2500. The XS series are very nice and I would’ve upgraded but I decided to go with a bar style light for better distribution
The TC600 is the coolest running light I have atm
Now first let me start by saying both my Viparspectra and my Mars lights were given to me by the companies for free. I am not a big Viparspectra fan. My XS2000 does an ok job but when I compare it to my Mars lights and my HLG lights it just under performs. Growth is not as good. Now I love my HLG 600 Rspec and it did an amazing job for me. I also really like the new Mars lights. The bar style FC models that is. I used and FC6500 and now and FC8000 and they both did an amazing job.
For your footprint @Cranio I would personally aim for between 650w and 800w as you have almost 25 square feet to light. I am running an FC8000 now and it is doing amazing in my 5x5. You could also go with multiple lights if you wish. That 460 watt light for 1700 is ridiculously overpriced. Here is a light on Amazon Australia, if it were me I might consider buying 2 of these. They can be daisy chained together, use Samsung diodes and 2 will give you 700 watts of power.
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Thanks for the info guys, here’s the light I was recommended it’s a 600w not 465 like i thought.
let me know what you guys think! It doesn’t use the Samsung diodes I think. Please let me know what you really think about it. I’ll go look up the others you guys mentioned and see if I can get them over here , peace guys 
Hmm I find it interesting that u haven’t had great growth with it and found it to underperform, I’ve actually been wanting to check out the xs series units and a bummer to hear someone not to thrilled with it
This was my veg room from last year running the cheapos and was having the opposite problem with explosive growth all over the place. Plants were ending up 4-5 ft tall, thick and bushy in less than 2 months running under 24hour and killer compost tea recipes
That room had 2 bloomspect 600(124w actual each), philzon 600(100w) and 2 vb1000 (100w each)viparspctras closest to the door and space is a 5x7. Combined cost of all the lights around $200 for that entire room with my at the wall wattage at around 550w between all 5 units
I guess not having high end with the high price tag lights to compare to I can’t say which one performed better side by side but I can honestly say FROM MY EXPERIENCE that the cheapo lights got the job done with some excellent results in my grows
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Don’t get me wrong @AzSeaindooin420 , they do work and I still use it in my 2x4 tent. I just found the plants I put in that tent do not perform as well as they do with my other lights. I have done a few grows with it and it’s just something I noticed. Could also be my 1 light itself so take my post with a grain of salt.
Also with regards to cheapo lights, there are some gems out there. I grew with some blurples originally and honestly they did a fine job. I won’t hate on any light that gets the job done and I hold no brand loyalty.
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