Unique LED Lighting fixtures ship with color controllability

By on Mar 03, 2011


Unique LED Lighting is creating some interesting LED aquarium lights right here in the United States and are including color control technology baked in. The surge of Chinese build LED devices have flooded the market and Unique LED is coming at the market by taking the production in-house including developing the company’s own proprietary drivers and circuitry behind the fixtures. The company is also marketing and including its Complete Color Spectrum Control (CCSC) in the LED light fixtures allowing you control of various color channels to get the color temperature you prefer for your system.

The company has released three primary LED aquarium fixtures so far with both active and passive cooling. The passively-cooled Prism AC line is relying on extensive heat sinks for temperature controls and is comparable to a 125W metal halide bulb. The larger systems include a basic and more advance model with the fan-cooled D-Lite and D-Lux systems.

The Prism AC LED Reef fixture is available with either 12 or 18 high output Luxeon Rebel LEDs. These models use dual dimmable color spectrum control that appear to be a pair of dials on top of the fixture to let you adjust the color from a very blue from 460nm up to a 8,500K daylight look. The Prism AC fixtures are being targeted towards nano aquarium owners looking to convert their all-in-one cube into and open top, LED lit tank. These fixtures run $349 for the 12 LED and $499 for the 18 LED model.

The D-Lite and D-Lux models are tucked into fan-cooled, black acrylic housings and use the Cree XP-E line of LEDs. The D-Lite is your basic blue (455nm) and cool white (10,000K) LED fixture. Each color channel is connected to its separate CCSC system. The D-Lite models come in 36, 48, 60 and 72 in. models running $1,099.99, $1,499.99, $1,899.99 and $2,299.99 respectively.

The D-Lux system integrates Cree XP-E LEDs in four channels — red, royal blue, green, and crisp white. Each color channel connects to the CCSC system to give you RGB control on a larger scale. The D-Lux fixtures come with a power cord for each color of LEDs to let you set up the lights using timers or an electronic controller. The D-Lux is also available in 36, 48, 60 and 72 in. models running $1,799.99, $1,999.99, $2,499.99 and $2,999.99 respectively.

LED + T5 hybrid lovers also have the option to add T5s with the T5 D-Lux line of lights. Each fixture adds a pair of T5HO bulbs into the fixture. Coming in 24, 36, 48, 60 and 72 in. models the hybrid runs between $1,999.99 and $3,499.99. We are concerned though that even with fans, tucking a pair of T5HO lamps inside the same case as the LED circuitry will cause heat issues. It would seem to be more practical to have the LEDs and T5 lamps enclosed in separate, vented and cooled compartments.

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  • http://twitter.com/jfarabaugh jfarabaugh

    Hate to break this to you but you cant achieve a full color spectrum by using only CW and RB LEDs. You invented nothing new what so ever so please don’t brag about making a fixture using LED tech and methods from 3 years ago.

    Luckily your price for a nano tank sized light is way more realistic then the Pacific Sun Galileo 48w one posted on here a few days ago. Nice to see that Unique LED isn’t smoking crack like Pacific Sun is when coming up with a price for a light used over a nano tank.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_JJKAECJPHONJW33PSPLKQRMBGI J

    “The D-Lux system integrates Cree XP-E LEDs in four channels — red, royal blue, green, and crisp white. Each color channel connects to the CCSC system to give you RGB control on a larger scale.”

    Read much????

  • http://twitter.com/jfarabaugh jfarabaugh

    I’ll bite

    Even in that color combo it is far from full spectrum. If you know anything about color LEDs they have a very narrow color output. Basically you will be missing large chucks in the full spectrum. They are using the cree CW LED so with this setup they will be missing large bands in orange, yellow, violet and that is just off the top of my head.

    Also they are using color temperature in place of color spectrum in lots of places.

    So do you read much?

  • Anonymous

    Sorry J, but I think you need to do more research to get your facts straight. I suggest you go look at the spectral output of a CREE cool white again. Also white LED’s in general do not have narrow peaks but have outputs over a broad range of wavelengths. Much broader than the typical triphosphor fluorescent lamp. Your mention about lacking in yellow and orange (550-630 nm) is outright untrue. You are correct that there is a dearth of output in the violet colors (425 nm and lower) but can you then tell me one fixture that does have violet LED’s? The answer is no because the output is so close to the nonvisible range of human vision that they look like crap and manufacturers will use the much more visible Royal Blues. Not to mention that these near UV LED’s are also considerably more expensive.

    The biggest real problem with RGB fixtures is the color blending. Because LED’s focus the light so intensely you end up with the disco effect with little swatches of specific colors showing up on the aquarium substrate. Hence the reason for RGBW fixtures so that the white LED’s can overpower this effect and minimize it.

    All that being said there is nothing really revolutionary in these lights and the price is reasonable.

  • http://twitter.com/jfarabaugh jfarabaugh

    One fixture

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puVvkbdDCn8

    Just about a true even power full spectrum…..missing some cyan peaks and the very highest reds bands (they are weak)

    That is my custom fixture by the way. I spent about 8 months of research on it before putting it together. Mix of CW,NW,RB,B,V

    MaxSpect also runs violet LEDs in their fixtures and IMHO are some of the best looking store bought LED fixtures out there…beside the one I built of course.

    When I said color LEDs I meant the non white LEDs. Sorry for the confusion.

    You are correct…..the CW does put out some very weak yellow, orange, and red but because of their weakness they don’t really do that much if anything aesthetics wise . Most DIY folks and even some light manufactures are now moving towards NW as they put out much more yellow, orange, and red. This is why most tanks running a CW/RB setup can look kind of dull.

    At the end of the day LED setups still have a long way before they can make the color output of T5s and halides.

  • http://www.reefbuilders.com Brian Blank

    I would disagree. I have seen some incredible colors in LED tanks that have sold me. Maybe it is the saturation of higher Kelvin MH and T5 bulbs with tons of blue where you don’t get to see the reds, yellows and oranges. I am liking LED lighting for being able to have the best of both worlds — an uber-blue pop plus a balanced white with pops of red, yellow, oranges.

    Unique LED may not be on the “bleeding edge” but it is nice to see a company taking the challenge to build a quality product and not just rebadge a Chinese box. Will be interesting to see what they will have coming up. Hands down though, AquaIllumination is probably the best US manufacturer where form and function meet nicely (in my opinion).

  • Anonymous

    http://www.cree.com/products/pdf/XLamp7090XR-E.pdf

    Please tell me again how the CREE cool white has very weak yellow orange and red. Appears to me that there is considerable light output in the yellow, orange, and red wavelengths.

    The LEDs are cooler because the blue is so strong. But combining that with red LED’s can balance that.

  • http://twitter.com/OzarksReef David Montgomery

    I saw the D-Lux model in person at the recent Dallas NextWave event. Hands down the nicest looking spectral output of any LED I’ve seen. The rep at the show recommended two of these fixtures on tanks wider than 18-inches. That pushes the price to $4K for a standard 120-gallon aquarium.

  • Jon Hahn

    I wonder what Orbitec thinks of the color control.