The Hydra Aquatics Retina I LED Fixture is a new compact fixture that popped up at Marine Depot recently. Despite being a new name on the market, the company and light itself is aiming to impress with looks and hopefully back that up with performance. The compact fixture boasts 50W of lighting goodness through 20 Samsung LEDs in a mix of 12 white and eight blue for an overall 10,000K appearance.
Measuring in at a compact 5.75 x 2 x 0.875 in. overall and weighing just over a pound, the Hydra Aquatics Retina I was designed to mount on rimless aquariums with glass up to 8mm (5/16 in.) thick. The swing arm of the unit and has a two-point swivel action to adjust the light just where you want it, plus being able to easily swing it out of the way for maintenance. The Retina I LED fixture has a removable power supply cord that mounts on the back of the swing arm and is passively cooled.
Despite being pocked into a tight area, the LED are surface mounted (SMT) diodes without any optics to focus the light. This gives you a wide, even spread of light ideal for smaller tanks mimicking a single point light source. While the intensity will peak right below the light fixture, there will be enough usable light to cover most small to moderate sized nano aquariums. Retail price of the light is coming in at $99.99 and is available today at Marine Depot.
[via Advanced Aquarist]
