What are the best HPS bulbs-brand?

I use Phillips Son-T Agro 600w for many years now as the best all round HPS mixed spectrum. Have just changed to the new Phillips Gravita 600HPS enhanced spectrum. It's the closest to Plasma with depth of penetration and total lumen output, supposed to be awesome. Will keep 420 posted on the difference. I run two rooms, one on each.
Plasma next year, very expensive !
 
I've come to the conclusion that the brand makes very little difference. Buy a cheap bulb online for like $20, and only use it for one grow. You will get great results.

Hygrohybrid on Youtube, pulls 1.3lbs or more with one plant and one 600w cheapo bulb.
 
What I have found is that no matter if you buy the cheap apollo bulbs or the hortilux bulbs, the don't generally have an indefinite lifetime. 6 month's max and you start to see degradation in overall quality of lumens put out. Me personally, I much rather spend $18-20 every few months than $75-100 to replace mt bulbs. No disrespect intended towards those with different beliefs.
 
I've used Maxlume, Hortilux Lumitec and Growlux. Prices vary to where you buy them. I see no big difference. In-fact the cheaper ones last longer. Spend $40 each or $80 for almost the same thing, Tomato, Tomatto ya know. I only buy Eco-tec now. 600watt bulbs for $34.99 and they last 6-8 months. The value outweighs the 1000-2000 Lumens of difference, if that. P.S. Stay away from auto flowers. Personally I perfer as much control as I can have. They Flower when I'm ready.
 
I want to update my suggestion based on new bulbs I have been using. The Phillips Retro White Ceramic Metal Halide bulbs rock. A true full spectrum and very similar curve to the par curve. These bulbs are only in 400w or less, but I have had amazing results with these in my flowering tent. The price is very nice too ranging from about 40 to 60 bucks a bulb. I am disappointed that they are getting discontinued and on limited supply now, but for 400w or less, the best bulb for your money.
 
I know the number of my posts infer that I am new, but I am certain of of one thing, those of you who continue to use the same bulbs grow after grow are short changing yourselves. True they seem to be just as bright, and the plants respond. Plant's respond to t-5's too. As the bulb ages you are losing potency that you had when it was new. My opinion, you should replace them every six months. I would also like to see any black and white documentation that hortilux 400 watt outperforms a cheap Apollo bulb. I think it's just marketing hype to raise the prices.
 
Yup, I'm sticking with Apollo bulbs, and changing them every grow. My indoor critical x ak47 is huge right now and is flowering, just small white tops. She is LST, and about 4x4. I have to measure to be sure, but she is huge with a huge stock.

She is in dwc, water 73 degrees, but I use h202 in res. Res 18 gallons, just two air stones. Temp in room 72 or so.

I will see for sure how well the Apollo does.

I used a maxlume for WW auto and got 3oz, in a 5 gallon, half hemp, half dwc, experiment.
 
LEDRF said:
Yup, I'm sticking with Apollo bulbs, and changing them every grow. My indoor critical x ak47 is huge right now and is flowering, just small white tops. She is LST, and about 4x4. I have to measure to be sure, but she is huge with a huge stock.

She is in dwc, water 73 degrees, but I use h202 in res. Res 18 gallons, just two air stones. Temp in room 72 or so.

I will see for sure how well the Apollo does.

I used a maxlume for WW auto and got 3oz, in a 5 gallon, half hemp, half dwc, experiment.
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LEDREF, can I Pm you for some detailed info concerning dwc, I am thinking about doing that on my next grow. Soil is just too damn expensive on top of everything else. Thanks.
 
If you use probe start bulbs like hortilux, ushios, cheap plantmax's, maxlumes etc. you'll experience certain failures: BULB FLICKERING, Shorter bulb life, and random miss fires! I actually just bought several Solis Tek Matrix Lcd Digital Ballast from these guys: mbferts.com, and this is where I got all my info from. FYI I too bought cheap bulbs and since learned "the hard way" that you must use pulse start bulbs.

Good news is they sell them for around $60 NEW (FYI $120 MSRP), also they were selling the Matrix's for $200(FYI $400 MSRP) NEW, but Solis Tek I guess made them raise their list prices. I recently talked to them and they said "My friends and I would have to call or email them for the prices, since they no longer can list ANY Solistek products this low on their site, or they can lose their right to sell them." Good group off people though, and in this "cut throat business" we need people like them out here, you know the people who look out for the little guys!

Red Neck
 
If you use digital ballasts then you need digital bulbs. Gravitas pro 600 100w HPS are great
 
Sativa, yeah you can. Just so you know deep water culture
Is more expensive ad time consuming than soil.

Tried neck I learned the opposite. 1.3 pounds off one $20 Apollo hps 600w dwc.
Use a new bulb every grow. Hugrohybrid pulls
It of every time.

Those companies just want ur money. Just use
A good digital bullast and Apollo bulbs work just as
Good.
 
The best way I have found in the how long should I use my bulb dilemma is to simply download a lux/lumen app and check your output. You can argue over the 6 months or 3 grow thing all day, but the meter app will tell exactly how many lumens/lux you have lost compared to the first time you fire up your bulb.Talk about wasting money. Some of you are pitching out bulbs that may or may not have lost any output at all. BTW to settle the debate... phillips cmh bulbs are the closest spectrum to the sun you will find in any bulb, save for plasma.
 
KarmaPharms said:
Phillips ceramic metal halide. Absolutely the best 400W bulb you can buy. They are not expensive and have a full spectrum.
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I 420% agree with this!! CMH bulbs rock and have excellent PAR value :)
 
imtyson said:
I'm looking for a top of the line 400 W Digital HPS Any Rec?
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Ushio Bulbs are pretty good. I definitely was happy with the results I got...


I believe they make pulse start Ceramic Metal Halides too now, I only used the ones for magnetic ballasts, but if they are even close to the spectrum output, these also would be a great choice.
 
I have only used Osram 600w Plantstars, they're £30 to £50, but have 20% more blue spectrum than their peers, and still push out 88k lumen, which, in a 6.9 square foot tent, is more than enough :)
 
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