Speakers For Your Light Sockets

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These new LightSpeakers from Klipsch look pretty bad ass if they put out some decent sound. The only drawback, a two speaker kit retails for $599 and adding two more speakers (for four total speakers) will set you back an extra $500.
 
who the hell turns off the switch let alone the circuit breaker? that's how you know when it's in all the way. :p
 
Not a bad deal but as you say Steve, I think it really depends on the sound quality you get from these.
 
I doubt Klipsch would sacrafice sound quality for a somewhat gimmiky install.
 
Someone comes into a brainstorming session with this sort of thing, and they somehow find a target audience who will spend $600 on musical light bulbs. That's innovation.
 
Says a 10 watt LED will be as bright as a 65 watt incandescent bulb. Are LED's the in thing and CFL's on their way out now? (in a non speaker light bulb scenario)
 
Met-AL said:
Says a 10 watt LED will be as bright as a 65 watt incandescent bulb. Are LED's the in thing and CFL's on their way out now? (in a non speaker light bulb scenario)
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Naah, I think CFLs have about the same efficiency and a bit better color balance. Likely to be cheaper if you want few but bright lights, too - the LED niche seems to be multiple smaller lights, so far.
 
I see one huge catch to this - who has recessed lighting everywhere they want a speaker? If you don't have them, you're easily going to spend more money on installing them + the light speakers than you would just having distributed audio installed correctly.
 
I could see buying these if I had money to burn. But as has been said, all hinges on sound quality. I wouldn't be willing to sacrifice any quality of the added convenience.
 
What if you want to turn the lights out but still have music or a movie on surround going? There an extra switch somewhere for that?
 
HHunt said:
Naah, I think CFLs have about the same efficiency and a bit better color balance. Likely to be cheaper if you want few but bright lights, too - the LED niche seems to be multiple smaller lights, so far.
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LED's use less power than CFL and last much longer too.
 
gdonovan said:
LED's use less power than CFL and last much longer too.
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Meh, depends on application. Far more often CFL is more energy efficient. Not even comparing florescent tubes which are by far best investment for lighting.

One problem with CFL vs LED is CFL includes a ballast losses. People like to go "Oh look this LED hits 150lumens/watt!" But they don't realize that drops to ~100lumens/watt when you include a power source and then to 80lumens/watt when you drive it hard enough to create a usable amount of light, and then to 60lumens/watt when you realize you can't stand cool white and want lower efficency warm white LEDs, and then it drops even more when you realize no fixtures are made for LEDs so you have reflector losses.
 
bexamous said:
Meh, depends on application. Far more often CFL is more energy efficient. Not even comparing florescent tubes which are by far best investment for lighting.

One problem with CFL vs LED is CFL includes a ballast losses. People like to go "Oh look this LED hits 150lumens/watt!" But they don't realize that drops to ~100lumens/watt when you include a power source and then to 80lumens/watt when you drive it hard enough to create a usable amount of light, and then to 60lumens/watt when you realize you can't stand cool white and want lower efficency warm white LEDs, and then it drops even more when you realize no fixtures are made for LEDs so you have reflector losses.
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actually in no application are cfl's more efficient. Ask anyone who grows with either, they are more costly for sure initially but that's it.
 
Jakalwarrior said:
What if you want to turn the lights out but still have music or a movie on surround going? There an extra switch somewhere for that?
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no kidding. there isnt any way around it, you either have all lights on and music too, or nothing. i cant think of a way you could seperately control the lights, its not the switch thats the problem its all the other can lights that are wired in parallel without a wild leg in there usually.
 
joblo37pam said:
I see one huge catch to this - who has recessed lighting everywhere they want a speaker? If you don't have them, you're easily going to spend more money on installing them + the light speakers than you would just having distributed audio installed correctly.
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Just hang it from the power wire old style.

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you would have to have a wireless socket for each can light... that could work and maybe thats what they do. id have to research and stuff to find out and im lazy
 
Jakalwarrior said:
What if you want to turn the lights out but still have music or a movie on surround going? There an extra switch somewhere for that?
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krupted said:
no kidding. there isnt any way around it, you either have all lights on and music too, or nothing. i cant think of a way you could seperately control the lights, its not the switch thats the problem its all the other can lights that are wired in parallel without a wild leg in there usually.
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That is a good point, while the controls for the light in the speaker would be controlled from the device, that wouldn't help for all the other lights on that line. Normally you wouldn't have a switch for every single light.




Overall, if the sound quality is good and you have house where this is usable, it sounds like a good idea to me. Easy setup, easy for the average person to use. And as it said, with what you save by not having to hire somebody, with what you can save in the power savings for the light, over time it could very well pay for itself. Being able to take it with you to your new house if you move and not having to pay again to have the system installed would also be a plus. So it could be a nice system in some cases, but this isn't going to be for everyone.
 
butterfliesrpretty said:
actually in no application are cfl's more efficient. Ask anyone who grows with either, they are more costly for sure initially but that's it.
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Growing!? HMM I think that would be covered under "depends on application." Growing is so unique, photosynthesis works best with specific wavelenghts, yeah LEDs can make some colors (red) pretty well. Not really useful for lighting up a house though. Or almost any other application.
 
bexamous said:
Growing!? HMM I think that would be covered under "depends on application." Growing is so unique, photosynthesis works best with specific wavelenghts, yeah LEDs can make some colors (red) pretty well. Not really useful for lighting up a house though. Or almost any other application.
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butterfliesrpretty is right, LED's are FAR more efficient, they can put out better light, and they last much longer. the only reason we're not using them is because the quality LED's needed to get the bright light and nice tone/colour we expect is just not economical at this point.

i think you need to go to some research my friend, you're bordering on the lines of trolling.
 
Ok, so CFL's are good but LED's are better for growing and if you spend enough on the LED, you can get decent regular LED light that a person that doesn't grow would like in his home?
 
Met-AL said:
Ok, so CFL's are good but LED's are better for growing and if you spend enough on the LED, you can get decent regular LED light that a person that doesn't grow would like in his home?
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Yep. You can outfit your house with them and save 50 or 60 dollars a year, for only a few thousand bucks ;) And they "can" last forever (good luck with that, there is more to fail in one than the actual LED).
 
They're actually on backorder on the site.

People actually bought these!

I don't see how they can make the money saving argument. Oh sure if you used these
instead of equivalent Klipsch speakers but not your run of the mill JBL or Pioneer system.
1099 for four speakers??

Seems like an awful lot of trouble just to use them too...

Gimick..
 
Syndicated_Death said:
For those asking about music without light. There are light controls on the remote control guys.
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The argument is that other lights on the same circuit would remain on. It is pretty rare to have only two pot lights per light switch. (That being said, it seems rarer I'd want sound in a room without the lights on. Especially if they are all LED-replaced.)

jwalk6 said:
They're actually on backorder on the site.

People actually bought these!

I don't see how they can make the money saving argument. Oh sure if you used these
instead of equivalent Klipsch speakers but not your run of the mill JBL or Pioneer system.
1099 for four speakers??

Seems like an awful lot of trouble just to use them too...

Gimick..
Click to expand...

True wireless speakers + LED replacement for pot lights. I have (at best) rudimentary wiring skillz and I'm staring up at this basement home office ceiling with 2 of 5 CFL recessed lights still working, and at the floor with meters of wire running to two rear speakers. It also happens to be the room with the circuit breakers. :)

And you say I can add another zone in the kitchen without running wires or using up wall sockets? I'm in once some competitors help drive costs down.
 
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