Phillips Dimmable LED Bulb - A Real Disappointment

[Teken]

I had a few moments to drop by a local Home Depot today to finalize my storage bin stock. Decided to see what they had to offer in terms of LED bulbs and current price points.

 

Without any energy star rebates from the local POCO it appears the market is still pretty competitive and the latest generation of LED bulbs can be had for a reasonable price. I was really interested in testing out a few new 5K dimmable 60 watt LED bulbs for a long term project.

 

Decided I couldn’t go wrong by purchasing a few boxes of the Phillips branded LED bulbs. This 3 pack was (approx) $15.XX per box and was stated as dimmable, no flicker, and no hum!

 

Ran home like a 12 year old carrying my new toy chomping at the bit thinking:

 

*Look Mom - Daddy is the LED King - Who’s your Daddy*

 

Cleaned and removed the existing Luminus LED bulbs from above the kitchen table. Installed the new Phillips bulbs and flipped the switch!

 

Houston We Have A Problem: Bulb comes on and it has a horrible hum / buzz?!? I ramp up the switch from high to low. Low to high and the noise continues. The only thing I can say is the bulbs dimmed very smoothly without flicker and dimmed down to approximately 2-3% before blinking out.

 

Took the bulbs out and decided to place them on a standard relay lamp and you guessed it - hum / buzz.

 

Pulled out the other three bulbs from the package hoping the first were duds - nope! Decided to place them on a test bed which includes a standard incandescent bulb just to rule out improper loading - nope!

 

In the past have had great success with various other Phillips LED bulbs. One would figure in 2020 you got this tech hammered out.

 

Nope - Give this specific LED bulb a pass and consider something else.

 

 

 

 

 

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[lilyoyo1]

I wonder if you just got a bad batch. Historically, I've never had a problem with their bulbs. I'd be surprised if you did a swap out that you would have the same problem

 

[Mustang65]

Do you still get the hum if you only have one bulb working in that hanging lamp. Try 1 then add another... see if it only hums when all of them are on

 

Edited February 17, 2020 by Mustang65

[Teken]

Do you still get the hum if you only have one bulb working in that hanging lamp. Try 1 then add another... see if it only hums when all of them are on
 

You know I didn’t even try that! I’ll try it out today on a old school rubber neck desk lamp too.


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[Teken]

So mixed results seen here and should have been more thorough in the initial test. To be fair to myself the reference and expectation is installing a dimmable LED bulb to work with Insteon.

 

Perhaps the results would be different using other branded smart hardware but that is the standard and goal here. Using a old school on-off rubber neck lamp produced no hum. The bulb also came on immediately upon activation.

 

 

Moving forward I installed the same (Phillips) bulb into the kitchen table fixture. Several things were quite apparent with how this single bulb performed and general use.

 

Upon activation with a 6.5 ramp rate the bulb did not come on until (approx) three bars as indicated by the switch indicator. Dimming continued to be smooth within a very restricted range of the switch. Manually ramping the bulb affirmed it had a premature cut off.

 

When compared to the Luminus branded LED bulb as seen here it was absolutely no contest. I’ve been using various models of the Luminus branded bulbs for years with 100% satisfaction. They offer no hum, buzz, flicker, strobe. They ramp up and down without issue and the start up is Instant and dim down to approximately 2-3% before cut off.

 

 

It’s possible others using leading edge vs trailing edge dimmers will see different results. Again that offers me little solace as my reference and use is with Insteon! I’m not going to replace a switch for a bulb when that is the technology in use.

 

 

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[ScottAvery]

I have been experimenting with bulbs as well.  I tried GE Relax bulbs, ordered in 8 pack from Amazon.  They did not dim nearly as low as cheap Costco FEIT bulbs, so they are not useful to me with Insteon.  The FEITs go well under 10% and the GEs stop at 20-30%.  In a room with a Lutron non-smart dimmer they worked fine, dimmed down very low.

Is there a Zwave dimmer that is not the same Triac design as Insteon?  I saw Homeseer branded dimmers on Amazon that I had not noticed before.  Anyone tried them with LEDs?  I have a ton of spare Insteons from the annual sales, but I may try something else for a few rooms.

 

What bulbs ARE you all having success with for your Insteon switches?

[DrLumen]

I got the cheap generic (probably chinese) LED bulbs and have no real issues with them. They don't smoothly dim from about 5% to off or from on but no flickers or hum that I have noticed.

[firstone]

On 2/17/2020 at 12:45 AM, Teken said:

 

I had a few moments to drop by a local Home Depot today to finalize my storage bin stock. Decided to see what they had to offer in terms of LED bulbs and current price points.

 

Without any energy star rebates from the local POCO it appears the market is still pretty competitive and the latest generation of LED bulbs can be had for a reasonable price. I was really interested in testing out a few new 5K dimmable 60 watt LED bulbs for a long term project.

 

Decided I couldn’t go wrong by purchasing a few boxes of the Phillips branded LED bulbs. This 3 pack was (approx) $15.XX per box and was stated as dimmable, no flicker, and no hum!

 

Ran home like a 12 year old carrying my new toy chomping at the bit thinking:

 

*Look Mom - Daddy is the LED King - Who’s your Daddy*

 

Cleaned and removed the existing Luminus LED bulbs from above the kitchen table. Installed the new Phillips bulbs and flipped the switch!

 

Houston We Have A Problem: Bulb comes on and it has a horrible hum / buzz?!? I ramp up the switch from high to low. Low to high and the noise continues. The only thing I can say is the bulbs dimmed very smoothly without flicker and dimmed down to approximately 2-3% before blinking out.

 

Took the bulbs out and decided to place them on a standard relay lamp and you guessed it - hum / buzz.

 

I think Philips bought Wiz lighting at some point and started putting out cheap bulbs to compete in the marketplace. This could be offshoot of those. Also, I believe Philips split off their lighting division into separate company.

[LFMc]

4 hours ago, ScottAvery said:

What bulbs ARE you all having success with for your Insteon switches?

For bulbs, I have two sources:

1. Utilitech Pro from Lowes

2. Hyperikon from Amazon

Both brands work great, but I have stopped buying the Hyperikon. Their tech support is GREAT and very responsive, but I had about 20% failure (out of 20 bulbs) in my first batch I bought. To their credit, they replaced them very quickly. Even sent me an extra bulb to cover the *one* flood bulb I had left that had not failed. I had 3 floods fail out of 4 and one 4' fluorescent LED tube bulb fail. I have not had any regular bulbs fail yet, they do not hum or buzz on insteon and they dim very smoothly down to <5%.  To be fair to Hyperikon, it seems I had a bad batch of floods and they made good on all of them. I think the LED 4' tube failure may have been self inflicted. They can be run without ballasts. 

The Utilitech bulbs also work great, no hum, no buzz and also dim to <5%. But I think they obtain full brightness somewhere close to 50%. A very minor issue. I have put out about 6 of these and only have one location that seems to blink occasionally, but it seems like it has something to do with Insteon activity elsewhere. I switched to Lowes due to their easy return policy and being local. 

I also put in about 25 Utilitech Pro recessed retrofit down lights (into the ceiling can lights). These also work great, no hum, no blinking and dim to <5%. But I did find out that one of my switches was wired backwards when they would stay on at a very, very low level when the switch was off. The lights were neutral switched. These particular units were not on Insteon yet.  I have yet to have a Utilitech bulb fail so far. 

 

[ScottAvery]

3 minutes ago, LFMc said:

For bulbs, I have two sources:

1. Utilitech Pro from Lowes

2. Hyperikon from Amazon

Both brands work great, but I have stopped buying the Hyperikon. Their tech support is GREAT and very responsive, but I had about 20% failure (out of 20 bulbs) in my first batch I bought. To their credit, they replaced them very quickly. Even sent me an extra bulb to cover the *one* flood bulb I had left that had not failed. I had 3 floods fail out of 4 and one 4' fluorescent LED tube bulb fail. I have not had any regular bulbs fail yet, they do not hum or buzz on insteon and they dim very smoothly down to <5%.  To be fair to Hyperikon, it seems I had a bad batch of floods and they made good on all of them. I think the LED 4' tube failure may have been self inflicted. They can be run without ballasts. 

The Utilitech bulbs also work great, no hum, no buzz and also dim to <5%. But I think they obtain full brightness somewhere close to 50%. A very minor issue. I have put out about 6 of these and only have one location that seems to blink occasionally, but it seems like it has something to do with Insteon activity elsewhere. I switched to Lowes due to their easy return policy and being local. 

I also put in about 25 Utilitech Pro recessed retrofit down lights (into the ceiling can lights). These also work great, no hum, no blinking and dim to <5%. But I did find out that one of my switches was wired backwards when they would stay on at a very, very low level when the switch was off. The lights were neutral switched. These particular units were not on Insteon yet.  I have yet to have a Utilitech bulb fail so far. 

 

I have bought Hyperikon, too.  Probably have 4 different variants.  I have an odd behavior in that both sizes of floods used from Hyperikon react to the microwave being on.  I have not fugured out if it is power draw or some sort of noise being fed back into the circuits. Neither lighting circuit is particularly close to the microwave and no bulbs of other brands have a reaction.  One set is on an Insteon dimmer and the other on a non-smart Lutron, similar to the configurations of the GE bulbs I mentioned above, but here the only common denominator is the bulb brand.   I have bought some of the big in-line x10 filters to try to isolate the microwave, but it will be easier to just change bulbs.  I keep trying different brands and keep getting disappointed.

I have two different variants of AmazonBasics MR16 bulbs that came in recently, and neither of those are great.  The "commercial" version is actually awful.

[Teken]

48 minutes ago, LFMc said:

For bulbs, I have two sources:

1. Utilitech Pro from Lowes

2. Hyperikon from Amazon

Both brands work great, but I have stopped buying the Hyperikon. Their tech support is GREAT and very responsive, but I had about 20% failure (out of 20 bulbs) in my first batch I bought. To their credit, they replaced them very quickly. Even sent me an extra bulb to cover the *one* flood bulb I had left that had not failed. I had 3 floods fail out of 4 and one 4' fluorescent LED tube bulb fail. I have not had any regular bulbs fail yet, they do not hum or buzz on insteon and they dim very smoothly down to <5%.  To be fair to Hyperikon, it seems I had a bad batch of floods and they made good on all of them. I think the LED 4' tube failure may have been self inflicted. They can be run without ballasts. 

The Utilitech bulbs also work great, no hum, no buzz and also dim to <5%. But I think they obtain full brightness somewhere close to 50%. A very minor issue. I have put out about 6 of these and only have one location that seems to blink occasionally, but it seems like it has something to do with Insteon activity elsewhere. I switched to Lowes due to their easy return policy and being local. 

I also put in about 25 Utilitech Pro recessed retrofit down lights (into the ceiling can lights). These also work great, no hum, no blinking and dim to <5%. But I did find out that one of my switches was wired backwards when they would stay on at a very, very low level when the switch was off. The lights were neutral switched. These particular units were not on Insteon yet.  I have yet to have a Utilitech bulb fail so far. 

 

What are the 40 watt bulbs being used for?? Mood / accent lighting?

[LFMc]

1 minute ago, Teken said:

What are the 40 watt bulbs being used for?? Mood / accent lighting?

I use them in the bedroom lamp stands and they are more than bright enough. ?  Who reads a book in bed anymore anyway?

Also I use them in the bath vanity lights that take 8 bulbs, each. ?  Never had any complaints about them being too dim. 

[Teken]

Last weekend saw these and on a whim bought them. I don’t have high expectations on these dimmable LED bulbs. But, if they work fine I’ll be shipping a dozen boxes way up north!








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[LFMc]

22 hours ago, Teken said:

Last weekend saw these and on a whim bought them. I don’t have high expectations on these dimmable LED bulbs. But, if they work fine I’ll be shipping a dozen boxes way up north!

At 12 watts each, if they don't perform as lights, you could always make LED spot heaters out of them. ?

[Teken]

3 hours ago, LFMc said:

At 12 watts each, if they don't perform as lights, you could always make LED spot heaters out of them. ?

Too funny!

Isn't it odd only 8~9 years ago most folks didn't even flinch in seeing 60, 100 watt incandescent bulbs. Now, the market is filled with LED technology that can offer like you see here 75 watts of light output. All the while only consuming (approx) 12 watts of power in use! I'll try to find sometime this week end to install, test, and offer a quick review as to their performance or lack there of. 

[DrLumen]

Hell, a few years back, the little C7 night lights were drawing 7 watts. Now LED's can light a room with 7 watts.

[Teken]

As promised over the weekend installed this no name dimmable LED bulb. Below are the pros for these bulbs in no specific order of relevance or importance:

Price: At $1.00 per bulb for 75 watt output that is hard to beat.

Noise: This bulb unlike the Phillips branded unit had no discernible noise from hum, buzz, or static. One of the old school tricks I use and follow is turning on a portable radio. In the past bulbs that had some odd noise would inject similar RF into the air.

Sometimes you had to be tuned to solid channel to hear the interference while other times it needed to be tuned (in between) to a static area. While in this area you could hear injected RF noise from hum, thumping, to slight erratic pop. This bulb didn’t exhibit these traits so that’s a pass.

Output: This bulb is stated to put out 75 equivalent watts. I couldn’t find my light meter but compared it to a standard 60 watt incandescent / 60 Watt LED. This dollar store bulb was brighter by rough eye 15~20%?

Size: This bulb is almost similar in length and size as the Luminus bulbs. But this one is approximately 1/4” / 4mm longer? The overall diameter by eye appears to be the same.

Startup: This bulb incorporates instant start technology so it literally pops on when used with a standard relay type switch.

Indoor / outdoor: This bulb is indicated as indoor & outdoor rated. But can’t be used for any emergency lighting.

Cons:

Dimming: Sadly, this bulb was just like the Phillips were the bulb came to life (popped) on at the 3-4 LED indicator level of the switch. From there it ramped up and down fine within that restricted range. It appeared to cut off while turning off at 10-15% level.

I don’t have any leading edge vs trailing edge switches so can’t say if it would perform better using different tech.

That’s all I can really say at this point about the cons given the short test. I have since installed two of them in the Livingroom. This was more to validate issues with the Insteon network if present. Of which I haven’t seen any issues turning on and not able to turn off.

All related scenes all operate as expected and haven’t seen delays in any of the scenes. A quick compare of old vs new bulbs continued to show two hops left.

The other two bulbs will be installed outside this weekend in a test rig. I have been doing arctic (extreme) weather testing for years and relaying the same to various makers. This is more for my own curiosity than anything. I like to validate how the product operates in extreme weather. In turn like to see how the maker handles warranty claims.

As of this writing only one LED bulb maker has failed to keep their promise with respect to warranty coverage.

I always take into account many of these bulbs are not rated for below -30’C to -45’C! Regardless, up north if something can operate for more than three years under extreme hot and cold.

It’s a good buy!

As of this writing I have four 100 equivalent watt Luminus LED bulbs which have endured 5~7 years and hasn’t skipped a beat! Two winters in the past there was a three week spell which broke -56’C with the windchill.

All of the exterior lights operated without any issues and the expected (drowning) hasn’t been seen at all. Essentially, moisture builds up and literally the bulb fills up with water until it blows out!

If I could only insert a gold fish and watch it swim that would be cool!




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[DrLumen]

One thing to keep in mind is that humming is not always a property of the bulb. Zero crossing dimmers that do not have chokes will cause bulbs to hum. Back when I was doing stage lighting I found that using cheap dimmers would make the high wattage bulbs not just hum but SING.

[Mustang65]

11 hours ago, Teken said:

........ One of the old school tricks I use and follow is turning on a portable radio. In the past bulbs that had some odd noise would inject similar RF into the air.

 

Teken,

For the younger owners of ISY/Polisy could you explain what a portable radio is (especially with AM band)!

[Teken]

Teken,
For the younger owners of ISY/Polisy could you explain what a portable radio is (especially with AM band)!

Well, if we go down that rabbit hole than it would lead to SW. I know my daughter knows her Dad is super old school. But even she has a hard time trying to understand how Daddy shoe horned a VHS / Beta into her iPod!

Let’s not speak about 8 track, open reel, LP’s, DAT, CCS.


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[LFMc]

On 3/4/2020 at 8:07 AM, Mustang65 said:

For the younger owners of ISY/Polisy could you explain what a portable radio is (especially with AM band)!

I'll take a shot at it.

It was like a pocket internet device that once you paid for it (or got it for free with a new checking account) and put a battery in it, it would play music of your favorite genre for free, tell you jokes, news, weather and other useless information from thousands of web, er, frequencies. Unhackable, no sign up, no fees, and only two buttons (dials) and one switch. The choice between bands was AM or FM, FM was for stereo and higher clarity (bit rate) but short distance and AM was for longer distances, esp at night. 

Makes me long for the nights listening to Wolfman Jack on KNOX skipping over the Appalachian mountains to my room at night. 

Oh and yes, good for tracking down RF leaks by using the AM band.  (-:

Edited March 5, 2020 by LFMc

[Teken]

13 minutes ago, LFMc said:

I'll take a shot at it.

It was like a pocket internet device that once you paid for it (or got it for free with a new checking account) and put a battery in it, it would play music of your favorite genre for free, tell you jokes, news, weather and other useless information from thousands of web, er, frequencies. Unhackable, no sign up, no fees, and only two buttons (dials) and one switch. The choice between bands was AM or FM, FM was for stereo and higher clarity (bit rate) but short distance and AM was for longer distances, esp at night. 

Makes me long for the nights listening to Wolfman Jack on KNOX skipping over the Appalachian mountains to my room at night. 

Oh and yes, good for tracking down RF leaks by using the AM band.  (-:

Best quote of the year thanks for the laughs!

[LFMc]

Found a great deal on the clearance table at Lowes this week: 

https://www.lowes.com/pd/Utilitech-85-Watt-Equivalent-White-Dimmable-Canless-Recessed-Downlight-6-in/1001767890

A 6" canless ceiling light, 85w and switchable from 2700K to 5000K in 5 steps. It would dim to 8%, instant on, no hum, and works great. I got mine by talking down the associate and buying them all for $10 ea.   Obviously not a bulb, but works great for a can replacement or adding to a new location. 

[larryllix]

8 minutes ago, LFMc said:

Found a great deal on the clearance table at Lowes this week: 

https://www.lowes.com/pd/Utilitech-85-Watt-Equivalent-White-Dimmable-Canless-Recessed-Downlight-6-in/1001767890

A 6" canless ceiling light, 85w and switchable from 2700K to 5000K in 5 steps. It would dim to 8%, instant on, no hum, and works great. I got mine by talking down the associate and buying them all for $10 ea.   Obviously not a bulb, but works great for a can replacement or adding to a new location. 

Not to be used in insulated ceilings though.

How are the colour temperatures selected?

Edited March 5, 2020 by larryllix

[LFMc]

2 minutes ago, larryllix said:

Not to be used in insulated ceilings though.

How are the colour temperatures selected?

It is IC rated, so it can be in direct contact with insulation according to specs. The temp selection is a switch on the back, so you probably won't be changing it very often once installed, but it is doable.