Right now t5HO and MH's are the least expensive. But in the past couple years, LEDs have gone from a couple thousand dollars down to under a grand. I feel that in a few more years, the price will be comparable to the other lighting options.
More and more people are using LEDs over their tanks. And so far, the reviews have been very positive! For me, they are still out of my price range. I think in the next 5 years or so, their prices will be competitive with T5s and halides, and will be the reef lighting of choice.
so how many LED lights would you need to add to get up to "reef quaility lighting"? I heard the watt/gal is old news, but 4watts per gal of LED is alot. What would a good rule of thumb be? I have a 90gal standard, wondering myself if a few LED could give me the boost I need. I was looking at adding these
ecoxotic Panorama LED Module how many would I need to add?
The Ecoxotics don't have any optics, so I'm not sure what kind of PAR you'll actually see. I'll be lighting my tank with LED's when it gets set up in the near future. I looked at the Ecoxotic modules but decided to go with the Aqua Illumination system. One of their modules has the same output as a 250W Metal Halide