9.5W Cree Soft White 2700k Bulbs [not Warm White 2700k]

So everybody has been talking about these in Captain's thread and varying responses from Cree? I guess.

I went out and bought 5 bulbs today [well I paid for them] and they are now all soft white 2700k's. They differ from the Warm White 9.5W's [1U100] by one number [2U100]


Same specs elsewise? No CRI listed either?

Seems like these are the new Energy Saving versions? with the X-be's? I am going to check out rebate info, and I included a pic of the warranty [don't know if it changed from the Warm White's?]

I think i am faukin pissed here.......might go to the Phillips mix with the existing Warms.

Good catch, I never noticed that. I would think the warm are xt and all the soft white are xb.

^ Exactly the conclusion I was thinking about, but trying to get a globe off to check....

The xb isn't a bad chip either. What I saw was 125 lu/watt @125mA and these bulbs are rated at 79mA, I think. Are they that much worse off than Xt's.

The warm whites were still being advertised last freaking night too on Homedizzo.com for $7.97. Today......nary to be found! 2014 Cree's are early.

[h=2]ENERGY STAR Certified Light Bulbs Product Details: CREE, Inc. - BA19-08027OMF-12DE26-2U100[/h]

ENERGY STAR Partner :	Cree, Inc.
Bulb Type :	A - Arbitrary (standard incandescent shape)
Base Type :	E26 (Medium)
Technology :	LED
Energy Used (Watts) :	10
Bulb Life (hrs) :	25000
Brightness (lumens) :	800
Power Factor :	0.97
Appearance/Correlated Color Temperature (K) :	2700
Color Quality (CRI) :	81
Special Features :	Dimmable
Warranty (yrs) :	10
Date Qualified :	09/26/2013
Date Available on Market :	08/01/2013
Markets :	United States

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Can't get the globes off two different bulbs.

Both @ 225 30 minutes at least. I mean I am a disabled vett, but I can't be that big of a pussei.

What I can tell is that the diodes are in a different configuration. There look to be ten altogether. 1 per each division of the thermal pad/circuit board that backs the heatsink. The warm whites have a double stacked diode config, with G17 numeration. These are different.

But since the globes won't come off. {Issue fixed?} I can't tell which diodes they are using. Sucks.

Bulbs work great however and I am not complaining about their performance, because everyone has been consistently stretching for these bulbs.

My main goal was retro fitting my house(except CW for clones), so I bought one of each bulb(CW, WW, SW) to see the colors first. I liked the WW personally so that is what I went back and got.

I could see the diodes more on the WW so I felt like I was getting more light. If I wasn't looking for a difference, I wouldn't really notice. I only took the globe off the WW but it had xt-e's. The CW had xb'x. But I didn't want to check the SW, so just put it in my porch light.

I had to do about 35 min @ 230* and I still had to pull too hard and I lost control a little; scratched a few diodes when it finally gave and came off. I have a heat gun I wanted to use, but went the oven route. I think 250* in the oven would be fine on it.

^ thanks Tags....

I have a friend who blows glass. I almost thought about calling her up and asking if she would blowtorch the bitch and then I could use a set of ceramic tongs to pull off the globe.

I will try a third time. I even scored the glue around the globe rim last night. I have bad memories of breaking glass in hand, maybe that's my block?

Faukin things don't even budge......

On mine I just leave them in a socket for 30 mins and then twist them with heavy leather gloves, worked so far.

bondoman said:

On mine I just leave them in a socket for 30 mins and then twist them with heavy leather gloves, worked so far.

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That's an awesome trick. I have thought about how warm the heat sink gets...specially compared to how cool the globes stays.


I got some of the TW 40w and 60w versions today and they have the XB's. I think when using standard/average bin chips, it really doesn't make a difference. It is only the better/top bins that really separate good from the best(at least with cree vs cree). And with the XB's design, it's actually the better fit for a house bulb.

bondoman said:

On mine I just leave them in a socket for 30 mins and then twist them with heavy leather gloves, worked so far.

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Tried that first. Have you tried the soft whites? or just the ww's?

For the amount of effort, taking them off, has about banished all of my curiosity. Sad but true.

wow I'm surprised the TW uses the XB also.

Abiqua said:

Tried that first. Have you tried the soft whites? or just the ww's?

For the amount of effort, taking them off, has about banished all of my curiosity. Sad but true.

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lol I get confused with all these names. I've done it on the ww's and sw's, and on the daylight(xb 5000k) which I think used to be called Cool white(xt 5000k)

tags420 said:

And with the XB's design, it's actually the better fit for a house bulb.

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can you elaborate? I was reading some of the Xb datatsheets, interested to hear your thoughts.

What are the TW's. Spotlights?

Thanks again!

bondoman said:

lol I get confused with all these names. I've done it on the ww's and sw's, and on the daylight(xb 5000k) which I think used to be called Cool white(xt 5000k)

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Nice! Yeah so the first one, I had in the oven for 40 minutes mostly @235F. That was after it has sat in an ENCLOSED fixture I had to warm the chit out of it for at least 45-1hour.

Each time it literally felt like I would just rip the guts of the bulb along with the globe. I got my thick ass jungle wire gloves too from them Army daze. Fuck me, im gonna get blazed now......you guys rock thanks for all the info!

Abiqua said:

can you elaborate? I was reading some of the Xb datatsheets, interested to hear your thoughts.

What are the TW's. Spotlights?

Thanks again!

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The first thing I ever heard about the XB is that they emit out the side of the chip(not sure if that is true, but sounds and looks like it could). So I looked into it and the description of from cree pretty much says it,

"Optimized to lower cost for high-lumen, omni-directional replacement lamps, the XLamp XB-E High-Voltage White LED delivers high efficacy in the small XB footprint. The XLamp XB-E High-Voltage White LED enables smaller and more efficient driver circuits than standard-voltage LEDs. In addition, the XB-E LED has a wider light distribution that can improve the omni-directionality for ENERGY STAR replacement lamps. These system optimizations combined with the light distribution enable more-efficient, cost-effective and better LED replacements for omni-directional lamps. Built on Cree’s SC³ Technology™ Platform, the XB-E High-Voltage White LED delivers up to 364 lumens and 105 lumens per watt at 125 mA and 85°C."

But then when looking at the data sheet look at the spatial distribution graph you can see the pattern is wider than the XT. So when on the tower they will emit a more true "omni-direction" and get the very top of the bulb better than the xt's.

Then we have to remember that it is not really a 1 vs 1 with the chips. The goal for cree is to get the bulb to output the required lumens ~40w=400lm ~60w=800lm...so whatever amount/pattern of chips is required to hit that goal is what they will do. Also, the bin thing I mentioned before. They might be using an average XT bin and better XB bin, so they actually put out the same lm/w. then plus the direction benefits, the XB get the approval.
The TW=true white and are a high CRI(93 instead of 80) version, but they require more watts to produce the same lumens 40wcree=6w, 40wTWcree=8.5w...yet they both put out 400lm. And the chips are the same model...but the high CRI bins have lower lm/w(no matter what company chip).

Now lumens aren't really what I care about for growing, but when the spectrums are nearly identical and from the same company, it will actually be a decent thing to compare with. The true question is what out more par µmols? I testes a WW with XT's vs a CW with XB's, both with globes on, and the WW had 14% more par output surprisingly. But that was only one primitive test and a reflector was used.

What I have come down to is a Cree globe is pretty much a Cree globe, whether xt or xb. But when picking a chip to use in a panels that will be trying to achieve max performance...XT-E all day.

tags420, I know warm white and soft white are the 2700k, but what is CW(cool white)? I thought that was 5000k, and you tested against a 2700k bulb? What do you think of the XB 5000k version, on paper it seems better than the XT version.

^ im on the lumens is "incompatible of sorts, for measurement for growing" trip as well. Im color blind. I have read everything y'all and Chaz has posted. So definitely, lumens is of no real use in my personal opinion. Even with C#.

It certainly is hard to quantify after your readings with the Cree's and a CFL bulb. Double the lumen output didn't mean double the PAR output, in fact it seemed just the opposite. [ I finally found that shit and read over it a few times.]

Working on new reflectors too, to test out, adjustable. Should be interesting.


I even said I argue with PAR which is true, to an extent, but more along your arguments, good enough without shelling out faukin huge coin for a spectroradiometer. [Wish I had the Par meter, at the very least is what I am typing]

Even pico's anti-Photon paper [which every one should read]. Even though people trip of over photon versus wave, I like to read up on the Corral Castle. That is one fantastically bat shit crazy story, that reminds me of the argument.

bondoman said:

tags420, I know warm white and soft white are the 2700k, but what is CW(cool white)? I thought that was 5000k, and you tested against a 2700k bulb? What do you think of the XB 5000k version, on paper it seems better than the XT version.

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Yep the 5000k is the Cool White [aka blue steal aka cold as ice aka....]

The TW thru me off. So far I can recognize CW, NW and WW and now SW [lolz] The TW seems like a waste of money for growing in my opinion. A high CRI does not quantify anything other than it might hit the peak at or around 555nm real well? And C9 just says that it might be better to the right of the diagram?

bondoman said:

tags420, I know warm white and soft white are the 2700k, but what is CW(cool white)? I thought that was 5000k, and you tested against a 2700k bulb? What do you think of the XB 5000k version, on paper it seems better than the XT version.

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The test is in my current grow thread, post#443
https://www.rollitup.org/led-other-lighting/676858-tags-high-efficiency-lighting-garden-45.html#post9770939

I bought all 3 to see...ended up liking the WW and CW(cool white) and haven't looked or thought about the SW since(till today I bought the TW's in SW). I took the CW to test against a CFL(CW). Then I had a Y splitter for my CFL's so I grabbed the WW to use to fill the other part with the CW. So WW+CW cree vs CW+CW CFL's. The Y splitter ended up not optimizing things for any bulbs(led or cfl) once I saw the numbers. But since the WW was out there, I tested it solo vs the CW solo assuming the CW would be a clear winner based on the lm/w of top bins(this is what I keep getting at). But the WW was actually putting out more µmols. I could see the XB's in the CW but it wasn't till I took the globe off the WW that I knew they were XT's. So it could be that the XT's are better...more likely though, it's because there is more chips(driven less each) in the WW compared to CW.

On paper the XB 5000k has more red in it and is pretty balanced spectrum for a CW. When maximizing output/w is not the main goal, I can see why they use it.