Never used em. In the 70s it was mh. now hps and mh.. just never used em. I admit I'm rookie with em. Just something to mess with. I'm a naturalist..like bugs and how things work in nature. I only flower 4-6 plants at a time..fucking pain relief.
I know VT uses a T5 for Veg and swears by it. Not sure at all though how much area they cover. I have MH/HPS, and it's my first grow anyways. lol. I definitely have been told T5's are find for veg though. Not sure about flowering though. From what I'm told is the more light the more bud, but I'm not sure at all about using them for flowering. I've heard of some people using CFL's, but I'll stick to the HPS.
Thanks..nothing yet..looking at it. Old farts like researching. I run 400 veg and 600 flower now. I got too many trials going. I was giving clones away but the dispenary was selling em $$$ instead of helping folks.
I use T5's throughout my grow cycle with good results, it's a small grow due to space, I have a 2 ft 2 tube lamp and can grow 3 plants at a time with no problems. 6500K for veg and 3000K for bloom. Pics below, the 2 on the right are Big Bud and the one on the left is Afgan, they are appox 3 weeks old, plan to veg for 2 more weeks and then bloom.
no comparison on total availability of light on those two choices. t5 anytime over the cfls, and i have some of those big cfls, not to mention how much more heat they produce.