Philips Ambient LED bulb review

I recently purchased the Philips Ambient LED bulb at Home Depot for $24.97 but you can buy the Philips Dimmable AmbientLED 12.5-Watt A19 Light Bulb on Amazon for 72 cents cheaper! While I've voiced my opinions on why the Philips L Prize LED bulb is overpriced, I really like the lower cost version. It puts out a great color light and will supposedly last me 22.8 years (3 hours/day, 7 days a week).

I purchased the bulb as a direct replacement for 60 watt incandescent. I originally thought it could be used in my kitchen in place of the incandescent bulb I'm using as a resistor in my occupancy sensored lighting circuit with almost all CFLs. You can read about my experience with why the incandescent is needed in our post Occupancy Sensor and CFL lights. But as soon as I screwed the LED in the lights started flickering so my plan was dead. Then I actually read the back of the box where it states: "This lamp is not compatible with photo controls, occupancy sensors, or timing devices". Although it is suitable for use with dimmers.

You can see use the lighting calculator in our post best lighting cost comparison to see that LEDs are a better value against incandescents over the long term. It is harder to justify the current price of LEDs vs. CFLs on a lumens/watt basis, but if you don't like CFLs, then it's almost a no-brainer to make the investment and switch to LEDs as they are a much better investment when compared to incandescents.

Check out the Philips LED bulb on the Department of Energy's LED Lighting Facts website.

The model number on the bulb I purchased is 12E26A60-1.

Additional Data:

Watts = 12.5

Life - 3 hrs/day = 22.8 years

Color Temperature = 2690 K

Brightness = 805 Lumens

Dimmable

Tags:

LED review

philips dimmable led

Philips LED

Comments

Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 04/20/2012 - 00:35

My utility subsidizes these things so I can pick them up for $15. Not bad at that price! They do hum just a little, and they actually get surprisingly warm - maybe even hot. I didn't expect that. I have 3 in enclosed fixtures (globes on the ceiling) so I hope they last...

Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 04/20/2012 - 01:35

normal lamp output is like 60W? if i put a 13W led light bulb on the 60W lamp, wouldnt that burn the LED bulb?

ckmapawatt Fri, 04/20/2012 - 08:20

Mungoo, The led light will only use 13 W, not 60 W. Imagine the wattage of a bulb as like a valve. If it says 13 w, it will only pull 13 w out of the electrical outlet. Of course there are issues where this would cause a problem (if you installed a light big enough to trip the breaker), but that's the basics of it.

ckmapawatt Fri, 04/20/2012 - 08:22

One thing people don't realize is that LEDs do put out heat, it's just less than incandescents. In lighting, all the energy used by the light is eventually turned to heat (either at the base of the bulb or once the light hits the surface of something). But we're just talking about 13 W of heat, instead of 60 W of heat.

Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 04/20/2012 - 09:57

Understood, but I didn't expect 13W to be almost too hot to handle. :) I suppose it's a question of heat dissipation, too...

Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 04/20/2012 - 09:59

Yep, what Chris said. Or, do this thought experiment - you can unplug a lamp with two 100W bulbs from the wall outlet, and plug in a 2W night light instead, right? No problem there, no problem here.

Anonymous (not verified) Sun, 04/22/2012 - 13:25

RE Rebates to bring down the bulb price... Still means people are forced to pay for them, as taxpayers for the subsidies to utility companies, as also passed on to stores (and as with similar CFL programs in California and Ohio, http://ceolas.net#californiacfl )

Anonymous (not verified) Sun, 04/22/2012 - 13:26

No wonder the (overall) price is high, given all the lobbying money Philips has to claw back! The truth about that Philips bulb, and how Philips won the prize: The lobbying, the evading of rules, the poor quality of the bulb on testing - as referenced with competition rules, patents, lobbying finance, lab tests etc http://dunday.com/2012/03/lots-of-public-money-for-doubtful.html .

Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 04/23/2012 - 19:00

I saw this bulb at the NYC Green Festival on Saturday. It is nice and bright but a bit too red for me. I have a bunch of the $10 Home Depot LEDs and I am very happy with them. The color is nice, they are quite bright, and they are dimmable.

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