Re: Need help to buy correct X10 equipment.

[andrew@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Andrew Gabriel)]

In article <1113467382.928576.104220@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
	"Steve" <stevierg@xxxxxxxxxxx> writes:
>
> Andrew Gabriel wrote:
>> Personally, I'd never try lighting a room using downlighter
>> spotlamps due to the inappropriate use and appalling efficiency
>> of the setup, but that's a different matter.
>
> I was planning on buying two sets but only running 8 lights as my room
> is long and then having the front 4 and back 4 run seperatly.
>
> The reason for this is that I am planning to have a video projector in
> the middle of the room, though this is not for some time. Having
> hanging lights would be in the way of the projection.
>
> Why wouldn't you light a room using downlighters? I've never done this
> before so I thought it would be cool.

They are horribly inefficient. The lamps themselves are not too bad, but
then you are lighting the room by using indirect light bounced off the
floor.  That's why you'll need 400-500W of lights to get the same room
lighting as you'd achieve by hanging a 100W lamp in the middle of the
room (not that I'm suggesting this, but just using it as a comparison).
Oh, and 400-500W of lights in one room isn't "cool";-)
Also, a personal view, but I hate the resulting glare from these lamps
too. You might get round this by dimming them, and then the efficiency
of the lamps themselves plummets too.

You probably need a couple of different lighting schemes in the room,
one for general purpose lighting, and another for lighting when using
your projector. For the general purpose lighting, given your restriction
of nothing hanging below the ceiling, I would look at designing the
lighting to bounce off white ceilings and/or light coloured walls to
give a good coverage with no glare. Wall mounted and/or floor standing
uplighters, and recessed ceiling mounted wall washers can be used to do
this.

I'm not so familiar with the lighting requirements when the projector
is in use, but one suggestion would be to use *very low* powered recessed
spot downlighters, like 10W, to light the floor (their objective is just
to light the floor, not to buonce the light all round the room). Additional
ones could be used to provide accent lighting (lighting a picture, vase,
display cabinet, etc). For this application, you need no-glare types, which
are not so easy to find -- they don't spill light off-beam, and hence into
your eyes, and they'll be 12V types. A light itself can also form an accent
in the room, in the form of a table lamp. This scheme would give a more
subdued light so as not to wash out the projector image. The accent lighting
part could also be used in conjunction with the general purpose lighting.

Anyway, just a few thoughts.

--
Andrew Gabriel