Emisar D4S review

Great to hear. I have a 3000k ST20 with amber on order from Hank also.

Twisted raven, I also got my 2 (more) D4’s (not S) today—one 4000K SST-20 and one 3000K SST-20. The 3000K is the warmest light I’ve even owned and was warmer than I anticipated but I agree it’s pretty sick. The 4000K is quite similar to my 5000K Nichias, but yes, a tighter hotspot, very noticeable in throw even for the D4, and no green. I think a 50/50 mix of the 3000K and 4000K would be pretty awesome, but I’m going to try not to remove the bezel from these and “Just let them be” for once.
Cheers

I replaced my amber Aux leds for Cyan Aux leds to match the PL47 Aux Leds. It was super easy to do, great design went into these Emisar lights, wish Hank did his version of the PL47.

Got my green amber D4S 4000k SST-20. I like the hardware but the UI is a disappointment. If the old Emisar UI was near perfect then the new FSM based RampingIOS V3 has the same little annoying differences that Anduril has:

  1. Delayed turn off. This makes the light feel sluggish and unresponsive.
  2. Moonlight on button down when turning the light on. If I want to turn on moonlight from off state with click-hold then the timing needs to be perfect. If its too short I get the memorized brightness level, if its too long the light starts ramping up. Most often I end up with too short press because of this “fake” moonlight on button down press (press the button, see the moonlight, think “on nice, that’s what I wanted”, release the button too soon, BOOM!!! get 1000 lumens of memorized brightness).

It never ceases to amaze me how many different takes people can have on a product.

I LOVE Anduril, pure and simple. There are no glitches as far as I’m concerned, but then I’ve been using it in multiple lights at many different power levels for quite a while now and it’s second nature to me. Whether it’s the green emitter D4 or the 25,000 lumen 458 Ham’r, I can count on consistency of operation and the features I’ve learned to cherish are always there across the board, regardless of whether I picked up the little TK05 or the SP-03, D4S or ODL-20… or any of the others.

Seems to me if someone’s life is lived in a nanosecond environment (not the laid back camping scenario pictured in oto’s avatar) then a more professional and expensive light would be necessary. Mayhap that’s just my relaxed view, having had so much experience with so many lesser interfaces over the past half a decade and hundreds of lights. Diversity can be a good thing for competition, can also be devastating when trying to get anything done…. good examples of this lie in our own group buys with several thousand arguments about what should and shouldn’t be and the project taking a virtual forever to see reality. Designing perfection is certainly a chore I for one do not wish to be put upon with…

It’s just a matter of getting used to it. Having used Zebralights for so many years (they have the same quirks about them— delayed off and having to get used to moonlight timing), Anduril wasn’t an issue for me.

Whenever I handed my Zebralights or Anduril lights to friends or family though, literally none of them could figure how to turn the flashlights off, and accidentally activated turbo modes or strobe modes. Having a snappy and responsive UI is very nice and natural, but I’m definitely used to the delayed off.

It took me quite a while to get used to the moonlight timing on Zebralights— probably a good week or so— but I’m used to it now.

Don’t get me wrong, the UI is still quite good. The thing that bothers me is that it is a bit worse than the UI of the previous Emisar lights.

It’s really interesting how divisive these features are. At some point, I really should make a compile-time option to select between immediate on or delayed on, and between immediate off or delayed off. However, the immediate on (moonlight on button down) has been improved since the version Hank uses on the D4S. Specifically, it makes a subtle “blip” when the timing threshold has been reached, to help people get the timing right for moon.

Anyway, the options would be:

  • Delayed on: V2/NarsilM waits until a “click” is either released or held before turning the main LEDs on.
  • Immediate on: V3/Anduril turns the main LEDs on at the ramp floor level as soon as the button is pressed, then either goes up to the memorized level when the button is released, or gives a brief “blip” as a timing hint when it has been held long enough to stay at the floor level.
  • Immediate off: V2/NarsilM turns off the main LEDs as soon as the button is released. If there are any clicks afterward, it turns the LEDs back on again. So, doing a shortcut to turbo means turning the light off for a moment along the way.
  • Delayed off: V3/Anduril waits until it’s sure the user is done pressing the button before turning off or taking other actions. This means double-click to turbo doesn’t cause the LEDs to turn off first, and a click-release-hold to ramp down doesn’t cause a blink either. It also allows other actions without interruptions, like changing the ramp style or going to a config mode or ramping the tint. However, it means there’s a small delay after click before the light turns off.

In more detail, what happens is:

When turning on with a single click…

  1. Button is pressed. V3/Anduril turns on at floor level, V2/NarsilM stays off.
  2. Button is released. V2/NarsilM and Anduril both go immediately to the memorized level.
  3. Timing window expires. Both UIs stop looking for more clicks.

When turning on with a hold…

  1. Button is pressed. V3/Anduril turns on at floor level, V2/NarsilM stays off.
  2. Timing window expires. V2/NarsilM turns on at moon level, V3/Anduril makes a subtle “blip” to provide a timing hint.
  3. Second timing window expires. Both UIs start ramping up.
  4. Eventually, the button is released. Both UIs stop ramping and stay at the current level.

When turning off with a single click…

  1. Button is pressed. Nothing happens.
  2. Button is released. V2/NarsilM turns off, V3/Anduril waits for more input.
  3. Timing window expires. V3/Anduril turns off and goes to sleep. Both UIs stop looking for more clicks.
  4. 5 seconds later: V2/NarsilM goes to sleep.

The difference is a small one, but it’s something people seem to really notice. The response to it has been unexpectedly large. I find that delayed on makes the light feel unresponsive, and turning off in the middle of a double-click action feels clunky. But some people feel that immediate on is hard to use and delayed off feels slow.

If it feels too slow in general, it makes the button timing fairly easy to adjust in firmware. Change the values of HOLD_TIMEOUT and RELEASE_TIMEOUT as desired. The default is 24 frames, where each frame is 16ms. Some people like 20 or even 16 frames, while others think 24 is too fast. Some major brands use a value more like 36 frames. It really depends on personal preference.

The little blip for the moonlight timing is on my ROT66, not the D4S though.

Maybe I can get Hank to update the firmware he uses. I’ll send a new batch to him sometime soon.

Change the timeout values to something that works for you, recompile, then flash.

I have that particular delay set to 28 ticks IIRC and its about perfect for moon timing. The only problematic thing ive come across with Anduril is that sometimes if I turn on using moon shortcut, leave it on a few secs, then shut off. It wont memorize moon for some reason.

Is the XP-L HI worth the extra vs SST20?

It doesn’t memorize the floor, ceiling, or turbo levels when they’re reached by a shortcut. This is on purpose, because people didn’t like losing their memorized level after using moon or turbo. To make it remember moon, the user must ramp to it… typically, by ramping up a little then back down.

Basically, it behaves that way because that’s what people asked for.

a 5000k xpl is a little to yellow for me but 6500k xpl to white. How does 6500k sst20 look?

Where do you see that the 5000k is yellow? It’s not.

I’m not bothered by the delayed turn off because it is only a fraction of a second. However, trying to get it to start in moonlight mode but end up with full blast in the middle of the night with the wife asleep is very annoying. I wish that can be fixed.

Does nobody use nightlights in their household outlets but me lol. I don’t need to grab a flashlight just to relieve myself at 1AM or grab a drink.

Where is the fun in that?

Lol

I’m also replacing our bedroom fan lights with Alexa enabled LEDs so we can use reds to preserve night vision and not bother each other when our schedules conflict with sleep habits. Soon there may be no need at all lol

Well, knowing its behaving as designed is a consolation and after further thought, it actually makes sense.