They said I’d need to return it via the store where I bought it… which I was hoping to avoid, since GoingGear has been great and I prefer not to burden them with someone else’s problem.
I find that Zebralight’s moon modes measure below spec even on their own scale, but I still find the output to be at a useful level. The highest moon mode on my Zebralights is actually what I’d consider the ideal level of output, even if it’s only 0.1 lm instead of 0.3 lm. I can’t complain about the runtime, either… one of mine gets used like 6-8 hours per night as a night light and only needs a recharge once every month or two.
The human eye has a much wider dynamic range than most cameras, so I usually take three exposures to show what the human eye can see in just one viewing.
As for the blue ring, I’ve found it distracting. While using the light indoors, I can see the blue ring as far as 5 meters away. This is generally the case when I’m looking down a long room; the walls next to me have a bright blue crescent on them.
The blue ring goes away if I add diffuser film though, which I intend to do once I have other issues sorted out. It seems to improve the tint a little too. I’d really like to see the beam without the lens though.
This is a light-orange-peel reflector. I don’t see the x-shaped beam pattern on any of my smooth-reflector lights, or on any of my other orange-peel lights. Actually, I don’t see it on any of my other lights regardless of the type. It’s not a big deal though; just a tiny quirk which makes the D25A unique. Its light cone has the narrowest point about 8cm in front of the lens, instead of at the lens itself like most lights.
This D25A has full-on PWM, not high-frequency noise or oscillations.
My ZL SC52 has high-frequency oscillations on its L1 mode, and my JB RRT01 has noise/oscillations on several of its levels. I can see it, but only when I’m specifically looking for it with my usual PWM test. Those two oscillate quickly back and forth between two nearby brightness levels in order to get an average output somewhere in-between. The D25A isn’t like that though. It strobes completely on and off in a manner which looks identical to the common, cheap nanjg driver at 4.5 kHz… and I see it even when I’m not looking for it.
FWIW, the reason I see the 4.5 kHz PWM is because my eyes are weird and don’t do “saccadic masking” very well. This video explains more, if you’re curious. Basically, the strobing catches my attention every time I move my eyes while using a PWM-based light to look at stuff. Instead of the usual blur I’d see while moving my eyes, I see a bunch of discrete frames, especially on reflections, and it’s distracting. Also annoying when I encounter PWM-based LED tail lights on the road.
My D25A definitely has a Nichia 219B in it. It looks different than my 219A lights, and identical to my 219B lights.
All my Nichia 219 lights are spec’d at 4500K 92CRI, but the 219B lights appear to be actually around 5000K. I looked for others with 219B emitters, and they mentioned having similar results; the 219B we’ve all gotten has been significantly cooler in tint. So, I figured the D25A would be around 5000K too, especially since that’s what EagleTac said in their spec. But it’s the warmest of all my 219s, roughly the same color temperature as my ZL H52Fw (spec’d at 4400K), warmer than my 219A lights (about 4500K), and cooler than my ZL H51w (spec’d at 4200K). I don’t have a lot of lights in that range to compare against though, because I prefer slighly cooler tints.
I don’t have a way to measure CRI, but visually the D25A 219 doesn’t make colors “pop” anywhere near as well as my other Nichia 219 lights. It looks roughly on par with the ZL H52Fw, except that it’s more yellow and the H52Fw is more pink. I prefer the pink hue since I don’t see red quite as well as green or blue and the tint corrects for the bias in my eyes.
That is actually quite possible. If I recall correctly, the N219B has a bin available with significantly lower Vf, and if they used that bin it might look quite a bit brighter at the same voltage. But others reported really bright moon/low modes with Cree emitters, so I kind of doubt it. Apparently the anomaly isn’t this unit… probably the entire mid-2014 batch.
How about 2.9 lm for 96 hours? That exists… it’s not quite as bright or quite as long, but it’s available today.