Vont lantern rant

LightEnthusiast · 2019-11-05T07:59:44.000Z

I have to express my disappointment, nay anger at the fact that the cheap, poorly designed, tasteless Vont lantern is the first result that shows up when you search for “lantern” on Amazon and that it is so highly rated (4.7 with 9051 reviews as of this post). I’m not even going to give a link this lantern since it’s unworthy of even that.

The fact that this crappy lantern has such high ratings points to very good marketing on Vont’s part. If only the lantern itself was even half as good.

If you search for “lantern” in Google the Vont lantern makes it into various 10 top lantern lists or if you search for it on YouTube there are lots of reviews giving it 5 stars or whatever. And the reason is pretty clear - it’s because these “reviewers” are really shills that want to make a buck off of the affiliate program so of course sing songs of praise on this junk lantern in hopes to get consumers who don’t know a lumen from a lux to buy the crappy thing using their provided link. I’ve never seen so many “giveaway contests” for a lantern before.

These paid “reviewers” give sales to this Vont lantern and since these unsuspecting consumers have been told ahead of time how great this cheap lantern is, they end up giving high reviews for the lantern themselves on amazon saying things like “it’s so bright!” without even knowing what a lumen is. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if a large number of the reviews on Amazon were paid as well.

Let’s go over the bad qualities of this lantern:

The glass isn’t diffused at all, it’s just 30 leds shining outwards to give the maximum amount of blinding eye glare. “It’s so bright!” indeed.
The tint of the leds can only be described as a cold blue
You “dim” the lantern by collapsing it which just makes the shell block the leds. Of course this won’t increase the runtime whatsoever.
The light pattern is just light shining outwards. To get the most out of the brightness you would have to have it at eye level which would give the most eye straining blinding glare
It’s made from cheap plastic
It runs off of 3 AA batteries so most of the advertised “up to 12 hours of runtime” will be far from the advertised 170 lumens

Fine, to be fair these things are inexpensive, 2 for $16 or 4 for $30 has got to be appealing to the average customer who knows jack shit about a quality light. I’m sure when looking at a better light they think “but I can get so many of these other lanterns for the same price, and look how highly rated they are!” Yeah, thanks shills. But you absolutely get what you pay for and if it’s cheaply priced then the lantern is cheaply designed too, and oh boy is it.

If I sound irrationally angry about the large number of positive reviews and shills pushing this crappy product it’s because I am. It’s like praising a McDonald’s hamburger like it’s this healthy, great tasting food. It brings us as humans down culturally to think this cheap thing passes as a good lantern.

Bearbreeder · 2019-11-05T08:52:52.000Z

Mcdonalds …

“You don’t need to stick to salads either. ”Craving a burger? Go for it!” says Sharon Zarabi, R.D., C.D.N., C.P.T., the program director of bariatric surgery at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York. “The 3.5-ounce serving of meat in the classic burger contains a healthy dose of 12 grams of protein and is lowest in calories of all meat patties, at 240 calories and 8 grams of fat,” she says. You can add cheese for an additional 50 calories and 4 grams of fat.”

Henk4U2 · 2019-11-05T09:03:24.000Z

Maybe I’m a bit cynical, but who is reading reviews that are not going any deeper than “ooh, it smelled so nice when I opened the box”. Pun intended, because when you have little to spend, it’s a shame to spend it on cra. A lot of these reviewers say they are leo’s. Or at least professionals (doing what?).
What is bothering me more is that even magazines with experienced looking names do the same.
A short while ago, someone asked something about a tactical light that I had never heard of. So I *oogled the brand (let’s call it XYZ) and was directed to a lot of sites related to guns, bushcraft, survivalists, and preppers. I even came to a site that made a list of the best 10 tactical lights. Of course it made the list. As did SF and Fenix, and a 3*AAA 1,000+ lumen light. The reviews of all these lights were obvious “courtesy of the manual”. At a certain point the reviewer made an observation that almost showed some sense of knowledge when he/she wrote that the Fenix was the brightest light, which was not expected given the output which was rated at a mere 1,000 lumen. Maybe it was a bit too much asked to direct that remark the other way around. Like: why are these lights with higher output (in the manual) than Fenix, in reality falling behind?

Epilogue: my age and a shoulder condition make that I throw like a ltttle girl. But when I throw a pebble into the sunset from my garden, there is a good chance I hit one of those reviewers. Or his wife. I found this out only a couple of weeks ago. Most lights he’s reviewing are not exactly what we would call budget lights.

DBSAR · 2019-11-05T18:59:24.000Z

Yep, had a couple of those… modded them with warmer LEDs. One of them fell part, and gave the other away.

RobertB · 2019-11-05T19:05:49.000Z

And this is the eyesore garbage you see lighting up campgrounds all over Michigan. We need some sort of national LED education campaign

DavidEF · 2019-11-05T19:09:51.000Z

RobertB:

And this is the eyesore garbage you see lighting up campgrounds all over Michigan. We need some sort of national LED education campaign

Well, now that the LT1 exists, perhaps it will be a bit easier to convince people how bad those other lanterns actually are. There’s nothing like a side-by-side comparison to really get the idea through.

RobertB · 2019-11-05T19:35:21.000Z

DavidEF:

RobertB:

And this is the eyesore garbage you see lighting up campgrounds all over Michigan. We need some sort of national LED education campaign

Well, now that the LT1 exists, perhaps it will be a bit easier to convince people how bad those other lanterns actually are. There’s nothing like a side-by-side comparison to really get the idea through.

For sure. There needs to be a simplified no frills BLF lantern with WW emitters, with no tint ramping, no blinkys. Just on/off, ramp up/down, and a usb charge port. And all that for a reasonable cost. The Fenix lanterns are actually quite nice, but way over priced.

The general (non flashaholic) public will never buy into something as complex as the LT1 lantern is right now.

RobinVC · 2019-11-05T22:07:16.000Z

I feel the same way. Reminds me of those crappy “tactical military” zoomies with 5 star reviews. People are way behind on led technology and are amazed by anything that produces more light than their phone.

Lightbringer · 2019-11-05T23:20:14.000Z

All those knobs prefer quantity over quality. Never mind that it’s harsh angry blue light, it’s bright!

iamlucky13 · 2019-11-06T02:28:42.000Z

Curiously enough, I discovered this lantern yesterday because a poster on another forum I visit frequent about lanterns. One of the other posters suggested them.

I had a pretty strong suspicion of the quality level from looking at the listing.

That thing is huge for only holding 3 x AA batteries. It could fit 4 x D batteries.

Vont Lantern: 180mm x 88mm
BLF LT1: 170mm x 57mm

The Fakespot rating is C. I suspect they used a lot of fakes to initial rise in the Amazon rankings, and then momentum and price carried them onward from there, along with a lot of buyers who reason “It hurts my eyes to look at. It’s so bright!”

Lightbringer · 2019-11-06T04:42:22.000Z

That’s the problem with 3×AAA lights, and if I’m reading it right this beastie takes 3×AA, no?

I got a freebie 3×AAA light just for downloading a whitepaper from some company, and admittedly, with brandy-new AAAs, it was rather bright (albeit horribly blue). But brightness decreases from second 1 with increasing internal resistance of each cell, so that with just 10-15min on the clock, it’d be noticeably dimmer when compared side-by-side vs brandy-new cells.

And how long the batteries are “good” depends on your tolerance for how dim the light would get before being driven to reload.

So yeah, those types would look at the light with brandy-new cells (included!), and of course be wowed. Harsh glaring Angry Blue™ light that still hurts to look at it if dim, would make people wince and be wowed at its “brightness”.

DBSAR · 2019-11-06T04:59:06.000Z

Lightbringer:

That’s the problem with 3×AAA lights, and if I’m reading it right this beastie takes 3×AA, no?

I got a freebie 3×AAA light just for downloading a whitepaper from some company, and admittedly, with brandy-new AAAs, it was rather bright (albeit horribly blue). But brightness decreases from second 1 with increasing internal resistance of each cell, so that with just 10-15min on the clock, it’d be noticeably dimmer when compared side-by-side vs brandy-new cells.

And how long the batteries are “good” depends on your tolerance for how dim the light would get before being driven to reload.

So yeah, those types would look at the light with brandy-new cells (included!), and of course be wowed. Harsh glaring Angry Blue™ light that still hurts to look at it if dim, would make people wince and be wowed at its “brightness”.

Even with the best 3 AA Eneloops, driving any lantern to 200~300 lumens & dimming constantly will get you 1.5 hours average or less. Useless if it can’t last half a night. Added its very rare to find a good consumer lantern anywhere for less than 70 bucks with a good high CRI tint.

toddcshoe · 2019-11-06T05:16:03.000Z

I made a lantern topper for my Q8. Works perfectly and cost pennies to do. I have posted pics of it before on here so I won’t waste space with that again. The Q8 uses 4 18650 cells and of course everyone here knows that. When you use a Q8 at lower levels 200 lumens or less. It will last for what seems like forever, especially with 4 high capacity cells. You don’t need high discharge cells on a lantern. I would never spend good money on a lantern. I have way too many flashlights that can me made into lanterns if necessary.

Swap out the emitters in the Q8 with something to your liking and make a lantern topper. It’s funny, once you make one, you start eyeballing everything in search of a better object for a lantern.

raccoon · 2019-11-06T05:28:08.000Z

"Vont lantern rant"

Better than a Violent lantern rant!

TheIntruder · 2019-11-06T08:23:31.000Z

Blindly reading and trusting Amazon reviews?

As they say, “Well, There’s Yer Problem.”

But why not trust the smiling dude, and the heartwarming story about how the brand supports cancer, animal and natural resource charities? All part of what I look for when shopping for a light. And electronics are fun!

The sad fact is that a lot of people like cheap, and don’t know, or don’t mind if it’s junk.

These lanterns are cheap, come ready to play with batteries, and when they arrive, people will turn them on, see that the emit light, then put them in the closet, where they may get pulled out once in a while. Those who put them to actual use will be fine with them until they break, get discarded, and something similarly cheap takes their place. Lather, Rinse, Repeat. The Modern Consumer Cycle.

More than half of Amazon’s sales are now made by third-party Marketplace sellers, mostly selling cheap Chinese goods, so it behooves the savvy buyer to separate the wheat from the chaff. If they care to at all.

Vont’s lineup is at least mostly lighting related, but hey, who doesn’t pine for a digital kitchen scale from their lighting supplier? Convoy, Sofirn, Emisar, etc. better take note, if they want to grow.

Cheap, relabeled, Chinese ODM stuff serves its purpose, and Amazon is full of fleeting sellers and brands that do a good deal of that business. If it’s not already obvious from a listing, then it’s easy just to click on the brand link to see what they sell, and whether it’s a product lineup that cohesive, originally developed, and promotes trust, or just a random selection of stuff that’s ordered from Alibaba with a custom label, and shipped directly to Amazon’s fulfillment center from China. It’s just like Aliexpress, but with good customer service, some proofreading, higher pricing, fewer coupons, and with a two-day, not weeks-long wait to receive your stuff.

A9 has always been crap, and Amazon’s search results often reflect their goal to provide profitable options, not necessarily the intended or best results. Sometimes, a very specific search won’t return the intended item, but lesser, maybe even unrelated results, so one has to result in a Google site search to reach the desired listing.

There are a couple good pieces published in the last month about Jeff Bezos, and how he’s built his behemoth. Long, but interesting reading.

rngwn · 2019-11-06T11:15:56.000Z

Admittedly, I was looking for something like these for modding.

But at $18 for 2?? nah. I am not willing paying much more than $2 for one of these.

The another problem of these cheapo lamps is that they use a resistor to “regulate” the currents, and boy these resistor dissipates just as much (if not more) heat than the LEDs itself. This drains the extra voltage to the “wrong” place and make the battery life situation even worse.

Thulium7 · 2019-11-07T09:44:45.000Z

That's the common situation on Amazon now, The best way is to return it

wle · 2019-11-07T13:06:56.000Z

using 3 alkaline is usually a sign of ‘crummy’
at least these are not AAAs

you have now learned something about reading reviews, not just looking at overall ratings
some of these are probably fake
the ones that are not, are still by and large, not written by what i would call ‘discerning LED light users’

what i ALWAYS do is, read the 1 stars first

wle

BlueSwordM · 2019-11-07T13:15:53.000Z

You know what’s really sad though?

This piece of trash gets less 1 star ratings than the immaculated BLF Q8.

Sad.

Thulium7 · 2019-11-12T04:00:19.000Z

You know what, sometimes the 1 star could be left by another seller's shill. It's also a good habit to check the reviewers' profil too.