When you see {insert brand} , you think ...... (Flashlight brands)

LED Flashlights – General Info
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Everybody has a "feeling" when they see a certain brand name.

This is also the case with flashlight brands.

How would you describe a certain flashlight manufacturer?

Convoy: one of the best bang for the buck brands. Very affordable and great choice driver settings, LEDs etc.

Nitecore: high quality flashlight brand. Their designs are well thought through.

Jetbeam: the best anodizing/machining in the industry.

Name a few brands and share your brand perception.. What stands out?

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Olight: (angry) blue, but a great simple UI.

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When I see Klarus, I think great customer service!

https://budgetlightforum.com/t/-/56879

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  1. Acebeam: High quality but sometimes overpriced flashlights (LEP lights), their manuals deserve a better and more extensive content and translation
  2. Convoy: Like Sofirn very good price/performance ratio and best flexibility of all manufacturers. Very fast and short development cycles. Special inquiries are often taken care of.
  3. Emisar/Noctigon: Great quality performance flashlights as well as fast and helpful customer service by Hank Wang.
  4. Astrolux/Mateminco: Good and affordable lights in competition to Acebeam and Imalent but drivers are not as efficient as their more expensive counterparts. Customer service dependent on Banggood‘s CS, i.e. lots of mails/pictures/videos to share before a solution is offered
  5. Enogear: Great budget flashlights such as IRA Nightwatch, unfortunately hard to buy from them as their website seems disappeared often.
  6. Fireflies: Interesting new budget lights with unique design and flexible emitter choices. Quality is not perfect yet but getting better. Customer service helpful but sometimes hard to reach.
  7. HaikeLite: Very sturdy, massive flashlights at reasonable prices. Unfortunately, new lights seem to come out rarely and some of their successful items are not available anymore.
  8. Jetbeam: Very solid machining, sturdy and hard to break (TH20).
  9. Klarus: Useful tactical flashlights (XT12GT), interesting tailswitch design (360T1). Due to irresponsible behavior (see their warranty notice on BLF) I will keep away from them from now on.
  10. Olight: Nice fancy design and appearance combined with efficient performance (Warrior X) but customer service is almost nonexistent over here.
  11. Rofis: Complicated customer service, quality okay but boost drivers (MR30, MR50) could be of better quality
  12. Sofirn: Outstanding customer service and best bang for the buck. Like Convoy very affordable and with reliable quality. Unfortunately, they are not as flexible as Convoy in terms of individual wishes (LEDs, body colour, ...)
  13. ThruNite: High efficiency drivers (TC15), very good quality but their distribution network has collapsed for European customers and prices have increased a lot.
  14. Zebralight: Best efficiency at small size flashlights. Quality is far beyond average but as usual high quality comes with a high price.
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Olight Where are my tint options?
Thrunite Expensive but reliable
Klarus Like their knurling
Convoy Cheap but effective
Armytek I love waiting 4 months for shipping!
Astrolux Usually good
Jetbeam I love that paint finish
Emisar Where is my oven glove (for the heat on turbo)
Zebralight At that price il just buy 5 convoys!
Rofis Avoid after their tc01 fiasco
Nitecore Is that price a misprint?
BLF oooh new goodies!

Just my opinion as a non expert and price is very objective i know.

6

Lux-Perpetua, that is a nice list ;)

Klarus: worst anno

Sunwayman: my old time favorite... But not anymore. Infinite Variable Magnetic Control Rings.

Zebralight: impressive. High quality, well thought through UI and design.

Malkoff: super simple UI, lifetime warranty. Pottef.

Emisar: machining not perfect, feels a little cheap. Great choice LEDs, tints etc.

Solarforce: They lost the game. Simple designs. Affordable. Coating not always the best (read: color mismatch)

Olight: provably one of the most EDC flashlight brands.

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Lumintop: Is that an Olight?

Astrolux: What is this a clone of?

Nitecore: CCT 7000K

Olight: Do not open.

Zebralight: battery efficient is not cost efficient

Sofirn: Oh, so close.

Convoy: Hosts.

Jaxman: I love you but I need a coupon

Jetbeam: Where'd my wallet go?

Klarus: deKlaration

Thorfire: What's UI?

Amutorch: At least they're trying new things.

Rofis: Get bent ;)

Maglite: The muggle brand

Coast: Please only compare us to Maglite, thanks.

Okay maybe I'll post the more serious version later

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Olight: very nice lights, good value.
24/7: good lights, good value.
Fenix: well made, lovely lights, a bit conservative, not cheap.
Nitecore: innovative, lovely lights, and will whoever found my MT10a return it.
Sunwayman: very well made, good anodising, good regulation, lovely rotary controls, my favourite brand by far.
Jetbeam: very nicely made, good anodising. My aaa Jetbeam survived the washing machine.
Crelant: well made, awful regulation, avoid.
Zebralight: well made, odd anodising (stripey on one side, wears easily), the UI from hell (absolutely awful), awful mode spacings, avoid.
Lumintop: my sole example a 2 aaa penlight is very well made and works well, a beauty.

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Came here to post this.

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Deleted

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4Sevens: sadly out of business, made decent lights in their time, really needed neutral-white LEDs and higher CRI, though.

EDIT: 4Sevens was taken over by Prometheus Lights (thanks to MascaratumB for the info :+1: ).

BLF: If it can be done on a budget, BLF will do it first. All manner of now-commonplace light options started as a BLF project. One of my 3 EDCs is a BLF-348.

Convoy: Best value for money on a budget, high quality, great customer service, lots of options available as standard, special requests may be possible, spares are available either as standard or on request. Great lights if you’re starting out as a modder, too. Historically not at the forefront of technology, but getting better. Two of my 3 EDCs are Convoy (an S2+ SST-20 95 CRI 4000K and an L4 XML2 5000K).

Fenix: Used to be a budget standard - I have family members still happily using the original-model E11s and E21s I gave them years ago. Unfortunately expensive nowadays, and not really keeping up on drivers, tints or CRI, either.

Haikelite: Decent budget lights, get the job done, but nothing stands out specially. Convoy are significantly better quality for the money.

Klarus: I don’t have any Klarus lights, and the warranty controversy is scaring me completely off. I don’t care who I buy the light from, I expect the warranty to be honoured. Do what Fenix does: the local dealer handles it if you bought the light from them, otherwise you send the light back to China. Seems fair to me.

LED Lenser: Best zooming optics in the business, behind on everything else. I get the impression that they’re just resting on their laurels by way of their optics. I have a couple of LED Lensers from over 10 years ago, and I’m occasionally tempted to try a newer model, but without high CRI options and better drivers, I never get to the point of clicking “buy”.

Nightwatch: I have an NS22 Seeker with 4000K 95 CRI SST-20, and it’s a nice light. A new brand, but one to watch.

Nitecore: I only have one Nitecore, an MT06MD. Very nice light, reliable and good quality. Probably my most-used light around the house, also handy when doing electronic projects. Ludicrously expensive now, though - the price has more than doubled since I got mine.

Rofis: Decent quality, mid price, get the job done. Notable for their multi-angle heads that can rotate from 0° to 90°. Mine are mothballed now, though, for lack of CRI at lower output levels and lack of high output / long throw.

Sofirn: A good budget light maker, known for their willingness to work with BLF on all manner of interesting projects. They have AA / 2×AA options that Convoy don’t, which is good for people who don’t want Li-Ion cells, but Convoy tend to win me over with the range of LED options they can supply.

Solarforce: Some people love these, but I’ve had a lot of trouble with supposedly interchangeable parts not fitting. No more Solarforce for me. Convoy are far, far better at consistently manufacturing parts that fit.

Sunwayman: Used to be a great mid-range manufacturer, my V10A & V20As are lovely lights with their continuously-variable magnetic control rings. If only there’d been a high CRI option (I really must get around to reflowing a high CRI LED into one). Sunwayman seem to have dropped their magnetic control rings now, though, despite that being their unique skill. Not really on the map for me these days.

Toykeeper: :slight_smile: OK, not a brand as such, but deserves her place as the creator of such an amazing choice of firmware and UI options. I don’t even try to count my Biscotti lights anymore :slight_smile: but one of them is my EDC Convoy S2+ SST-20 95 CRI 4000K.

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Sofirn - Value

Zebralight - Quality

Fireflies - Gamble

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Skilhunt - "you were the chosen one!"

Zebralight - you too

Armytek - screw modders, ads more red locklite, and Clemence in particular

virence.com - perfectionist

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Maglite: the first ever flashlight I wanted to have.

Convoy: my go to brand for a reliable, EDC light. Best mod light

Nitecore: good quality, not always easy to mod

Astrolux: my new favorite brand, but price may be out of reach for regular tasks. fair value though

Thorfire: great customer service, good lights, but not “too fancy”. a bit bland in times of Anduril, Narsil or other custom firmware. Haven’t heard from Thorfire lately, what happened to them anyway?

edit:
Solarforce: the best modular solution for my taste. Always great anodization, good quality, VERY reliable, durable under heavy use. The perfect light for car, hobby and other use. Unfortunately, they seem dead at this point? Innovation level –10. No further development at all. A pity.

15

Prometheus Lights (Jason Hui) took care of the business. I guess the brand itself is different now, but it is still “active” :wink:

Convoy : being able to mod them, and for the price they have, is a great part of brought me and keep me in this hobby :wink:

Wuben : building quality, reliability and average good price are pros; the UIs need a little tweak to perfection!

Sofirn : Always listening to customers and improving, at a budget but good quality :+1:

On The Road : Underrated flashlights, with great quality and good/complete packages for buyers.

Amutorch : Innovative, good overall quality and some place to modding, is a good thing from this brand.

Odepro : Excellent anodizing and build quality. The lights lack better UIs and led options.

RovyVon : Very innovative and listening to customers, offering better LEDs and UIs, more and more, definitely an excellent choice for “in-built battery” flashlights!!

Nitefox : Good build quality and reliability, but the looks of the flashlights are very close to other “major brands”. Other than that, good lights!

Olight : Great building quality and anodizing, probably the best UIs (if the BLF UIs are excluded) in the lights I have; poor TINT options, as they’re mostly Cool White!

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Hanko machine works: the most beautiful flashlight designs... by far... way too cool.

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So many brands. Good times.

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Zanflare. Another good sturdy budgetlight.

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Zebra for headlamp,
Emisa for torch .