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Cultivated Reef

Quick Comparison: Orbit Marine LED vs Odyssea ADV Plus


DurocShark

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They're both in the same price range, so it's fair. Note that the Orbit Marine is NOT the Pro model. I suspect the far more expensive Pro would do better.

 

The tank is 36" wide and 30" high. In these shots it's filled with fresh water. I photographed them with my HTC One M8, trying to set exposure on the tall rock pillar. But this camera sucks, so it's not perfect. You can compare the exposure of the window blinds to see how much brighter we're talking about. If someone has a PAR meter, I'd love to take real readings, but this will do for now.

 

Anyway, here we go!

 

Current USA Orbit Marine LED 36"-48" $189

 

It sets closer to the water, but still doesn't really fill the tank with light. You can see it is much bluer than the Odyssea T5/MH light.

 

7bpe0oQ.jpg

 

 

Odyssea ADV Plus 30" $144.49

 

Even up on its legs it's MUCH brighter. I recognize I will pay a penalty for the heat generated. Also, because my tank is only 15" front to back, I had to modify the legs to fit. I probably could have gone with a 36" light, and I still may. But I really don't like the look of a light that goes as wide as the tank. So I'll try this first.

 

Also note that the glass cross brace is directly under the metal halide lamp, blocking some of the light.

 

Metal halide on only:

 

43OTpQG.jpg

 

 

With the stock MH and actinic bulbs (and moon lights) on:

 

4KZTeny.jpg

 

 

Now I know this is far from scientific. But it does show how much of a difference there is between a low end LED lamp and a low end T5/MH. Obviously, from these two I will choose the Odyssea. Of course, those aren't the only options out there. Thankfully!

 

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Hey this helpful to me at least! I I know this is a LED t5/mh comparison but can you compliment on the quality of the Odyessa fixture?

 

I'm on the fence on which fixture to get. The odyessa mh/t5 or just the 4 bulb fixture. The other thing is most people change out the bulbs so that gives you a large variety of colors you can get.

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I was surprised how solid the Odyssea was. I question the 15000k color of the MH bulb that came with it, but I planned on replacing bulbs pretty early anyway. The only flimsy part was the acrylic covers for the T5 bulbs. It's paper thin. Everything else feels solid. The cooling fans are pretty darn quiet too.

 

The MH really adds a lot of punch to the light. I would absolutely do the MH/ T5. It seems silly not to.

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Odyssea fixtures weak point is the ballasts are crappy.

I read that too. But it seems that either they work or they don't, as told by the amount of draw from the mains. Mine's good, first thing I checked. :)

 

That said, it draws a LOT more power than the LEDs. :(

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Cencalfishguy56

Odyssea fixtures weak point is the ballasts are crappy.

Mine was fine had it for 8 months before switching to led and it never overheated or even got really hot for that matter

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It's not a matter of overheating usually. They just don't drive the lamps as good as quality ballasts.

 

I've actually opened the T5 fixture ballasts up after they cooked in my dad's T5/halide oddesea. The four foot fixture lacks adequate cooling between the halide reflectors where the ballasts are stored.

 

The moon lights are also print to frying from halide heat but they're just accents anyways so big whoop on that.

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Cencalfishguy56

It's not a matter of overheating usually. They just don't drive the lamps as good as quality ballasts.

 

I've actually opened the T5 fixture ballasts up after they cooked in my dad's T5/halide oddesea. The four foot fixture lacks adequate cooling between the halide reflectors where the ballasts are stored.

 

The moon lights are also print to frying from halide heat but they're just accents anyways so big whoop on that.

I agree the moonlights are garbage but how long ago did you check out the ballast? The newer ones aren't bad I had pretty decent output

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