Yeah I would hope those bulbs were built pretty well, they were crazy expensive... expensive enough that they wouldn't be competitive in lifetime-per-dollar against today's crappiest bulbs even if they lasted a person's entire lifetime.
> I don't think I've had any last more than 5 years.
Do you shut them off every 3 hours? That's probably what the estimate on the box is based on. Run the same bulb half the day and you'll only get 2.5 years out of it.
> There are plenty of teardowns on YT showing how poorly even major brand name LED bulbs are put together.
I've seen them. And dissected my own. Still, at the price that modern LED bulbs are being made, I'm surprised they're built as well as they are. Brand name Sylvania bulbs are $0.79/ea in a bulk Amazon right now.
> I've seen them. And dissected my own. Still, at the price that modern LED bulbs are being made, I'm surprised they're built as well as they are. Brand name Sylvania bulbs are $0.79/ea in a bulk Amazon right now.
LED bulbs aren't lasting any longer than incandescent bulbs used to. My house has 2 bathrooms, one had incandescent bulbs when I moved in and I didn't bother to replace them. Those incandescent bulbs have outlived multiple sets of LED bulbs in the other bathroom.
I honestly worry about the increase in e-waste with LED bulbs vs the old incandescent bulbs.
> Do you shut them off every 3 hours? That's probably what the estimate on the box is based on. Run the same bulb half the day and you'll only get 2.5 years out of it.
Which given that LEDs should damn well last 20-30 years of always being on, this is all a farce. I can't even pay 2x the price to buy a bulb with an honestly stated lifetime on it.
> Yeah I would hope those bulbs were built pretty well, they were crazy expensive... expensive enough that they wouldn't be competitive in lifetime-per-dollar against today's crappiest bulbs even if they lasted a person's entire lifetime.
I bet they would be. Given LED bulbs last less than 3 years now, with some not even lasting 2 years, a 20-30 year bulb could cost 4x as much and be competitive.
The real problem is that those long lifetime LED bulbs are not driven as hard, so the light output isn't nearly as high. AFAIK all research in the last 20 years has been into bright LEDs with meh lifetimes, so I wonder if it is even possible to mass produce long lifetime consumer LEDs anymore.
(Except the LEDs in all my consumer electronics have no problems staying on for 5 years non-stop! Tiny output, long lifespan...)
Either you are misremembering incandescent bulbs or you're buying some real hot garbage LED bulbs. It used to be a regular chore to replace bulbs and people would keep a stock on hand like they'd keep soap or toilet paper. Incandescents usually lasted 1,200 hours, LEDs of today last around 11,000. Nobody's bulbs are lasting 250,000 hours, and if they did they wouldn't be 4x the price of the 11k hour bulbs.
The reason indicator LEDs last a different amount of time is because they are very different applications. If you want to walk around your house lit by an indicator lamp, go right ahead, but most people want more light, and more light = more heat and degradation of the diode.
> I don't think I've had any last more than 5 years.
Do you shut them off every 3 hours? That's probably what the estimate on the box is based on. Run the same bulb half the day and you'll only get 2.5 years out of it.
> There are plenty of teardowns on YT showing how poorly even major brand name LED bulbs are put together.
I've seen them. And dissected my own. Still, at the price that modern LED bulbs are being made, I'm surprised they're built as well as they are. Brand name Sylvania bulbs are $0.79/ea in a bulk Amazon right now.