T-5/Metal Halide vs LED Lighting

[CPC Reefer]

I am setting up a new 320 gallon reef. I am also new to the reefing keeping. I pretty much have everything figured out with the exception of lighting. I have heard much debate between T-5/Metal Halide combo vs LED. I was really excited when the new EcoTech XR30 Gen 5's came out and was pretty sure thats what I wanted to purchase. Then I see many successful reefers using a combination of Metal Halide and T5 combo units and they swear by them. My tank measures 72"long x 36" deep and 30" wide. I would like to be able to have fish, sps and eventually lps corals and anything else that comes my way. I am trying to only buy lights one time and not have to upgrade later. Don't really have a budget and any suggestions or advice would be appreciated.

 

[AcroNem]

You're going to get a bunch of different answers with that question. There isn't a "wrong" answer either. My favorite to this day will always be Radium 20,000k halides and T5. In my opinion nothing will beat them for real color and growth. There are some amazing LED options and they'll still be a great choice, it's really whichever you end up deciding on will be fine.

 

[RCS82]

$5000---->6 Radion XR30, full control over different color channels, sleek looking, cool effects, needs many units or T5s to acheive spread, best of the best for LEDs.
$1000---->2 400watt Radiums in 20" reflectors, amazing spread, output, shimmer, natural color and spectrum, not as sleek looking and can generate a little heat. Can add a couple 5' LEDs bars for some color pop and fun.

 

[Gareth elliott]

Maintenance cost and effort is going to play a role here as well.

Halides and t5s know you are going to be replacing bulbs on a regular basis, some halide bulbs are harder to find. Some setups those bulbs are also going to require a chiller.
Leds last longer but not indefinitely, every 5 years or so may have to prepare to replace the units.
Next have consider aesthetics. If have a canopy, doesn’t really matter which but a show tank of mh/t5 might look “unfinished” without one.

 

[oreo54]

Since you mentioned t5/MH specifically..

I thought I'd try to amortorize the cost of what ended up being recommended and the current "flavor of the day" LED..

Starting w/ the MH t5 hybrid:
$2200 for the fixture.
$800 for bulb replacements w/ a change schedule of 18 months and assuming initial fixture comes w/ a set.
$3000
1070 Electrical watts at the bulbs approx

Not considering heating ect .. just sort of light equivalence.

Current Radion Gen 5
4 units placed sideways for a 72 x 24 area
$3359.96

720 Watts at the diodes..
I consider that about watt equiv..

big assumption is that the Radions are run full..
Probably have about 20% leeway in that assuming delivery is normal..

72x 30 changes things a bit though...

 

[TMC1313]

Probably a bit too small for your tank dimensions, but you could start out with something like this and add to it. Keep this fixture in the center and eventually flank it with more T5's or Led's. If you added Led's you'd pretty much have the best of everything.

Florida Giesemann Spectra fixture 72” $650

A bunch of users recommended I create its own selling thread here for my Giesemann Spectra fixture 72”, in immaculate condition. Works flawlessly. This fixture is absolutely amazing and breaks my heart I am selling it however I don’t see setting up a 72” tank any time soon and want to pass this...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[RCS82]

 

[WVNed]

I decided to use MH/T-5 on my 240. I am happy with it. My second option was 2 Photon V2 LEDs. I think that would have worked as well. I have a 4 foot one on my 75.
The Hamilton fixtures were $2000 and the Photon V2s would have been $1500. Both of these were much cheaper than Radions.

 

[Bpb]

Halide user here. If this were my brand new tank I would buy a pair of the 50” photon v2’s and a twin bank of 6500k t5ho to run in the center. Hang it all about 12” off the water. Rent a par meter and set your par levels to 350 max at the tops for your sps. Any lps and softies can go lower in the tank.

 

[fredk]

They all work equally well.

Find some local reefers and go look at their tanks. Pick the look you like, but remember to consider maintenance and how that fits in with your aquarium maintenance routine/personality. I personally lean towards LEDs because I'm not good with keeping track of and changing bulbs.

Adam of BattleCorals recently weighed in on yet another 'this is the best tech' thread pointing out that he runs MH, T5 and LED. In his opinion you can't tell the difference between corals grown under each system. Pick what you like and don't worry too much about the enthusiasts in any of the 'this is the best tech' camps.

 

[SEAN REILLY]

You're going to get a bunch of different answers with that question. There isn't a "wrong" answer either. My favorite to this day will always be Radium 20,000k halides and T5. In my opinion nothing will beat them for real color and growth. There are some amazing LED options and they'll still be a great choice, it's really whichever you end up deciding on will be fine.

I agree 100% As Far As The 400-Watt 20,000 Kelvin Radiums! I Had 4 of Those on my Old Oceanic 150 SPS SET-UP Back in 2004 (I was soo Happy as the Halides Progressed, That they were able to Manufacture "Bulbs With Those Gorgeous Blues" !!!......I Rmember when everyone thought that the 10,000 K Bulbs Were "The bees knees" back in (WOW! LAST CENTURY!) '98-'99! But I Myself even thought they were just too White! So I had about 500 Watts of "Actinic" 460 nanometers of the (Now Defunct) VHO (Very High Output) Fluorescent Bulbs along with the 10-K Halides!........

Now I'm just getting back into the Hobby After a 15 Year Hiatu!!...(Oh HOW EVERYTHING HAS EVOLVED! and For The Better!) As I myself "Scaled Down" My Gallons (TONNAGE!) Down to a 250 Liter Red-Sea-250 Deluxe! ❤ But This New Technology IS AMAZING !! Dence Matrix LED's !! Where 90 Watts is almost Equal To an Older 400-Watt "Mogul" Type Halides!!....And though I Myself Prefer the fore-mentioned "Dence Matrix LED's (RED-SEA's REEF-SPEC LED's, And the "Kessil's" Compared to the "Single, Many Individual Bulbed LED Pucks as in the AI's and Ecotec's, As I Think the Dence Matrix Bulbs have MUCH MORE LIFELIKE "Shimmering Effect"!......
I find the Spread Out LED's Seem to suffer from that Dreaded "Disco-Ball" Effect unless they are Fitted with a additional Refraction Lenz!......But as Mentioned,
You Will get MANY DIFFERENT Opinions! LOL

I WILL STATE FACT THOUGH!!......I for one DO NOT MISS THE EXTRA $500.00+ Dollars on top of my Monthly Electric Bill Due To METAL HALIDES OF OLD! Not to Mention that there was NO SUCH THING AS A DC Return Pump that could Pump up to 3,000 GPH WITH A 22 FOOT HEAD PRESSURE!!❤❤ And ONLY drawing about 150 Watts Doing this Pumping!.....Heck! Just my Old (BUT GOOD ) 6 Foot Tall 4 Venturi MTC Protein Skimmer Needed 2 Seprate Iwaki-100-RLT's to Run!!....That's almost 1,000 Watts for just the Skimmer!!......MY NEW NYOS 160 (Which can Handle up to a 180+Gallon SPS Dominated Tank) Uses about 70 Watts and because of "Revised-Increased" Water Contact Time, It Can Pulll "Wet" Skimate, "Dry" Skimate!....What Ever you Want!!.....And some of those DC CURRENT Skimmers can pull Cup fulls of Black Gunk while using UNDER 50 -Watts!!......

Ya see!......It's "Older" Dudes like me, that have been in the hobby our whole lives!....But then got out in the Early-Mid 2000's (Kids) Only to come back very recently to see ALL THESE GREAT NEW GOODIES!!.....That cost little to Run, So the Initial Cost for the Quality Products are SO MUCH WORTH IT!!.......Imagine, My FIRST SALT TANK WAS SET UP WAAAYY BACK IN 1976!!....With the THEN Undergravel-Uplift Filter, and the "Then" All New DIATOMACEOUS Filter with special HOB TUBES!!.....I was the Envy of my Buddies With My 2 Electric Blue Damsels!....Along with my 2 Cinnamon Clowns!.....Which we now ALL KNOW are not Clownfish at all!.....Just Fancy Damsel's Themselves!! LOL!!.......

I AM SO GLAD TO BE BACK "IN THE WET" After almost 15 Years Out Of This Great Hobby!!......And HAVING A "TOP SHELF" "FIRST CLASS!!" WEBSITE With GREAT Forum Members!........Life is GOOD! .......
Reefing is now ........GREAT!!!

 

[Bpb]

I agree 100% As Far As The 400-Watt 20,000 Kelvin Radiums! I Had 4 of Those on my Old Oceanic 150 SPS SET-UP Back in 2004 (I was soo Happy as the Halides Progressed, That they were able to Manufacture "Bulbs With Those Gorgeous Blues" !!!......I Rmember when everyone thought that the 10,000 K Bulbs Were "The bees knees" back in (WOW! LAST CENTURY!) '98-'99! But I Myself even thought they were just too White! So I had about 500 Watts of "Actinic" 460 nanometers of the (Now Defunct) VHO (Very High Output) Fluorescent Bulbs along with the 10-K Halides!........

Now I'm just getting back into the Hobby After a 15 Year Hiatu!!...(Oh HOW EVERYTHING HAS EVOLVED! and For The Better!) As I myself "Scaled Down" My Gallons (TONNAGE!) Down to a 250 Liter Red-Sea-250 Deluxe! But This New Technology IS AMAZING !! Dence Matrix LED's !! Where 90 Watts is almost Equal To an Older 400-Watt "Mogul" Type Halides!!....And though I Myself Prefer the fore-mentioned "Dence Matrix LED's (RED-SEA's REEF-SPEC LED's, And the "Kessil's" Compared to the "Single, Many Individual Bulbed LED Pucks as in the AI's and Ecotec's, As I Think the Dence Matrix Bulbs have MUCH MORE LIFELIKE "Shimmering Effect"!......
I find the Spread Out LED's Seem to suffer from that Dreaded "Disco-Ball" Effect unless they are Fitted with a additional Refraction Lenz!......But as Mentioned,
You Will get MANY DIFFERENT Opinions! LOL

I WILL STATE FACT THOUGH!!......I for one DO NOT MISS THE EXTRA $500.00+ Dollars on top of my Monthly Electric Bill Due To METAL HALIDES OF OLD! Not to Mention that there was NO SUCH THING AS A DC Return Pump that could Pump up to 3,000 GPH WITH A 22 FOOT HEAD PRESSURE!! And ONLY drawing about 150 Watts Doing this Pumping!.....Heck! Just my Old (BUT GOOD ) 6 Foot Tall 4 Venturi MTC Protein Skimmer Needed 2 Seprate Iwaki-100-RLT's to Run!!....That's almost 1,000 Watts for just the Skimmer!!......MY NEW NYOS 160 (Which can Handle up to a 180+Gallon SPS Dominated Tank) Uses about 70 Watts and because of "Revised-Increased" Water Contact Time, It Can Pulll "Wet" Skimate, "Dry" Skimate!....What Ever you Want!!.....And some of those DC CURRENT Skimmers can pull Cup fulls of Black Gunk while using UNDER 50 -Watts!!......

Ya see!......It's "Older" Dudes like me, that have been in the hobby our whole lives!....But then got out in the Early-Mid 2000's (Kids) Only to come back very recently to see ALL THESE GREAT NEW GOODIES!!.....That cost little to Run, So the Initial Cost for the Quality Products are SO MUCH WORTH IT!!.......Imagine, My FIRST SALT TANK WAS SET UP WAAAYY BACK IN 1976!!....With the THEN Undergravel-Uplift Filter, and the "Then" All New DIATOMACEOUS Filter with special HOB TUBES!!.....I was the Envy of my Buddies With My 2 Electric Blue Damsels!....Along with my 2 Cinnamon Clowns!.....Which we now ALL KNOW are not Clownfish at all!.....Just Fancy Damsel's Themselves!! LOL!!.......

I AM SO GLAD TO BE BACK "IN THE WET" After almost 15 Years Out Of This Great Hobby!!......And HAVING A "TOP SHELF" "FIRST CLASS!!" WEBSITE With GREAT Forum Members!........Life is GOOD! .......
Reefing is now ........GREAT!!!

I can respect your perspective and agree on many parts. But a Red Sea reef led90 will not put out the same par, coverage and spread as a properly reflected 400 watt metal halide bulb. Even with the improved efficiency, it still isn’t worthy of comparison. I think 500 watts of vho actinics and 1600 watts of halides on a 150 gallon tank is extreme overkill. With the right reflectors you can achieve 200-600 par anywhere in the water using 2-3 250 watt bulbs. Really the only things in the hobby that need more light than that (or can make good use of anyway) are trindacna clams

 

[greekspec2]

72x48x24 with a Giesemann Spectra 3-250w Radiums and 4-actinics and one of the best looking reefs on this forum.

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/nicks-360-gallons-reef-tank-with-angels.347824/

 

[Graffiti Spot]

I agree 100% As Far As The 400-Watt 20,000 Kelvin Radiums! I Had 4 of Those on my Old Oceanic 150 SPS SET-UP Back in 2004 (I was soo Happy as the Halides Progressed, That they were able to Manufacture "Bulbs With Those Gorgeous Blues" !!!......I Rmember when everyone thought that the 10,000 K Bulbs Were "The bees knees" back in (WOW! LAST CENTURY!) '98-'99! But I Myself even thought they were just too White! So I had about 500 Watts of "Actinic" 460 nanometers of the (Now Defunct) VHO (Very High Output) Fluorescent Bulbs along with the 10-K Halides!........

Now I'm just getting back into the Hobby After a 15 Year Hiatu!!...(Oh HOW EVERYTHING HAS EVOLVED! and For The Better!) As I myself "Scaled Down" My Gallons (TONNAGE!) Down to a 250 Liter Red-Sea-250 Deluxe! ❤ But This New Technology IS AMAZING !! Dence Matrix LED's !! Where 90 Watts is almost Equal To an Older 400-Watt "Mogul" Type Halides!!....And though I Myself Prefer the fore-mentioned "Dence Matrix LED's (RED-SEA's REEF-SPEC LED's, And the "Kessil's" Compared to the "Single, Many Individual Bulbed LED Pucks as in the AI's and Ecotec's, As I Think the Dence Matrix Bulbs have MUCH MORE LIFELIKE "Shimmering Effect"!......
I find the Spread Out LED's Seem to suffer from that Dreaded "Disco-Ball" Effect unless they are Fitted with a additional Refraction Lenz!......But as Mentioned,
You Will get MANY DIFFERENT Opinions! LOL

I WILL STATE FACT THOUGH!!......I for one DO NOT MISS THE EXTRA $500.00+ Dollars on top of my Monthly Electric Bill Due To METAL HALIDES OF OLD! Not to Mention that there was NO SUCH THING AS A DC Return Pump that could Pump up to 3,000 GPH WITH A 22 FOOT HEAD PRESSURE!!❤❤ And ONLY drawing about 150 Watts Doing this Pumping!.....Heck! Just my Old (BUT GOOD ) 6 Foot Tall 4 Venturi MTC Protein Skimmer Needed 2 Seprate Iwaki-100-RLT's to Run!!....That's almost 1,000 Watts for just the Skimmer!!......MY NEW NYOS 160 (Which can Handle up to a 180+Gallon SPS Dominated Tank) Uses about 70 Watts and because of "Revised-Increased" Water Contact Time, It Can Pulll "Wet" Skimate, "Dry" Skimate!....What Ever you Want!!.....And some of those DC CURRENT Skimmers can pull Cup fulls of Black Gunk while using UNDER 50 -Watts!!......

Ya see!......It's "Older" Dudes like me, that have been in the hobby our whole lives!....But then got out in the Early-Mid 2000's (Kids) Only to come back very recently to see ALL THESE GREAT NEW GOODIES!!.....That cost little to Run, So the Initial Cost for the Quality Products are SO MUCH WORTH IT!!.......Imagine, My FIRST SALT TANK WAS SET UP WAAAYY BACK IN 1976!!....With the THEN Undergravel-Uplift Filter, and the "Then" All New DIATOMACEOUS Filter with special HOB TUBES!!.....I was the Envy of my Buddies With My 2 Electric Blue Damsels!....Along with my 2 Cinnamon Clowns!.....Which we now ALL KNOW are not Clownfish at all!.....Just Fancy Damsel's Themselves!! LOL!!.......

I AM SO GLAD TO BE BACK "IN THE WET" After almost 15 Years Out Of This Great Hobby!!......And HAVING A "TOP SHELF" "FIRST CLASS!!" WEBSITE With GREAT Forum Members!........Life is GOOD! .......
Reefing is now ........GREAT!!!

I find it funny how much power you wasted on that tank, just the overkill on the lights and skimmer alone! I still run a Mazzei injector and halides. It apply them just a little differently, I would love to see some pics of that tank if you have them.
Any 90w led is never going to do what a 400w halide can. I wouldn’t over estimate these skimmer ratings these days either so don’t get to excited about how well that skimmer will keep up with your old MTC! I dare you to see what a good old school skimmer with a Beckett or mazzei on it pulls out of your tank after running any of the newer style, pump in the body type skimmers.
Refreshing to hear of a reefer getting back into the hobby from back then and loving led! Sounds like you have done a complete 180 in how you will run your next system, please share when you can!

 

[lpsouth1978]

If not for the heat they produce, I would 100% be using MH/T5 for EVERY tank. I have never had corals do nearly as well under LED's as they did under MH/T5. Unfortunately. I live in the desert and have to deal with 120 degree days in the summers. My A/C already runs like crazy and costs a small fortune in the summer. I simply can't be adding heat to the house requiring MORE cooling.

 

[A. grandis]

Halides and T5s for sure. Less initial cost with actual results! You will not regret and have any problems, nor will need to worry about what spectrum to choose for what you have, and stuff like that. 20000K Hamilton bulbs with electronic ballasts is the way to go. Simply straightforward.

For you that don't know me yet, I am the old man on post number 7 (just kidding).

 

[A. grandis]

They all work equally well.

Find some local reefers and go look at their tanks. Pick the look you like, but remember to consider maintenance and how that fits in with your aquarium maintenance routine/personality. I personally lean towards LEDs because I'm not good with keeping track of and changing bulbs.

Adam of BattleCorals recently weighed in on yet another 'this is the best tech' thread pointing out that he runs MH, T5 and LED. In his opinion you can't tell the difference between corals grown under each system. Pick what you like and don't worry too much about the enthusiasts in any of the 'this is the best tech' camps.

Adam didn't want to go deeper in his general statements... I believe he is pretty busy or didn't want to participate too much. He also needs to play with all the lights in order to sell his corals to different people. Very nice person and to me that is one of his best customer services, providing different lights to sell his frags in a safe way, avoiding to loose any of his precious corals to adaptation. I agree with you that people should pick what they like and don't worry too much about the enthusiasts, other wise he will go crazy and simply choose LEDs. There are lots of LED enthusiasts. More than halides.
By the way, this is the thread:

Metal Halide and T5 Grow Corals Better Than LED and Cost Less

As we see here in the forum, lately many people are leaving their LEDs and going back to halide and/or T5 to lit their home reef tanks. This is an article I found from Marine Depot, one of the oldest and most reliable sources of equipment since 1998: Metal Halide and T5 Grow Corals Better Than...

www.reef2reef.com

Cheers.