The best LED light strips in 2022 CNN Underscored
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Most strips have a range of 2,700K to 6,500K, with the higher number producing a natural daylight temperature. If you place them facing toward you, all you’ll see is LED lights. Unless you intend to use them to shine down and add direct light, place them facing away from you toward a wall or the ceiling so you’ll get that diffused effect you’re looking for.
As lovely as they look and as easy as they are to put in place, setup was incredibly difficult. The app, which was less intuitive than the others we tried, took over a dozen tries before it recognized our Dots over a local Wi-Fi connection. Once we got it set up, the lights offered lots of fun options and patterns but never got very bright and often didn’t show the true color. Each time I tried to choose purple, I got variations of blue instead.
3 RGB LED strip: 4 pin RGB LED strip connector
The LED wires we supply are made of high-purity copper with great electrical conductivity as conductor material. For outdoor use, look for one with at minimum an IP44 rating, meaning the strip can get wet and withstand jets of water. An IP65 rating, like the Govee Outdoor LED Strip Lights have, means it can be exposed to all weather conditions. Our issues with the Govee LED strips are pretty minor given the overall solid performance and value of the system.
You can put them anywhere; your only limitation is the availability of a power outlet. If placing them in a bathroom, consider a water-resistant light strip in case it gets splashed or there’s a lot of moisture. What we didn't like A lack of corner connectors makes tight bends difficult to negotiate during installation; adding accessories to an existing setup may mean buying more strips than you need. The best-looking LED light strips with the most integration options and control and sync possibilities. The most frustrating downside here is that because of the integrated chips that allow the multiple color effects, the Govee strips can’t be cut to size.
LED Strip Lights
They’d be fine for a party or a kid’s room , but those looking for true, bright colors may be disappointed. Dots aren’t extendable or cuttable, but they do come in a variety of sizes. It’s easy to install and set up, there’s no hub needed and you can control the lights and create your own scenes to save to a preset button. You can access those presets, along with other basic controls, in the app, using your voice or on the remote control.
The Wyze Light Strip Pro, the company’s RGBIC model, can display up to 16 colors per strip. It has everything the standard version has and comes in the same lengths, but it’s more customizable and gives you access to effects that sync with your games, movies and shows. You can also easily group multiple strips and control them all in the app, giving you endless hours of fun creating your own custom scenes for both lighting and music syncing. Some strips can display only one color at a time, while others can be segmented, showing multiple colors at once.
Wire splitter connector
When buying LED power supplies and adapters, you need to be careful to avoid a price trap. Some sellers of power supplies and adapters compete for price in the market, and the actual power of the power supply is not as large as it is marked or advertised. Such a power supply will not be durable, and the light strip will not work at its full performance. For example, if you have a 4 meters 12V LED strip with 6 watts per meter, you will need a power supply with a capacity of at least 30 watts. It is because that a power supply should not be running at full capacity.
For instance, the Sengled and Wyze light strips we tested have Wi-Fi built in, so there’s no need for a hub, while the Philips Outdoor light strip does. If you don’t already own one, you’ll be adding on the cost of the hub to the cost of the strips. It is sometimes simple to connect the light strip to the power supply, like directly plug into the power supply; sometimes additional connectors are required, or sometimes the light strips need to be connected to LED controllers first.
But be aware that some ULs are fake, so it's best to buy them from a trusted seller. The AWG gauge of a stranded wire represents the sum of the cross-sectional areas of the individual strands; the gaps between strands are not counted.
The individual dots, which are spaced an inch apart, can be put in place with adhesive (it comes with flat dot-shaped adhesive backings), but you don’t mount the connecting wire. We downloaded and connected the strips to the brand’s app and tested the features within the app. Most of the multi-color light strips we looked at are RGB, which means they can display any combination of red, green and blue color. Typically, there are 16 million color combinations to choose from. There is no “true white” in RGB lights, but variations of white can be created.
The Philips Hue LED light strip system looks better and is more flexible and functional than any other we tested, but it is much more expensive. If you already own other Hue smart lighting or want the very best experience, you won't be disappointed. Also, since Govee doesn’t include corner connectors like the Philips strips, you can’t easily make clean right angles.
If the current is too large, the wire is overheated and there are traces of burnt at the connection points. Once such an abnormality is found, need to cut off the power supply immediately. Examine the overload problem, and replace with connectors or LED wires of sufficient current. Below we present a detailed guidance of how to choose the right light strip connector to help you achieve professional installation of LED light strip.
Many DIY users choose this power cord for fast power supply connection. There is also a common terminal block connector for LED wire connections. This type of wire terminal connector can be used to connect 2, 3, 4, and 5 wires, which are also suitable for wires of different gauges.
We ended up looping the strip under itself where we wanted to make a 90-degree turn, hoping it wouldn’t come away from the floor or create a dark spot at the apex of the bend. The strips are voice reactive, so when connected to your sound system, the lights will flash and dance in time to the music. Cutting straight, not skewed, leaves enough copper pads on both sides of the cutting, which is important for a proper and safe connection. If not enough copper pads are left at the end, it may be impossible to make a correct connection for the light strip.
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