MH Ballast Preference

So I havent been able to decide which manufacturer to go with for my MH ballasts. I need two 250W HQI ballasts and I can find good and bad information on each of the manufacturers so its making my decision difficult.

Which would you go with and why?

Lumatek
Sunlight Supply
IceCap

 

I like me Coralvue ballasts, but the lumatek and icecaps are both highly rated. I'm not familiar with the sunlight supply ballasts.

sorry, I know that doesn't really help

 

Hows CoralVue?

 

So far I'm liking my Vertex ballasts. They stay cool, fire the bulb to full brightness / temp very quickly and were fairly inexpensive. In tests side by side with Galaxy and LumaTek they were fairly similar. Product Review: New Electronic Ballasts - Lumatek, Galaxy and Vertex | Advanced Aquarist's Online Magazine

 

good read! thanks Zach for the input I will check out Vertex as well then. Id have to mod the plug for a lumenmax elite reflector though i think.

 

Yes you would. I have the LumenMax Elite's and my friend showed me how to re-wire the plug on them. It was surprisingly easy, not to mention the Vertex ballasts also include the proper plug for the pendant.

I was just throwing that out there though. I got a 20% off sale on the ballasts which saved me $40. However, at normal prices, I would see no reason not to just go with the LumaTek.

 

so ill share with you what i know...
lumatek- all around good ballast, the ones with the adjustable features are nice because you can overdrive your bulbs to get more out of them (only downside is that the bulbs go bad quicker). I have heard of these guys getting a little hot and shutting off for a while until they cool back down
Icecap- All around the cream of the crop, these guys are really great quality and you wont be dissatisfied (I use them on all my stuff). never overheat and always efficient.
Sunlight supply- I have limited experience with these but from my understanding they are the cheapest of these three ballasts

 

Yeah at this point it seems its going to come down to price point. Each of them were in the same range within $20 of one another, atleast where I have been currently window shopping.

good to know. icecaps are on the higher end of the price spectrum too so i guess in this case it sounds like "you get what you pay for"

i think i may wind up with the lumateks simply because i just found them somewhere on sale...... we'll see if they're still on sale when the actual tax return comes.

 

BTW I got to see a LumenMax Elite reflector up close next to another retro style pendant and the LumenMax Elite is SICK!

 

+1 on that!!! I will never go back to any other style of reflector