Today I will be taking a look at this simple LED lighting kit from Antec, sure it may not be up there with the usual enthusiast hardware that we often feature on the site, but sometimes simple is effective.
So what does this thing do? well it’s a simple LED light strip that you stick on the back of your monitor to add a subtle lighting effect behind your monitor, this can help reduce eye fatigue and can general improve your viewing experience.
“The colour and brightness of the LEDs are carefully calibrated to achieve the optimal viewing experience and increase your monitor’s perceived contrast ratio – making blacks blacker and colours more vibrant.” – Antec.co.uk
I’ve been using the larger Soundscience lighting kit mounted to the back of a 46″ 3DTV for a few months now, although I never thought to review it when I purchased it. That kit however is much longer than the one we’re looking at today as this one is only suitable for monitors up to 24″ in side, but the technology, features and performance is the same, the only difference is the length of the strip of lights.
So lets take a quick look at the basic specification then well move on and take a closer look at what this little gadget has to offer.
- LCD monitor up to 24” in size placed against light coloured wall
- available USB port or powered USB hub
- Cable: 4’3” / 1300 mm
- Light Strip: 14.6” / 370 mm
- Net Weight: 1.0 oz / 28.3 g
- Gross Weight: 2.0 oz / 56.7 g
- Product Warranty: 2 years
I suppose some people may consider it useful but it looks like a waste of a usb port to me.
I have one of these underneath the front edge of my Allsop Redmond monitor stand. It shines down onto my Corsair K60 keyboard so that I didn’t have to buy the backlit version that was wider than I needed. All apartment lights out – plays PC games just fine!
But is this better than a cheap 10 LED strip light from fleabay for less than £2.50? Just bought one to try it out, will see how it goes.
I think that this LED lighting is a great thing to have in an office as like is said in the article it an really help to improve performance.
I found this to be interesting. I had never done this before with a TV. I never thought about doing this before with a TV. I read about it on my rss feed (source: http://pocinc.net/blog/technology-news/backlight-your-tv-with-antecs-led-bias-lighting-for-less-strain-in-the-dark ) and it mentioned it was good for defining the “depth” between your TV and the wall behind it, and that it lowers eye strain. I spend a lot of time behind the PC at work, so eye strain is a common thing for me. I had already taken the brightness down on the TV itself which helped a little. Then I decided to try this out. It does create a cool effect around the TV and doesn’t seem to be distracting. It does seem to relieve our eyes a slight bit. Who comes up with this stuff? So many thinkers in the world.