Are Led light strips safe ?

ryzouk · 31 May 2014 at 04:18

Hello,

I was thinking of getting led light strips for behind my tv. I have read a lot of reviews of them exploding. Is this a common fault ? If so are there any other options of tv lighting for the same cheap price ?

Thanks

areksnumbr1sxylady · 31 May 2014 at 04:33

You have anything against fireworks?

twist3d0n3 · 31 May 2014 at 04:37

strap your balls to them and test for us

fiveub · 31 May 2014 at 08:17

I've not heard of this, unless it is a low quality type of product maybe?

BuToNz · 31 May 2014 at 08:21

LED's don't require enough power to 'explode'.

melvis · 31 May 2014 at 09:04

BuToNz said:
LED's don't require enough power to 'explode'.

^ This, about 0.7V per diode, my parents have had led worktop lighting for best part of 5 years now, no explosions, and none stopped emitting light.

Rich_L · 31 May 2014 at 09:17

Wow, clearly you've never heard of the infamous LED riots of 1994 where a group of unattended LED strips wreaked havoc on the town of Denby-under-Water resulting in massive casualties and millions of pounds of property damage

mattyg · 31 May 2014 at 09:29

Rich_L said:
Wow, clearly you've never heard of the infamous LED riots of 1994 where a group of unattended LED strips wreaked havoc on the town of Derby resulting in massive casualties and millions of pounds of Improvements

Fixed

dacads · 31 May 2014 at 09:31

Probably ones off ebay that explode

Lopéz · 31 May 2014 at 09:50

I've had LED strip lights behind my TV for over a year and they haven't exploded. They were even purchased from eBay!

arknor · 31 May 2014 at 10:24

don't see how a led strip can explode but maybe cheap Chinese power supplies get to hot and fail

lurkio · 31 May 2014 at 10:25

I have used LED strips in my place for 3 years , no explosions yet , but the cheaper power supplies have a habbit of dying , make sure it can deliver enough current

Hitman_Leon · 31 May 2014 at 10:30

Must have been Al-Quada brand LED's, those dodgy halfwits can't even make vests without the damn things blowing up

On a serious note, I would just make sure whatever you get has a good psu, there are more dangerous psu's and chargers around than LED's.

TheVoice · 31 May 2014 at 10:37

I've had an Antec USB one stuck to the back of my monitor for nearly two years, it's been fine.

CREATIVE!11 · 31 May 2014 at 10:42

twist3d0n3 said:
strap your balls to them and test for us

GD at it's finest LOL

melvis · 31 May 2014 at 10:45

but the cheaper power supplies have a habbit of dying , make sure it can deliver enough current

Thats true, a faulty AC adapter or one with too much current being drawn will do damage no matter what its powering though.

this is basically how i would work it

1, check the rated draw of a single LED
2, check the rated output of your AC adapter
3, if output > single-led x number of leds in strip = dont worry

ryzouk · 31 May 2014 at 13:54

Yes its the cheap ones I'm talking about. I have herd a few review on amazon saying that the power supply from them has exploded and shot across the room. So can someone link me to some good quality ones because there seems to be a lot of crappy ones out there.

Unicorn · 31 May 2014 at 17:00

Mine pull 2A total for a 5m run. Charger can output up to 6a. All is well

Rroff · 31 May 2014 at 17:05

I've used the Antec ones and they seem like high quality products and as safe as anything like that will be.

I've seen some (not the Antec ones) melt before with the plastic going all brown but not heard of the strip itself catching fire/exploding though anecdotal stories of the cheap PSUs on knock offs malfunctioning.

I've also had some by silverstone that I was less than impressed with though they work ok and been using some outdoor/laptop ones by goalzero without any issues.