LED Strip lights for rear of TV - Anyone got 'em?

[Draeger]

Brother in law had a set of these fitted to his TV recently and I quite liked the look of the set up. Can't recall where he got them but I think it was the bay.

Our LG42LN575V sits under the stairs in our living room in an alcove which is quite dim so as I think these should work pretty well to lighten things up a bit. I'd post a link to the set I bought but I'm pretty sure since OcUK sells these kits the dons wouldn't be too chuffed (although I did check to see what kits were for sale here on OcUK and they are all out of stock). The kit I've bought on the bay looks identical to the ones in the shop here, I assume they are all pretty generic? There were a couple of options - I went for a 5m strip of RGB 5050/300 SMD's with a remote control. £20.95 with free postage.

Has anyone else got these? Any thoughts and opinions?

 

[jh30uk]

Pretty sure they were sold here and was a thread on it.

I do not see the point TBH, I want the room dark apart from screens own light.

Good to "keep up with the Jones" next door etc.

 

[Skeeter]

Static lights are just a bit of bling. However the active ones that react to the image on screen are pretty awesome.

 

[Warbie]

I do not see the point TBH, I want the room dark apart from screens own light.

You'd be surprised. Bias lighting helps with perceived contrast, eye strain, and all without having to deal with reflections on the screen messing up the picture.

 

[jh30uk]

So they claim, good marketing, so does a black bezel/border give same perceived contrast.

I use a projector so amb light is not good.

And in a perfect world we are not supposed to read or watch TV in poor light for our eyes sake as you mentioned but its not good for effect esp. in dark action movies like say Batman, I could watch a western during day.

Each to their own.

 

[Rroff]

I bought one of the bias strips to have a play.

You need a bang on perfect setup for it to work at all really - if you do have the angle and distance right and the right color and texture to the wall behind then it does quite noticeably increase the perceived contrast and "vividness" of the image way beyond what black borders do.

Personally didn't think it made any difference to eye strain but that will depend a bit person to person - if anything I thought it made it slightly more fatiguing on the eyes for prolonged watching so stopped using it.

 

[Warbie]

I use a projector so amb light is not good.

Same here, but even a pj can cause eye strain if you watch it in a batcave. Low bias lighting if you're watching something like sports or animation is still worthwhile. It makes even more sense with a tv as the light won't be washing out your picture.

 

[jh30uk]

I only watch at night and not more than 1 or 2 movies at a time (weekends) or a few TV Ep's weekdays with a break in-between each Ep.

I watch stuff that you ideally watch in the dark.

 

[Danny091]

I have some on my TV in my bed room, the screen is quite reflective so i dont like having my bedside light on as that's all i can see on the screen if i do. However watching tv in the dark gives me headaches i thought i would try the LED strip to just introduce some ambient light that didn't reflect and its worked great and helped a lot

Does yours have a little remote that lets your change the colour's / brightness? If so i think its the same one

 

[DannyDrama]

I have them, I've always been a fan of indirect lighting. Looks much better than having a vulgar light saving monstrosity IMHO. Even having it for the remote control is good.

Be warned though, the cheap ones are not good at creating white. They often end up very blue or pink if the reflective surface is too close, the ones in my bedroom and bathroom have this problem.

 

[Draeger]

Does yours have a little remote that lets your change the colour's / brightness? If so i think its the same one

Yep, its these ones:-

Like I said, sort of killing two birds with one stone - the alcove the TV sits in needs a bit of lighting up and I had considered faffing about fitting small recessed dimmable LED downlights but if these do the trick they will be a hassle free option in comparison. Did any of you need to cut your's into 4 pieces to secure them evenly on the back of the TV? The advert says they can be cut easily and there's a video on YouTube showing the end being cut off a strip but I'm kinda wondering how you connect up 4 individual strips to the power supply and associated wiring connectors? This is a diagram from the advert which mentions the cutting:-

 

[Psycho Sonny]

WARNING

don't buy cheap crappy sets from ebay the power supplies are a fire hazard and a ticking time bomb i bought a setup for £25 from ebay and the power supply exploded.

put it this way a proper UK certified power supply which has passed all the testing is going to cost a fair amount compared to the ebay ones.

your better off buying the antec kits which run off the TV's USB ports if you want a cheap setup or a lamp with a daylight bulb behind the tv.

Pretty sure they were sold here and was a thread on it.

I do not see the point TBH, I want the room dark apart from screens own light.

Good to "keep up with the Jones" next door etc.

you don't see the point because you have not done the research clearly, google bias lighting and look at threads from avforums, etc.

Static lights are just a bit of bling. However the active ones that react to the image on screen are pretty awesome.

lot of crap, static lights > active

the whole point of them is to improve PQ by improving black levels as well as reducing eye strain, an active light wouldn't help improve either.

I bought one of the bias strips to have a play.

You need a bang on perfect setup for it to work at all really - if you do have the angle and distance right and the right color and texture to the wall behind then it does quite noticeably increase the perceived contrast and "vividness" of the image way beyond what black borders do.

Personally didn't think it made any difference to eye strain but that will depend a bit person to person - if anything I thought it made it slightly more fatiguing on the eyes for prolonged watching so stopped using it.

once i stopped using mine i noticed i started getting a lot of eye fatigues and then ensuing migraines if i didn't rest my eyes.

 

[V F]

So they claim, good marketing, so does a black bezel/border give same perceived contrast.

I use a projector so amb light is not good.

And in a perfect world we are not supposed to read or watch TV in poor light for our eyes sake as you mentioned but its not good for effect esp. in dark action movies like say Batman, I could watch a western during day.

Each to their own.

 

[Raymond Lin]

I've had LED lights behind my TV for over a year now, I have to say my eyes prefer them on rather than off. It gives the room that little ambient light which is enough for me to walk out to get a drink without turning on the ceiling light and create a minimum light level so no extreme high and low lights with just the TV which is nice.

 

[spoffle]

WARNING

don't buy cheap crappy sets from ebay the power supplies are a fire hazard and a ticking time bomb i bought a setup for £25 from ebay and the power supply exploded.

The strip of LEDs, controller box and remotes are perfectly fine, I am unsure about the power bricks, because your experience of one burning up doesn't mean they all will and that there's a fault, this sort of thing can happen with any power bricks if there's something wrong with them.

The power supplies are easily replaced, or you can even easily hook one up to your PC's power supply with a few minutes of work, all you need to do is to connect it up to a 12V feed (the yellow cable on a molex connector) and a neutral. I have one connected up to my PC.

So they claim, good marketing, so does a black bezel/border give same perceived contrast.

I use a projector so amb light is not good.

And in a perfect world we are not supposed to read or watch TV in poor light for our eyes sake as you mentioned but its not good for effect esp. in dark action movies like say Batman, I could watch a western during day.

Each to their own.

Oh look, it's you talking about stuff you don't understand again!

You don't understand what is being spoken about here, this is the issue, not ambient light.

 

[Draeger]

Thanks for the info so far folks, good to hear opinions on these.

@Raymond Lin - That looks brilliant, just the sort of thing I wanted to achieve. What type of kit is that, one of the many available on the bay of 'E's?

 

[Rroff]

The strip of LEDs, controller box and remotes are perfectly fine, I am unsure about the power bricks, because your experience of one burning up doesn't mean they all will and that there's a fault, this sort of thing can happen with any power bricks if there's something wrong with them.

The power supplies are easily replaced, or you can even easily hook one up to your PC's power supply with a few minutes of work, all you need to do is to connect it up to a 12V feed (the yellow cable on a molex connector) and a neutral. I have one connected up to my PC.

I'd sort of agree with him in that its better to go for say the antec soundscience ones like I have if in doubt, while the problem ones are a minority there are some cheap knock off probably chinese made versions that are a fire hazard - I've also seen some cheap ones where the actual strip started bubbling/turning brown and melting down (I'm guessing some kind of short circuit internally) with probably fire risk.

 

[spoffle]

I'd sort of agree with him in that its better to go for say the antec soundscience ones like I have if in doubt, while the problem ones are a minority there are some cheap knock off probably chinese made versions that are a fire hazard - I've also seen some cheap ones where the actual strip started bubbling/turning brown and melting down (I'm guessing some kind of short circuit internally) with probably fire risk.

They'll be all made in China. The ones I've got are used a lot, in home installations and stuff, they are cheap knock offs. As for the power adapters, really unless you have a faulty one they shouldn't be catching fire anyway, they are only outputting 35 watts per 5 metres of LED, so if you have a 5 metre strip, they're barely using anything.

I wouldn't use one of those adapters on a laptop of course, but if they're not cheap knockoffs then you'll be fine.

 

[Rroff]

You know what I meant.

 

[Draeger]

Having looked into this a bit further it appears the kit I've bought doesn't come with solderless connectors of any sort. I might be wrong and maybe it will have them once they arrive but it doesn't mention them in the advert/listing. That said the kit in question is being advertised/described as 'TV WALL BACK LIGHTS LED STRIPS SET RGB 16 COLOUR CHANGING+REMOTE+12V CHARGER UK' so you never know. The issue I think will be that the 5m strip will require snipping into 4 x pieces to match the length of the rear of the TV at the top, bottom and down the sides. I don't think this strip stuff can be bent around corners but perhaps someone who has already fitted these can confirm/deny that? Cutting the strip seems simple enough as does joining it with 5050 solderless connectors which are available for a few quid. Just slightly annoyed I didn't realise this when ordering, otherwise I may have looked for a different seller who stocked pre-cut kits with the required adapters.