Finding the Perfect Battery and A/C Powered Clip on Book Light Designs that Properly Illuminate Your Books, Hobbies & Crafts
Properly selected, a book light can reduce eye stress by assuring ample light while reading, even in the darkest places, and can save both energy and money. A sturdy clip on book light design can make your light easy to attach to your book, book holder, or book stand, and many can also function as craft, podium, hobby or other task lighting. Light weight incandescent or LED designs can put just the right amount of light anywhere you need it, without wasting energy or disturbing others around you, like a spouse or partner watching TV.
By illuminating your reading materials with just the correct quantity and temperature of light, a book light can help to save your eyes from strain and assist your reading in darkened venues. Our eyes require more light as we age, and providing the right amount of light exactly where we’re reading can be a real challenge. Obviously, the best light for reading is natural sunlight coming directly over your shoulder, but we often have to read when or where sunlight isn’t available. Hence, the correctly selected book light, a light we can use any time and any place we choose, iscan be} an incredible convenience. By then turning off the overheads and lamps lighting things other than our reading, we conserve considerable energy as well as the money required to pay for it.
When choosing between incandescent and LED book light designs, three primary concerns are: the differences in the type of light produced by these two distinct technologies, the cost of original purchase, and the cost of operation over the lifetime of the light. Incandescent light sources typically create a warm, somewhat yellowish light, and incandescent bulbs typically have service lives of between 15-25 hours of use and then must be replaced. LED lights create a whiter, cooler light, with many designs now optimized to approximate the output of light from the sun. Hence, many readers find the light of modern LED designs to be more “sun like”, producing greater clarity and contrast and making all printing easier to read. While replacement incandescent bulbs are usually available in local electrical and hardware stores, as well as over the Internet, the expense and inconvenience of replacement can really add up over time. Since LEDs offer life expectancies of 10,000 to 50,000 hours, the 10-20% greater initial cost of acquisition quickly becomes irrelevant. Generally, then, LED lights are now the preferred choice over the older incandescent.
Battery powered clip on lights are the handiest, because they can be used anywhere. Unfortunately, batteries themselves are also a replaceable item, lasting 20-30 hours of use at best, in either LED or incandescent designs. Optional A/C adapters are available for most book lights, and another option is to make use of a good battery recharger and rechargeable batteries. Most book lights use either AA or AAA batteries, and many excellent models are available from which to choose. Additionally, if your light is typically used near to an electrical outlet, an optional A/C adapter can be a money saving investment.
Finally, the uniformity of light dispersal and the area over which it is dispersed is also an important consideration when choosing the perfect book light for a particular application. If your light will only be used to light a standard mass market paperback book, a single LED or incandescent book light design will probably be adequate; but, if you read magazines, most hard cover books or a stand full of music, you’ll need a more powerful light which can distribute the lighting over an appropriately larger area. The best way to determine the most suitable light for your particular application will be to test it in actual use. Wherever you shop, be sure your dealer provides both good information and advice before the sale, and a good return policy, in case your first choice doesn’t work out. With diligence, you can buy the best light for each and every use.