[95avblm3]

I spent the past 5.5 years working for a company that was a start-up in the LED replacement lamp market space, so I've been around this for a while.

You've already gotten good advice, so I'll try and be short but add a few more pointers.

1) Buy quality bulbs. Someone mentioned Cree... They are good. Phillips has been at the forefront of the big 3 (Phillips, Sylvania, GE) in creating LED lights. They have pretty nice stuff. We used Osram diodes extensively in our products. Osram is the semiconductor end of Sylvania, so I'd recommend them too. Avoid no name crap. Also be leery of some of the store brands like Ecosmart or Utilitech. They are rebranded and while some may be good, others are no good... For a while, a company named Lighting Science Group was rebranding their lights for HD under the Ecosmart name. Not all of them had fuses and there were a few instances of fires. Not trying to be an alarmist, just driving home the point that you get what you pay for.

2) Warmer color temperatures (designated by a lower Kelvin temp, like 2700K) will more closely match the incandescents you are replacing.

3) If you have dimmers, make sure you buy dimmable lamps and make sure your dimmers are LED compatible. If not, you may experience flickering.

4) Conversely, if you don't have dimmers, you may be able to save a few bucks by buying non-dimmable bulbs.

5) While cheaper off the shelf, LED is better that CFL because of better dimmability, better life, in direct comparison they can use up to 50% the power and most importantly, there is no Mercury as there is in CFLs.

Unfortunately, my company suffered the fate of many start-ups and ceased operations earlier in the year. If there's any consolation, my severance was enough LED 4' tubes to re-lamp my garage and bonus room, which combined is about 19 fixtures with 2 bulbs each. And I have spares. I replaced 40W LFLs with LED tubes that are under 10W each.

It's a good choice in my opinion.