Full Spectrum Lighting - Is it any better?

lennon asms: "Lighting in my apartment sucks. I am giving some thought to full-spectrum lighting fixtures, like the the Vita-lite. Some places say it's not any better than regular lighting, others say it's just great. What do you think?" I find the quality of lighting in my work environment to be very important. Would lights such as these be better than your standard soft-white or flourescent bulbs?

Comments

Full spectrum worse than incandescent

[Jon Peterson]

I find full spectrum light incredibly harsh and cold. I did a project years ago in a lab that was lit by full spectrum lights and it made my head hurt. Maybe things have improved in the last 10 year, I don't know.

The best lighting is indirect incandescent, or from things like candles and oil lamps (although that's too dim to read by). Indirect Halogen (OK, so Halogen is a kind of incandescent..) lighting is OK too. Fluorescent lighting is evil and must be stopped, but every office in the universe uses it for cost reasons.

I notice that there's a new and extra-bright kind of headlight in production with a slight bluish tint. That's pretty unpleasant too - I think they are metal halide based, but no-ones trying to light a room with them yet as far as I know.

Old yellow sodium lighting is disgusting too unless you go for that deserted carpark feel.

I was walking through Hyde park last night an noticing how nice gaslight is....