The Candlepower forums will lead you down a dark path… or a very bright one. Either way it won’t be good.
When you hear people talking about, say, the Surefire “M4 Devastator” and then you discover it’s just a flashlight can it be anything other than a let down?
Here’s the Devastator, for the curious. It’s… devastating.
I’m as clueless as you but basically, fits the same space as a AA, with more power (3x more than an AA), longer life, and better charging hold. At least from what I understand. So for LED lights that can handle that voltage, you get a brighter light for longer run times with the same amount of battery “space” within the light.
Ed’s awesome dealextreme link sucked me in and I picked up a UniqueFire. I’ve been carrying around a JTSpotlight rechargeable LED light (official output .5 watt LED, 28 Lumens, actually puts out 800 lux and reaches 92 feet) on my nightly walks for well over year now. Modest specs until you see how tiny the little thing is and charges last a while. First read about it here. (No, I’m not a VMer).
I hate LED flashlights. And maglights, for that matter. I like a nice, focused beam with no dark spot in the middle. The best ones I ever bought were cheap Eveready incandecents, one took AAs and one took D cells. I’ve had some more expensive flashlights (though I was never stupid enough to spend hundreds of dollars) and none of them have been as good or reliable as the Eveready. They’re still going strong, 10 years later.
I’m baffled as to how this criterion relates to your opinion on LED flashlights. LED flashlights give a much more “solid” beam with no weird artifacting.
I have yet to see an LED flashlight that produces shadows you can read tracks with. Maybe they’ve gotten better, but… I already have more than enough flashlights.