Blue lights

[shamaz]

Hi all
Just wondering if you could help me
My ballest unit on my t5's went bang last week luckly i had a 550w halide unit as spare, so i set it up 2 days later a bulb blew, great, £60.00 a bulb, because i only have a fowlr system halide's are not essential, so i purchased a new ballest unit and white and blue bulbs. The problem is my fish looked so much better with the halides would i get the same effect if i was to change the blue light for another white one or is this the reason that people use the halides because i was under the impression that the light density halides produce is more effective for corals. But with that said i would like my fish to look at there best. If any ideas please help.
Thanks
Sham

[gregony]

Most people think their fish looks best with a 50/50 combination. Half 10K and half actinic. With halides most people like the 14K and the 20K for the blue in it. The blue brings out the bio-luminescent qualities in the fish coloration. If you don't like the T5's it may be because they don't make the tank "shimmer" like halides. This makes everything in the tank look more exotic. You could add a fairly low cost LED light to get that effect (like the Current USA Powerbright) here in the US. I'm not sure what you can get in UK, but it seems like Europe always gets the cutting edge (albeit more expensive) stuff so I imagine you could find a decent LED fixture somewhere if you don't want to plunk down 60 quid for a bulb.