💾 Archived View for sbg.one › gemlog › 2021 › 2021-10-24-blue-leds.gmi captured on 2021-11-30 at 20:18:30. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content
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2021-10-24
I know I'm not the only one, I can't be. There are others like me out there that hate blue LED's on electronic devices. This is especially true in the home theater and home audio space. A big YouTuber in audio reviews I follow hates blue LED's with a passion equal to my own. This person is Zeos Pantera, link below.
What about you? Have you ever noticed this? Did you ever think about it? Do the blue LED's bother you?
Blue LED's are like nuclear weapons, just because you can make them, doesn't mean you should. Just about every audio and computing device has at least one bright blue LED on them. Why?
Those of us who are into home theather and home audio find these blue LED's annoying and distracting to what we're trying to watch or listen to. It's too much energy for the eyes to deal with in low-light situations.
The wavelengths of blue light are much shorter and contain more energy than red light which have long wavelengths and lower energy. The blue light messes with with eyes and even sleep.
When you're trying to watch a show or movie and your A/V equipment has these blue LED's facing you they grab your attention and distract your eyes from what you really want to see. If you're just listening to music and have the lights low or off those blue LED's are piercing you through the night and distract your mind from enjoying the music.
For instance, on my computer desk I have this Emotiva BasX A-100 amplifier with a builtin volume control. The knob has this blue LED ring around it. Sure it looks neat for a moment, but it's awfully distracting.
In my listening setup the only thing that has a blue LED is my turntable, but thankfully it's facing upward so it's not directly aimed at me when I'm sitting in front of my speakers. My old Pioneer cassette player has the orange LED's and I love that. My Yamaha stereo receiver has some basic white LED's which are not high power, so they're better than the blue LED's. The same is true of my TEAC CD player.
But the cable modem and my pfSense firewall both have these stupid bright blue LED's in my listening area and they're super annoying. I ended up taking some Scotch tape, covering them up and using a Sharpie to color over them. I do need to see the lights in case there is a problem and they change. They're so bright that they shine right through the black marker tape, but it cuts down on the eye piercing brightness of them.
Even kitchen appliances have blue LED's on them these days.
There's a reason why cell phone makers have created a setting to make the screens more yellow or redish, taking away from the bright blues and whites when it gets dark. It's to help stop messing up our eyes and sleep. But component and computer manufactures dont' seem to care.
Now I do have some stuff that is either old, like 1980's and 1990's when red or orange LED's were the standard. Using them in low-light conditions is a much more pleasant experience. One company in particular, Geshelli Labs, has taken to making their products with red LED's, or at least settings to change from blue to red. I don't know if their reason for doing so is the same that I'm complaining about or if it was for another reason. But either way, I love it. Next to my bright blue LED ring on the Emotiva, is a Geshelli Labs Jnog DAC and Erish balanced headphone amplifier. Both are set to all red LED's; the way they should be.
Who are these people that design equipment to use blue LED's? Do they live on the sun? Are they not people who do things in the dark or low light situations. Clearly they must not be computer programmers. How many of us out there have been calling for "dark modes" on all sorts of software products, and websites? I know I have been asking for dark mode for a long time. A side note, that's another reason why I love Linux. I can, and have themed my entire system to be a dark theme so that I'm not getting blinded by brights on the screen.
When I am looking at a product and there are different models, or competing brands of the same thing and one has blue LED's and the other with red LED's, you can bet your ass I'll probably buy the one with red LED's.
How did red LED's fall out of favor? How did they become uncool to have them in our products today?
Please, for the love of all things sane, stop making things with blue LED's! Bring back the red LED's!