AI Hydra Edge! AquaIllumination's NEWEST Reef Light!

In this video Blaine gets the chance to showcase the all new 44HD and 68HD Hydra Edge coming from AquaIllumination. Let's get a first hand look, check out the specs, and play around with some PAR readings!

If you are wanting to snag one today head over to the website and grab your Hydra Edge! Leave a comment your favorite part about the new light!

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[gsxrfire]

Steep price with only a 1 year warranty

[ws]

AI is no longer trying to stay affordable

[lilricky]

Thanks, this video review is outstanding.

[aqhan]

Will probably be nearly twice as expensive in Europe. But the lights look really good!

[thegolflife]

Does the apex MxM module allow you to pick a lighting schedule that changes with natural sunlight in a designated location? IE if I wanted to mimic Bali with the sunset and sunrise changing daily

[cwills]

AI is knocking it out of the park between their Blade and now these. People are going to bitch about their densely clustered spotlights having more PAR at the bottom of a tank - duh, and then that spotlight falls off massively just a few inches away. These let you utilize the same energy output as the old Hydras but diffuses the light much more evenly to the front/back/sides of the tank without blasting the corals directly underneath them. The angled mounting options are excellent, and you can use these along with Blades, using the Blades like T5 bulbs for even more coverage on big tanks. They are small, quiet and have threaded holes on either side for custom mounting options. The diffuser screen fixes the problems with their previous generation with salt spray causing heat build-up on the lens, ruining the lens and sometimes the light itself if people aren't paying attention to their tanks.

Besides this, the blue spectrum width has been expanded even beyond what the current Radion G6 can provide. It's not going to dial in as nicely with old AB+ profiles missing the red/green LEDs, but I'd personally much rather have all of the extra blues/violets/395nm UV LEDs. The red/green is going to have to be made up with cool white, which isn't going to give a little red bump on a spectrometer like what people are used to, but that doesn't mean it's necessarily bad either, just different. WWC doesn't even use AB+ and prefers a short 4-6 hour window with whites supplementing the blues, but then all blues the rest of the day. This maximizes coral growth and coloration, so seeing this light lean into the blues is a positive thing.

But to me, the best thing about these is the diffusion and the ability to angle the light. Photographers are keenly aware of light and how it affects our perception of reality. Decades ago Nikon ran an ad promotion with the tagline "The art of photographing light". None of us are looking directly at things as we stumble about our lives, we are looking at the light bouncing off of things, reflecting into our eyeballs. The "quality" of that light affects how we perceive the world. Want to take a really crappy photo, have someone stand outside in full sunlight blasting into their face and take a picture of them. Want to take a great photo, put them in the shade and use strobes and light modifiers to control the light how you want it, highlighting parts of the face you want, shadowing parts of the face you want for depth. Having the ability to angle the light allows this. First, it's diffuse, which massively contributes to the quality of the light, second, by putting the light further towards the front glass and tilting it down, you can now shine the light at angles closer to your viewing angle. Corals always look best from the angle they are being lit from, that's why most coral farms turn off the flow and take top-down photos. Those areas of the coral are being hit with the most photons and absorb that light, and then flouresce back in the same direction. Angling the light increases the glow from the corals to our eyes through the front glass and helps eliminate shadowing on the corals. This will help with SPS corals shading themselves from growth, where the bottom parts of the coral start to lose coloration due to light starvation.

[valleyreef]

the par readings would be great with water flow. regardless, awesome review 👍

[dusk]

Can they be mounted on existing EcoTech RMS Rails?
If we don't want to buy the AI arm coming in from behind the tank, because we have an existing RMS running the center length of the tank. Are they compatible?

I personally think the price is a bit steep. But at least they are less than the Radions. If these are meant to be a mid point between a Blade and a Radion in price, then perhaps they're fairly priced. But the initial par numbers seem underwhelming for it's cost. And more specifically, what is the specific spectral chart for the fixture?
Sure you listed the LED's, but what's the spectrum? Using the same company for a reference, the Blade Glow spectrum is very different than a Blade Grow and these fixtures appear to be quite similar in terms of technology. More demonstrations and spectral data is needed before I'd ever decide to put these over a tank. Are these viable for Arco growth? I have no idea, show me the spectral data.

[theReefED]

Blaine crushes it as usual

I'm really interested in this light and how it compares to the Hydra 32!

[NEONCorals]

Are those lights compatible with hybrid light fixtures? many thanks

[dandanthefishmanclothier]

Love your channel and thanks for the info on new lights but they seem abit over priced and im guessing like all lights the brackets are going to be insanely priced i know non of that is in ur control but theyll price themselves out of the market. We need more lights in the blade price range that are just plug in and play no necessary extras

[thomasthecat]

High price for a very unimpressive par. What are they thinking 700 for the 68 and 400 for the 44. Plus add 100 for the mounting kit.

[tf]

How many 68s would I need for a 60”x30”x30” acro tank with very high light demands? Would be pairing with 2x 57” coral grow blades

[tcmarineaddiction]

Wonder when ecotech will release the G7 feel like its coming soon. Undoubtedly will be crazy high priced. But i like seeing new equipment that comes out

[windblower]

Hi. My xr15 pro g3 just died today. I am looking for a new light. Is this better than the xr15 pro g3?

[TheAcroReef]

Interesting product. I don't think AI is trying to compete with other options out there, but hey congrats on the release? 😂

Low par, poor light diffusement, bland design, and low value. Even worse, at that price point, they slap customers with only a 1 year warranty. That alone says quite a bit about the confidence they have in their products. 🎉

[mateogomez]

When you sleep, go to the bathroom, etc., do you take off your cap or not? Maybe it's already part of your head.

[UNIVERSAL-UR]

Why do these channels only review the expensive products?

[raftai]

The pricing is just insane. I think we are, at last, about to reach the saturation point where the industry's greed hit the roof. And you have to pay extra for the bracket..In this economy, and for the sake of common sense, no thank you.

[Davidsworldz]

Anyone remember when AI used to be the affordable way to reef? Once ecotech took over prices got outrageous!! At this point I think the radion fakes is the way to go smh