Yesterday I reported that the new Philips Hue Festavia light chain always consumes between 16 and 17 watts of power, regardless of whether you have white or coloured light activated at 1 or 100 percent. This is partly due to the fact that voltage must be applied to each LED at all times and the LED segments are connected in a series-parallel combination. You can find more information about this in this article.
Susanne then got in touch in the comments with the following question:
Is this also the case with the power consumption of Gradient Lightstrips? Or do they behave like lamps in that they consume more electricity with pure white light?
This is a legitimate question, because after all, the Gradient products from Philips Hue can also display different colours in different segments. Reason enough for me to check the facts with a measuring device. And fortunately I have good news for all those who use a Gradient product as mood lighting.
For example, the Philips Hue Gradient Signe table lamp consumes around 10.2 watts of power at standard white and 100 percent brightness. If, on the other hand, you set a colour gradient in the range of purple-pink, the consumption drops to only around 2 watts. Moreover, the consumption decreases with dimmed brightness. We observed the same behaviour with other gradient products such as the Play Gradient Lightstrip.