Now that LED lighting for the sign industry is a mature market, a number of potential concerns have arisen that you need to consider.
随着LED光源市场的成熟与发展，厂商以及客户对LED光源性能的要求越来越高。接下来，我们将从价格、亮度等因素对这个正在不断茁壮发展的市场进行一次深度揭秘。
Price
价格不是决定LED光源服务质量的唯一要素
Price has become the wrong determining factor as your purchasing reason in the overly crowed market. Let me explain and to be fair, LED technology has mirrored the computer industry from a technology standpoint …you continue to get more for less …in other words performance increases and the price goes down. However you do not always get what you pay for at both ends of the spectrum! If you think all LED are created equal, you are in for some great surprises, just after your buying decision, or in about 2 years give or take that will prove you wrong or right. How you run your business determines your future!
我们通常都会认为LED光源服务“越贵越好”，所以大量的买家根据价格的高低，来判断一家公司能提供的LED光源服务好不好。但显然，随着时代的发展，这种简单的判断方法显然是错误的。随着LED光源行业的发展，存在于市场中的厂家也已经越来越多。从技术角度上来讲，科技的发展也推动了LED光源行业的发展，换句话说，我们不断地用越来越少的价格却换取了更好的服务以及质量。然而，你也并不总是能够获取到性价比最高的服务，这个行业充满了惊喜，毕竟不是所有的LED都是按照这套理论被公平地制造出来。换言之，那些你现在决定购买的LED光源，可能要在两年后，才能看出你购买的LED光源产品服务是超值的，还是那些又贵又容易被淘汰的服务。你要谨慎的选择LED光源服务，而不是鲁莽地决定，毕竟每一个公司的未来，都是由当下那些商业决定铺就的。
lumen / Brightness
LED光源亮度并不是越强越好
The real problem here is there are no testing standards in the sign industry for the total package! Thus when one brand says its lumens are XXX and a competitor offers there is XX and another XX.5 etc., most of you take that data as your relative sole decision making fact; and it is not! For reference, in the "Lighting" industry the IES / Illuminating Engineering Society has specific test standards for all lighting fixtures, thus when lighting company A offers XXX lumens and competitor B offers XX, the XXX is brighter. Period. As with price if you make your decision solely on the lm / brightness "data" you are doing your company and your customer a real disservice.
当一家LED光源公司将其服务进行外包的时候，我们实际上，很难对这家公司的服务做一个检测。因此，当一个厂家宣称他们的光效是XXX而他们的竞争对手是XX和XX.5。你们中的大多数，则会把这些数据作为是否使用这家LED的唯一决策依据。可是，只把这种数据作为唯一的参考标准，是极为不明智的。虽然,LED光源行业的IES(Illuminating Engineering Society）即光源工业协会则对所有的照明灯具，设定了一套具体的测试标准。所以当A公司提供了XXX的数据而B公司提供了XX的数据时，根据这套标准来讲，可能是会更亮一些。但是光效并不代表一切，只是一味地注重光效而忽略其他的效能，事实上也是在损害客户的利益。
Competitive Products
同类LED光源产品出现时，我们该如何对比
Of utmost importance, for you are the buyer, is to understand these differences. A prime example is the new optics enhancedChannel Letter Module (CLM.) Consideringa CLM just on price (and for this example w/o optics) is the wrong decision when compared to an optics enhanced CLM. Typically an optics enhanced CLM will totally outperform the non-optic CLM and while the non-optic CLM probably costs less, you will need at least a double row of them to counter the optic CLM. SO if you use price as the determining factor you will be paying more for the non-optic as you need 2X the quantity, if not more and you also have more labor to install 2X the CLM...getting the picture?
对于每个要购买LED光源服务的买方来说，了解每个产品的差异是至关重要的。我们这里以LED发光模组为例（简称：CLM），我们如果在发光模组这个要素中只考虑价格要素，（在这个例子中的w光学或者是o光学）会是错误的，我们更应该侧重其中的发光模组的质量。通常来说，发光模组的增强在性能上来说，是完全超越那些没有加强过的发光字模组的。尽管没有增强意味着花费的将会更少。但价格上的节省，将意味着你会在使用的过程中，需要至少两组视神经CLM计数器。综上来看，如果选择便宜的未增强的发光模组，你至少需要两组。即使你不需要，你也要花费两倍的时间来安装未增强的发光字模组。究竟选择那组，已经显而易见了。
What should you do?
多比较、多思考，才能选择到优质的光源服务
Per the above you hopefully can understand there is more to your purchase decision process than making a generic decision. Another is import brands, with no real US presence and one warehouse with one person is not a real distributor, just as dealing direct with a foreign country can be costly and time consuming.
以上提到的每个要素，作为购买者你都应该理解，在你的购买过程中，相对于平时做的简单的决定，你要考虑的要素甚至要远远多于以上提到的要素。另一个则是进口品牌，那些没有真正的美国认证，或者是那些一个仓库中只有一个人在负责的品牌都不是真正的销售商，或许造成的结果，如同直接与国外对接一样昂贵和费时。
So where do you get the facts, and even more importantly the credible facts? A whole lot of diligence. Do you think a national brand is the best performer? I can assure otherwise and can prove it. However that alone might not be a reason for your decision, maybe it is. Is the LED "spec'd and if so maybe you are stuck with it, then maybe you are not.
所以得到信息的来源，要比那些你认为可靠的信息更为重要。在做决策之前，你一定花费了大量的时间和精力来调查品牌的相关信息。你可能认为这些信息也有可能是虚假的。这一点我也极为认同。信息的是否真实，也许会成为你最终决策的唯一依据，可是盲目坚持这一规矩，也是不理性的。
LED performance like everything available to us at all levels is a sum of its parts. Do you make a decision one aspect? Some do that for sure, however if you are in it for the long term you need to know more and do more research if for no other reason that the playing field is NOT level. The best analogy is one brand vs. another is the epitome of the "Apples and Oranges" scenario at least in the Led / Sign market.
LED光源最终展现给我们的性能则应该源于其每个部分所展现出来的性能之和。你是不是也曾经只从一个方面入手来做决定呢，我相信有一部分的人可能真的是这么做的。然而对于每个有LED需求的人来说，最好的态度则应该是尽可能多的来了解，来花费一定的时间对该行业进行相关的调查。这里最好的方法则是进行品牌之间的对比，千万不要找一些风马牛不相及的产业来对比，相信经过对比之后，你能获得最好的LED光源服务。 |
