XENON HID lamps do not have a filament. Instead the light is created by an electrical discharge between two electrodes in an air tight tiny quartz capsule filled with xenon gas, mercury and metal halide salts. This improves durability as road vibrations can cause damage to coil lighting technologies. These light sources also produce a blue-white light that is safer because it is closer to natural daylight. The color temperature is approximately 5000 K compared to 2300 K for halogen. The increased light output from a 35 watt XENON HID lamp is approximately 200% more light then a 55 watt halogen bulb. The XENON HID system will also draw less power from your vehicles electrical system.




Temperature:

Color Temperature is a measurement in Degrees Kelvin that indicates the hue of a specific type of light source. Many people believe the misconception that color temperature is a rating of the brightness of the bulb or HID kit. This belief is completely false. The reality of the matter is that the higher the color temperature, the less useable light output you will obtain. However, it is also a fact that, all HID light is brighter than Halogen, even if it is a 12000 Kelvin, the Lumen still maintain well over 2500lm; which is still 2x brighter than 55W Halogen.



Temperature = Color and Lumens = brightness

Even though some halogen bulbs are coated with blue to get that temperature color you are looking for (ex:6000k), there's a big downside to that. The blue glass actually robs lumens and the bulb's performance is affected. So you end up having a bulb that reaches the promised color but gives you even less road coverage than your standard clear halogen bulb. If you want the white/blue colors and great performance, only HID will be able to give you both.


Safety:

It can be vital to see even more in borderline situations. Because unfortunately, the risk of having an accident at night is about twice as high as during the day - despite the fact that there is less traffic on the road. The reason: humans are only inadequately equipped to see at night or in poor weather conditions. The better you can see and the more similar the light conditions are to daylight, the better the compensation for the factors that make night driving difficult:

• Overstimulation caused by the large number of traffic signs.
• Reduction of visual acuity at night to one twentieth of the daytime level.
• Loss of important information due to restricted field of vision, considerably reduced ability to recognise contrasts and colours.
• Tiredness and decreasing concentration.
• Diminishing powers of vision in the dark from 30 years of age onwards