Xenon under cabinet light recommendations wanted

[elened]

A year ago we bought an old house and did some remodeling before moving in. We pretty much redid the kitchen which now has beautiful oak cabinets and granite countertops. Knowing very little about lighting, and liking the look of the halogen line-voltage puck lights that were installed under the old cabinets, we decided to keep them under the new cabinets for the time being. As I said, I love the look. It's the right task/ambience lighting for me. But it turns out that these are the cheapest Home Depot pucks you can get. Every few weeks a bulb burns out, and they've also burned out some of the multi-outlet extension cords they've been plugged into despite the fact that they are not too high voltage for these cords. Also, they flicker if we place a plate or a glass in the cabinet just above the puck. So, basically, now I just want to replace them with the best, since I'm so disgusted with the quality of the ones I have. I've seen some very nice LED's that were $200+ per puck - too expensive for me. And between what I've read and heard, xenon is probably what I should be looking for since the light rendered is quite comparable to that of halogen, and it doesn't run quite as hot. I guess I'd also be open to incandescent if I could find a nice unit. Anyway, can anyone point me in the right direction as to which company to go with? Pegasus, American Lighting, Hera, Bellacor, Seagull, Juno, Kickler(?). I hear Hera is very good, but their pucks don't seem to have ventilation holes. Is that something I should care about? I wouldn't mind spending $20 - $40 a puck. Thanks much!

[elened]

Maybe I should quickly add that I'm located in the Midwest (US). Thanks.

[Ranieri]

By chance, are the pucks on a dimmer?

[HerHusband]

I tried some low voltage puck lights when we installed our kitchen cabinets. But, I didn't care for the concentrated beams of light at each puck. They also got rather warm in operation.

So, I replaced the puck lights with thin profile (about 1" thick) fluorescent lights (line voltage). I like them much better. They run cool, provide wide bands of even lighting, use very little power, and the fluorescent bulbs will last years. The brand I got (GE I think?) includes sockets and cables for daisy chaining lights if you wish, but because of our cabinet layout, I plugged each into dedicated switched outlets. My lights are about 12 inches long, but they also make longer fixtures if you need them. They also have electronic ballasts so they come on instantly, with no flicker like older fluorescents.

Home Depot and Lowes both sell the lights around here.

The only possible negative is that they can't be used on a dimmer. That wasn't an issue for me, but it could be a problem for others.

Good luck,

Anthony

[elened]

Thanks. Actually, they come from Home Depot with a 3-level dimmer switch. Of course that part broke. I bought, from a lighting store, another multi-socket extension cord that comes with a slide-dimmer. And that works fine, except the bulbs which keep on burning out and the flicker when there is a vibration from putting a plate in the cabinet above.

[Ranieri]

I see. I misread your original post and thought you had low voltage lights and was wondering if you had an incompatible dimmer. FWIW, I have a set of cheapo low voltage halogen pucks (Good Earth, or something like that ) with a transformer that is wired to a low voltage dimmer switch and so far so good.