The Letter Box
By Greg Robinson
About Greg
Greg Robinson is an E-Gear contributing editor with a penchant for all things home theater. When he's not busy spinning the latest Blu-ray Discs, you'll probably find him thumping volleyballs or bemoaning the cancellation of "Firefly."Silver's Screen
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Say Hello to the Ultimate Night Light
First, a word of warning to my fellow tech heads and gadget geeks: yours truly is about to wax poetic about a night light. Said another way, prepare yourself for what may end up being the most boring blog entry you've ever read.
Still reading? Why?
Are you still here? Good. Now that we've weeded out the night light enthusiast posers, let's continue. Show of hands, how many of you have small children at home? Ages 2-7? I have two myself. My five-year-old son has demanded a night light in his room ever since he was little(r). Like many kids, he's not a big fan of the dark - at least not when he's alone. However, my three-year-old daughter never needed or wanted a night light until just recently. Suddenly it seems like a good idea to her. They're both old enough to use the bathroom by themselves and they'll often get up once a night to use the facilities. Said facilities are at the opposite end of our lengthy upstairs hallway. Our bedroom is downstairs.
Now that you're intimately familiar with my home's floor plan, allow me to get to the point. If you do the math, you'll see that we require one night light in each child's room, one in the upstairs hallway, one in the upstairs bathroom and one in the stairwell so the kids can journey to our downstairs bedroom in case of emergency. (Sample emergency: "Daddy, I dreamed there was a T-Rex in my room, but he was a nice T-Rex.") That's a total of five night lights. Until a few weeks ago, my wife and I had been using those so-cheap-they're-practically-disposable-but-after-you-buy-25-of-them-they-start-getting-damned-expensive models - you know the ones I'm talking about. Occasionally we'd buy replacement bulbs, but when the bulbs cost nearly the same as a new fixture, why bother?
I had resigned myself to this inefficient but (hopefully) temporary night light situation and I wasn't really losing any sleep over it. (Not counting the interruptions for stories of trespassing-but-benevolent tyrannosaurs.) All of that changed when I discovered Sylvania's "Power Failure Light (PFL)."
The PFL snaps into a standard receptacle using a flip-out plug. When plugged in, its internal battery recharges. The unit features a 3-position switch: OFF, ON and AUTO. OFF mode is self-explanatory. ON mode engages the 3-bulb, down-facing flashlight. AUTO puts the light in night light mode, whereby a sensor detects ambient light and engages the up-facing single LED bulb when it gets dark. In most cases, you'd leave it on AUTO all of the time. Here comes the cool part: the simple act of unplugging the light immediately engages the flashlight, which allegedly runs for up to seven hours on a full charge. In the case of a power outage, the light effectively thinks it's been unplugged so you suddenly have wall-mounted emergency lighting.
I don't know about your house, but when the power goes out in my house, alarm systems beep, the UPS on my computer starts blaring and my kids usually wake up - upset because they're now alert yet their night lights have gone dark due to a pronounced lack of electricity.
Sylvania's PFL now performs three extremely useful roles in my house: it's a long-lasting night light that doesn't need its bulb or battery changed; it provides light for my kids (and me) when the power goes out; and it's a great little flashlight which I'm guaranteed not to lose. If you'll pardon the pun, this light is absolutely brilliant - especially if your house has kids.
Sylvania's Power Failure Light is not a new product. Near as I can tell, it's been on the market for over a year. However, since it has suddenly become the most talked-about piece of tech in my high definition house, I thought it was worth sharing. I just wish someone had shared it with me about 25 night lights ago.
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