The cob light build I did, I couldnt get anywhere near that good of a price per watt. The cost of COB led's and other build components has went down since my last build years ago, but the heat sinks are still costly when not purchased in bulk like these companys can do. Plus cobs and smd led's use different heatsinks for cooling -cobs being more expensive to cool. I will say that the longevity of my cob build (though considerably more expensive), the longevity is there. Im going on 10 years trouble free with my 400W lights and they still shows no signs of stopping. Im currently 5 years outside of the manufacturers warranties lol. I have already got my moneys worth X2 so its paid for itself now. Any other premade light I could have purchased would need to be replaced 2-3 times in that same decade.
Problem with todays board leds is that a company will build them to run max wattage and lowest efficiency which is great when you need a lot of watts and lumens at a good initial entry price. Then the light burns out after 2-3 years from being driven so hard and so hot vs a light that runs at half the wattage but can do it for much longer. My cobs are rated for like 100W, but I run them at 50W and use 2x as many cobs per driver. Same lumens, same wattage, just more efficient and runs much cooler. Doesnt work the cobs or the driver so hard. When the driver or cobs finally take a shit on me it will be very inexpensive to rebuild like brand new for another 10 years since I already own the heatsinks (the most expensive part). The initial cost sucked, but Im glad I played the long game lol
