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Is it true that NO (even over driven 2X) won't have enough intensity to provide enough Lummens at the bottom of the tank?
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<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">True. But it depends on the depth of your tank. If it was a 12" deep tank I'd have no worries putting softies or mushrooms. maybe an LPS. NO anemone or SPS tho unless they were at or near the surface. NO's don't provide enough illumination for SPS or even some LPS to grow. Survive? Yes, barely IMO IME. Most corals and anemones need a lot of light. If they don't get it they will die.
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Let me know if I understand the properly. If I overdrive the 4 NO lights 2X then it would be like having 8 NO's instead of 4 NO
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<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Not necessarily. It depends on how much current each wire is pushing into the lamp. If you take a 120W ballast and hook it all up into one lamp your output will go up. It all depends on the ballast. Even then it doesn't go up as a factor of x2, x3, x4.
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But according to StirCrazy, 4 NO's are not even half as intense as 2 96W PCs. Assuming Stircrazy was not overdriving his lights, then even if I overdrive them (double the PAR, I think?), it will still not have a PAR Value as high as 2 96W PCs. Is this correct?
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<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Before we can answer what you wil be able to keep it is more important to know how deep your tank is. As light decay is an exponential decay in water with NO, PC or VHO you lose 66% of the power coming out of the tube in the first few inches of the water. MH goes deeper as it is a point source with a much higher intensity.
I'd share the numbers I have but I have had some problems with my puter and can't access my NTFS drives right now.
IMO NO(even overdriven) will not be sufficient to light deeper than say 10 inches. If you want a creature that requires intense light.
If you are looking at an anemone(which I don't suggest with a coral tank as it WILL wander and sting anything it touches) don't go with a seabae. Difficult to keep. Get a Very healthy BTA. And by healthy get one that is a dark or medium brown color. White means bleached, bleached means near death as it no longer has its zooxanthellae. If you get a white anemone you will need to feed it. Daily. An anemone with its zoox doesn't need daily feedings. I had a saddleback that I rarely fed. And it grew and grew and grew. With proper lighting. LOTS of lighting.