well, take my ansi M80 ballast for instanc.. I have to chose between 3 different part #'s 1 was a bare ballast, one was a ballast pluss capacitor, and the other was all three.. basicly what a starter does is takes a couple amps (say 2 amps on the venture son agro) but uses 2 amps at a very high voltage which starts the bulb faster and aparently with less stress. a normal M57 ballast uses open line voltage and full amperage to start the bulbs so they tanke longer to strike.
as for a more technical explanation you would have to ask Darren or Victor, which I am sure one of them will post shortly anyways
Steve
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