I basically got what I expected, but it's still a three star product no matter how you slice it. The "bulbs" that surround the LED diffuse the light nicely with a glassy look, not matte finish, but the diodes themselves have very inconsistent color. They're all in the "warm white" range, it's not like they mixed in "cold white" bulbs, but especially when you first take them out of the box and light them while they're still bundled, it's very apparent that the color of the emitted light varies, probably somewhere between 2000k and 4000k. When they're hung, it's not very noticeable, but be aware that this is also probably an indicator of the absolute lowest quality bulb Sylvania can make while still passing tests. Another issue has to do with the way the LEDs are wired. For one, when you lose a bulb, you lose the whole string because they're all wired together, not even alternating bulbs on separate strands like you might see in some of the slightly nicer types. They also don't appear to have any fusing in the bulbs - on some incandescents, when the bulb burns out, it fuses itself together so the strand stays lit and then you can just replace the bulb the next time you check it for dead ones. As it is, when one dies, you're going to have a really frustrating time figuring out which bulb failed because you'll have to check every one until you hit the right one. At least there's a fuse in the plug for safety, and they include a spare fuse and two spare bulbs with the package, but with these low quality bulbs, I question the longevity. The worst part is the flicker. Your mileage may vary, I know some people don't notice it at all, or barely notice it, but these strands, like many other cheap AC LED string lights, use half-wave rectification. This means that the lights constantly flicker 60 times a second, and are literally "off" more than half the time. Now, the diffusers help a little, and the further you get from them, the less noticeable it is, but it's definitely an issue that may cause some to send them back. The low quality LEDs really exacerbate the flickering too - you can mitigate the flicker, even without full wave rectification, if you have good quality diodes, even more so with capacitors and resistors. If you've got really good eyes and tend to pick out lighting issues or details other people don't see, maybe skip these. For $7.99, and hanging them out of my direct eyeline, they're good enough for me, but for another application they would be unacceptable.
