The accountants have clearly had a part in the redesign of the circuitry on this classic Chinese light panel.  They are intended for use in ceiling bulkhead fixtures, where the new panel sticks to the steel backplate with magnets.  This type of light has no easy way to change a lamp.  You will literally have to turn off the power and hook wires into terminal blocks instead.

The earlier versions used buck regulators with no flicker, but the new ones have cheaped out in every way possible, creating a very flickery light that has the classic over-driven LEDs.  There is no other explanation for this other than profit above all else.

Given the LED layout I reckon they have used the original LED positions and tracks, but replaced the original single chip LEDs with multi-chip ones to cater for the higher voltage that is better suited to the linear regulators.  That would also explain the rogue track passing under the rectifier.

In this video I do several experiments to stop the flicker and reduce the power dissipation to give higher efficiency and a much longer LED life.

Note that a lot of the experiments involve live exposed connections, so suitable precautions should be taken if doing similar experiments.


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