Hi I know we're late to this thread but we've gotten a few emails about it so we just wanted to throw in our two cents:
1) Lighting is very much a personal choice, and there's really no right or wrong answer. The right light depends on what YOU are looking for and it's important to understand the advantages/disadvantages of the main lighting types (MH, LED, T5) to make your decision. Once you do that you can go a step further into the strengths/weaknesses of specific brands within that technology (ie. Rapid LED, AI,
Ecotech, Fathom, etc).
2) Specifically for LEDs, the differences between most of the name brand (ie. not Chinese/generic LEDs) fixtures are becoming fairly subtle, so understand what you're paying more/less for. Do you want certain colors (ie. UV, red, green, cyan, etc) included in your light? Do you want the ability to dim all/some of the colors? Do you want wireless control? Do you want a full fixture or a DIY project? If you answer a few of those basic questions it'll help the decision making process a good amount because for every 20 people that say a certain light has been fantastic for them I'm sure you'll find another 20 that will say another light from another manufacturer is better which can be pretty confusing without actually seeing the light in person.
3) There's certainly nothing wrong with mixing lighting types. If you love the color of T5's but want shimmer go ahead and add a strip or two of LEDs to get that shimmer. If you love the growth from MH's but don't want to use as much electricity supplement it with a few T5's or LEDs. Again, there's really no wrong answer. Everyone has different priorities and resources (time, $$, etc) so everyone's lighting
should be different.