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Bright main light, good additional dipped and red, fast built-in charging, full brightness stabilization and full 900 lumens when cooled — unexpectedly, but the Nitecore HC65v2 turned out to be a very nice model. If you are looking for a branded headlamp with additional light, then I hope that the Nitecore HC65v2 review may come in handy.
Declared characteristics
- LED Luminus SST-40-W
- Maximum brightness 1750 lumens, maximum range 165m (7000 cd)
- Optional LEDs: 4500K HiCRI low beam and red light
- Shooting range optics
- No PWM flicker
- Overheat protection with brightness reset
- Built-in USB-C charger
- Aluminum body
- Hard anodized HA III quality finish
- Water and dust resistant IP68 (submersible up to 2 meters)
- Impact resistance — up to 2m
Packaging and appearance
Definitely, the packaging design of the latest Nightcore models is much nicer than the previous ones.
The kit includes the headlamp itself with a head mount, a 3500mah 18650 battery, a type-c charging cable, a pair of o-rings, a manual, and a warranty.
The headband is made in a classic T-shaped form factor and has standard dimensions for it, standing out only with a wide front panel of TIR lenses. It certainly looks nice, you can immediately see that this is a branded item.
Head mount is good. The fabric is soft, there is a gel strip inside. I’ve seen worse and better.
The fastening here is classic, through rubber eyes, so that if necessary, the headlamp can be completely pulled out.
On one end of the flashlight is a Type-C charging connector. The current here is wonderful, so you can charge quickly. There is PD support! You cannot use the flashlight while charging.
As you can see, a special “leash” is provided so as not to lose the cover of the charging connector.
As expected, the battery is inserted from the opposite side. There is only one spring, on the plus side there is a small peg of the contact pad, everything is as usual
I note that the inner diameter here is almost comparable to the diameter of a 21700 battery. I think that Nitecore could well add a millimeter in diameter and 5-6mm in length to make this headlamp work with a 21700 battery.
Nitecore HC65v2 is controlled by one button. During charging, the backlight works, it also blinks the voltage on the battery, which extremely useful for estimating the remaining run time.
The button travel is average, with a slight click. There is nothing unusual here. Pretty handy button.
And here is the interesting one. Let me remind you what the optics of the previous version looked like
Now the near and red light are separated by their lenses.
Lens without glass on top! This may repulse someone, but I have been using a headlamp with a plastic lens block for three years now and absolutely have no problems with it.
This is what it looks like live
Control
Kind of management. Not in the sense when something bad is called so evasively.
The unusual thing here is that by default, on click, the minimum brightness is turned on, and on hold, the last used mode is launched. Usually, if the flashlight supports instant access to the firefly, then it works on the contrary, namely by holding. Be that as it may, access to the firefly from OFF is, and this is wonderful.
Otherwise, everything is as usual — switching brightness on click, off on hold
2 clicks — switch to special modes. And here I would prefer to have a mode memory so that you can immediately turn on the near one. Now the near diffused light is the last on the list, you have to get through the red light. On the other hand, the fact that red is turned on first by default here is good when you turn on the headband at night to preserve night vision.
How Nitecore HC65 v2 shines
Nitecore hasn’t surprised me in such a good way for a long time! The flashlight perfectly fulfills any cooling. Even running on a balcony at +10 gives a 15% increase in brightness, i.e. up to 800-850lum! And this is a stabilized long-playing brightness. If, under the same conditions, we also add cooling by a fan, then the turbo starts to work to the maximum. Yes, you lose time, but the flashlight will actually shine brightly and far away.
Well done, I didn’t expect that. It’s all the more sad that the HC65 v2 doesn’t support 21700 batteries, with which the run time would be really impressive.
As for the light and the scatter of modes, then here I have no reason to complain. Unless, of course, I would prefer that the main LED be with a temperature of 5000k, it is quite affordable for the SST40 LED. The flashlight would lose its brightness quite insignificantly, but it would get rid of the light greenery in the light.
In the same form as it is, Nitecore HC65v2 gives excellent light in terms of maximum brightness and unexpectedly good light in terms of range. In case of need, albeit somehow, but you can highlight an object located at a distance of ~ 100m. The red light here is very bright and, which is extremely rare, has two levels of brightness. An additional LED is quite convenient for close work. However, it would be great, I will make Nitecore 2 brightness levels here too.
Are commonimpression
I think the Nitecore HC65 v2 is the best Nitecore flashlight I’ve had since… mmm… perhaps my favorite EC4GTS or NU32if we are talking about forehead
It has absolutely everything that can attract an ordinary user:
- impressive turbo, far from decorative runtime
- full brightness stabilization
- the work of thermal control, which is enough for a little coolness to make the flashlight work brighter.
- fast 2A type-C charging
- very convenient control
- additional dipped beam
- two levels of bright red light
For me personally, there are 3 cons:
- the first is completely expected — the cold light of the main LED.
- the second — I am sure that this headlamp certainly deserves a more capacious 21700 power supply
- it would be great to see 2 levels of not only red, but also low beam
If to speak about big expensive brands, about 18650 models for the mass user, then I am inclined to believe that this headlamp is most likely the best one on the market. At least the ones I’ve had in my hands over the last couple of years. It’s not cheap, of course, but for the price you get everything you can possibly get.
Anyway, I think that even an advanced and sophisticated user can (or maybe not) find the Nitecore HC65v2 a pretty good flashlight.
Those who constantly read and watch my reviews may notice that I am far from enthusiastic about the latest Nightcore models and criticize them both for being turbo-puffed and for being tied to monstrously expensive native batteries. It was all the more pleasant to finally say something that I had not really said for a long time, and now I am ready to say it. Well done Nitecore! They got a worthy update of the previous model.
It would be wrong not to note that there are, of course, functionally more interesting headlamps from lesser-known or budget brands. But will they be of interest to the Nitecore audience due to the latter? I doubt that the Nitecore buyer will be interested Panda or Wurkkos HD15. That is why I highlighted the keywords in bold a couple of paragraphs above.
Where to buy and how to save
You can buy Nitecore HC65 v2 at aliexpress
Yandex Market(500 2500r promo code for all purchases in the telegram discount channel at the link below in the «about the author» block
Sbermegamarket
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