Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)I have owned a Cygolite MityCross 350 headlight for 18 months now, and was initially not too excited about the MityCross 400, with nearly identical specs other than a 50 lumen increase.
However, I saw a difference...the new OSP (On-Site Programmable) feature, supposedly allowing settings to be modified. I found a great price on this light, and decided to try out this feature, and see what else was new.
Here are my initial observations on the changes from the 350 to the 400, in detail:
++ Beam pattern is slightly wider to the sides, with less blue color, and is brighter (slightly different optics/LEDs as well)
++ OSP setting allows programming of Medium, Low, Daylight Flash, and Walking modes (more detail below)
+ Entering flash mode is signalled by a dimming of the light while the power button is held (on the 350, there is no indication of how long to hold down the button to enter flash mode)
+ Exiting High/Medium/Low brightness is accompanied by a gradual transition to off
+ Demo mode (accessed by holding down the power button while plugging in the battery) can now be used to change the OSP settings
- The charger has changed to a wall adapter, rather than an in-line adapter (power brick)
= Aside from these changes, the battery, housing, connectors, and mounting hardware are kept the same
OSP Breakdown
Four of the six modes can be changed. The Medium, Low, and Walking modes can have the brightness set to virtually anything the LEDs are capable of (from ~20 to ~350 lumens by my estimate). This will obviously affect battery life greatly. (A quirk is that the Low setting can be made brighter than the Medium setting)
The Daylight Flash settings are different than the previous three; the rate between each set of flashes can be changed from the default 0.6s to between 0.3s-2.2s. By comparison, the MityCross 350 has a pause of 1.0s between each set of three flashes.
In my opinion, the ability to decrease this delay to 0.3s is the most important upgrade to the MityCross, as the 350 flash felt too slow at 1s (nevertheless, it is very useful and powerful).
As per the instructions, an extremely helpful video on how to use OSP is available at cygolite.com / tutorial.
Conclusion: The MityCross 400 not a major upgrade from the 350, as even the improved flash mode and OSP probably cannot compete with the Cygolite MiLion and Expilion flash modes.
However, this is the true multipurpose light, having enough power to light roads and trails during high speed riding, or putting out a very powerful strobe in the same package. My recommendation is to go with the MityCross 320 (or possibly the Pace 310) if you are interested in the OSP feature (it is priced 40-50 lower than the MityCross 400, and there are great deals if you look around).
Click Here to see more reviews about: Cygolite MityCross 400 Li-Ion Dual High-Brightness LED system
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