OK, I'll admit it was a mistake to say "unequivocally". The overall drag of the Magnics compared to the Cyo/SON is significantly lower.. a simple wheelspin test confirms that easily enough. Of course, the light output is a fair bit lower as well, so it gets a lot murkier in terms of overall system efficiency. Personally I haven't performed any tests that are anywhere close to scientific, so I can only tell you my conclusions based on my observations, namely that (and yes, I understand Lux is highly dependent on beam pattern) in my estimation the Magnics are roughly 1/2 as bright as the dyno setup but have far less than 1/2 the drag.

AFAIK Dirk has investigated the actual system efficiencies. IANA electrical engineer so I can't pretend to follow it in great detail. There is some info here: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/...ess-bicycle-dy (under What's new in Magnic Light iC?) regarding the LED efficienty but I'd love to hear him explain it in greater detail. I can ping him and see if he can provide something more substantial if you're interested.