>>The thing that annoys me with most of the electric/electronic/mechanical stuff is the multitude of standards. While for mechanical it does make sense to have different standards for different sizes, having six types of fittings for just halogen lightbulbs is nonsense. Which is another reason I went to swirl bulbs (or neon - which they more or less are, I just can't and don't care to remember their commercial name) - they fit in the same place where the hot bulb was, no need to rig anything.
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>Are these those white, twisted tubes, that use far less lecky and last longer, so favoured by the green movement? I've never heard of a swirl bulb.

That's an expression I picked this week and liked it immediately. Short, descriptive, to-the-point, unambiguous (unless you thought I'd say "and they look even better when swirls are in full blossom").

> BTW, did you know that whereas you have screw-in bulbs over there ours are mainly a "bayonet fix" (push in and twists), but we do have screw-ins, mainly from habitat tat :-)

But then do the bayonet fix ones plug into the trafo (the high voltage transformer), or straight into the 110/125/220/whathaveyou volts? The screw-ins have their own transformer and starter. I had one back home, sized like chopstick, above the kitchen sink (ah, nice bluish tinge ;).

Does that mean that when you want to switch to one of these, you need to replace the whole fixture (or at least the socket)? If that's the case, I'd rather skip them and go straight to LEDs.