TimR writes:

I have a four foot two tube fluorescent in a finished basement room
with a failed ballast. At least, I think so. I put new tubes in,
they glowed orange at the end for a second but never lit.

It's an old T12 fixture with a very old ballast.

I could:

1. replace the T12 ballast with a modern electronic one

2. replace the fixture with T8 or T5

3. replace the tubes or the fixture with LED tubes. They would have to be the kind that don't use the existing ballast.

4. something else I haven't thought of

My goals are lots of light (this is my music and DIY projects room),
and long life (I'm old enough to think about jobs I won't have to do
again.) I don't care much about energy efficiency as all the
solutions are reasonable.

Any suggestions?

These are tube fluorescents, not CFLs, but the short life of CFLs has
me a little worried about LEDs. It's always the electronic driver
that fails, not the light source itself. We've found at work that
with some energy savings projects, when they do fail you rip them out
and start over, because after a couple of years the company is out of
business and you can't get parts.

LEDs are not CFLs. Not the same technology, color, or lifetime.

I recently got tired of my 4 foot fluorescents dieing every 5 years
or so, so I bought these:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Very happy with the result.
I did the rewire myself, but some of the less DIY types leaving reviews
brought in a repairman. Seemed dirt simple to me, and I'm happy
with the color of the light too.

I think you will find the LED tubes ideal. I did.


--
Dan Espen