These lights are unbelievable. Nice and bright I recommend thisHaven't used it yet but I am hoping it's going to be worth the costMy application is for an inside Christmas tree.In a nutshell, you have 4 different brightness levels of the 11 programed color/steady/flash options. Two are steady & the rest flash or change in some respect.10 buttons introduce color into the string. Odd thing is... the string is divided in half. Half one color on one end & half another color on the other. Only time the string is same on both ends is white! So if your looking for steady white, you got one along with 4 levels of brightness.- The lights are very bright as far as lumen is concerned. They do dim in 4 steps but the box says "NON DIMMABLE". You can control the string from buttons on the in-line receiver box or the optional remote. They essentially do the same thing. The instructions were minimal & vague.There are no vivid reds & greens as shown in the inside advertisement photos.The lights didn't work for my application so I returned them.Love these lightsI love these lights for my classroom but my remote doesn’t work. I have changed the battery 3 times and it still doesn’t. My neighboring teaching as the same lights and her remote works on mine so I know it’s the remote. Can you send me a replacement remote?I loved these lights so much I bought two - one for my office and one for decorating bookshelves BUT I've had to replace both strands twice in 4 months!! Very disappointed in that. Hoped it would last a lot longer than that plus I had issues with them blinking on and off. All 4 strands did this independent of each other. When they're on they're wonderful but I shouldn't have to replace them so often and they shouldn't be blinking on and off so much.These served their purpose for our white Christmas tree but the blinking would go crazy at times so much that I had to Turn the lights off completely sometimes because it was just too much.