HID lamps use less power, last longer with brighter beam, and blind everyone in it's path!!!
 
 

Associated Press
Two BMW sedans are equipped with new high-intensity discharge lamps, top, and halogen lights, bottom.

Have you seen these cars? The Mercedes, Lexus or Porsches with these bright, bluish headlights!

They are called High-intensity discharge lamps and provide about twice the brightness of halogen headlights but use less power and can last longer.

"HID is kind of a prestige thing, but over time, and it will be a relatively short period of time, people are going to expect them on their car," said George Peterson, president of AutoPacific, an automotive consulting company.

From the Associated Press:

These lights are good for the driver, BAD for everyone oncoming!!! A lighting specialist at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said some people are more sensitive to light that has a blue cast. But he said the lights meet the same intensity and beam shape standards in place since 1978, the last time the government made a major revision of its standards.
Halogen lamps on most of today's cars generate light by heating a tungsten filament inside a halogen capsule. The halogen gas helps prevent blackening of the capsule as the filament slowly burns out.
High-intensity discharge lamps operate more like vapor-filled streetlights. They don't have a filament, but create light by zapping an arc between two electrodes. That arc excites a different kind of gas, usually xenon, which in turn ignites metallic salts.

The lights appear brighter to the eye because of their spectral content. Although their beams travel no farther or wider than those produced by halogen lights, they contain more light at the margins. It fades less at the edges. It also appears blue.

More powerful headlights have long been popular in Europe, where driving speeds can double those in the United States. During the past few years, American car buyers have started ordering HID lamps as an option.
 

Mr. Traffic believes that these lights are inevitable, but need some diffusing to calm the glare....they are WAY dangerous to others!!!