I have never used any type of artificial light so I don't have first hand information on that. But first off it would depend on what plants you were growing. The blue spectrum light is generally best for growing foliage, where orange and red spectrum light help grow better fruit and vegetables. Again I have no first hand experience, but from what I have herd and read the full spectrum
lights aren't all there cracked up to be. I guess it depends on the actual bulb and manufacture though. The way I understand it is that even though the full spectrum
bulbs put out blue, orange and red spectrum's, the intensity of at least the orange and red spectrum is not good.
Kind of like saying you have a large glass of ice water, but it's actually just a large glass of warm water with only one ice cube in it. I have seen the charts that show the ranges of the spectrum for the full spectrum lights, and with lots of orange and red. But so far I have not herd of anyone having good luck with them, so I'm just not impressed by the charts. But again, I have never actually tried them myself. If it were me and I wanted both ends of the spectrum, I don't think you could beat a combination light fixture with one MH (
metal halide) bulb, and one
hps (
high pressure sodium) bulb. Just make sure it's capable of it, I think they take two different ballasts.
P.S. Florescent's have two spectrum's also, I forget witch is witch right now though. I have even herd of an adjustable sprectrum
led light, but I have not herd anything about how well they work. If I used LED, I would probably supplement it with some blue end florescent lights also.
Basics of Artificial Light for Hydroponics