Long time toker... first time grower

Hey people not really first time to grow but first time to really mean to grow something...you know something other than throwing seed out the window.....Anyway my first question is what is the best lighting to use on seedlings? After seedling phase what is the best lighting for vegatative and then the best part the flowering stage? I've read a bunch of posts here on this forum and different lights being used a lot of people use different lights. I just want to know what an experianced grower uses. (By the way this isn't my real name just remembered the jingle from kindergarten.)

Thanks for you help.

large, nice, expensive grows: High pressure sodium

small, stealthy, on the cheap grows: daylight CFLs for veg and regular yellow CFLs for flower.

i think this is most ideal setup, not considering money

start seedlings under fluorescent lighting,

after 2 weeks move to metal halide, remembering to have the light very far away from them at first and gradually move closer each day (getting them used to the strong light)

when you switch to flowering, use HPS (high pressure sodium).

the metal halide has more of a blue spectrum which is good for the vegetative stage, while the HPS has a red spectrum which is needed for flowering.

if you don't have a lot of money and can't afford both metal halide and hps, or conversion bulbs, its completely fine and generally accepted and common for people to just use HPS throughout the entire grow. but you should always start seeds with fluorescents IMHO

Thanks guys appreciate your input on this matter.