to be more specific, this is what i would like to do:
A) grow maybe 12-14 vegetable transplants (e.g., tomatoes, brussels sprouts, etc) and B) grow 10-15 flowers like geraniums for my outdoor planters

last year i spent way too much money on transplants and potted plants, so i would like to avoid this in the future by growing my own from seed. that's why i'm looking for a moderately priced grow light, because otherwise it's not cost effective for me to grow my vegetables. does anyone have experience with the park seed goliath light? it's $150, but has 4 lighting tubes. or would the cheaper 2-tube lights (like the hydrofarm system) be ok for this purpose? i figured for the amount of transplants i want to raise, that 4' lengths would be better than the shorter 2'.

i did a little reading on the internet, and it sounds like all i would need to do is start the seeds on top of the refrigerator (for warmth) and then keep the seedlings under grow lights until it's almost time to put them out. is it really this easy? i was thinking of setting up the grow light in my basement with a little fan for air movement.

If you just want some cheap 4' florescent lights the best place to go is Home Depot. They've got cheap 2-tube shop lights for just under $10 each. Just stack those things side by side as wide as you want to go.

If you really want to go crazy, buy double what you need, scavenge the ballasts out of half of them and rewire the other half with double ballasts to "overdrive" them. There's a few threads in the GardenWeb forums about them, just search here or on Google for overdriving lights.

It's not at all complicated to do this kind of thing.

Well, the overdriving can be if you're not electrically-inclined, but the growing under lights is simple enough.