- Status
- Location
- nj
Lol. That's pretty bad
- Location
- Ossining, NY
Perhaps do some more research for what controllers are capable of doing - especially the APEX
Price is hard to argue, especially since "value" is determined by the individual who has different needs and what they care about is not necessarily what others care about.
FWIW
Price is hard to argue, especially since "value" is determined by the individual who has different needs and what they care about is not necessarily what others care about.
FWIW
- Location
- Mahopac NY
If a heater gets stuck ON, you'll be very glad to have paid for a controller.
I agree through, APEX is a little overpriced. I actually prefer the Reef Angel now. Its not as hard to program as it looks, and costs much less.
- Location
- Flushing NY 11355
That's a very useful feature but I would pay the extra money for other convenience that this mature product has provided. My 30 bucks digital heater can take care of that.
- Location
- Mahopac NY
I think $400-700+ wave pumps and $1,000+ lighting units are my vote for overpriced gadgets, especially when much cheaper alternatives have been shown to provide the same performance.
Apex does a lot more than just pH and temp, you'd be surprised of the things you can do with it.
Funny thing is that I used to say the same thing as you when I started the hobby, oh these things are so much money, what's the benefit of all of them. Now I have lots of 'toys' for my tank, such as high end LEDs/skimmer, Vortechs and a controller.
For a newer hobbiest, it's understandable to have these opinions on certain equipment but in time, if you make through all the obstacles of reefing, you'll understand the value of such instruments. The trick is also not to get everything at once, little by little you can have a high tech tank, just think of all the bday/holiday present possiblities lol
And lastly, although certain 'cheaper' equipment gives the same performance as more expensive equipment, you should always think of why that is. Some companies aren't necessarily in the market for the long run, thus, buying something that's cheaper may just end up costing you double later on.
Just my .02 cents.
Happy reefing,
Fortunato
Funny thing is that I used to say the same thing as you when I started the hobby, oh these things are so much money, what's the benefit of all of them. Now I have lots of 'toys' for my tank, such as high end LEDs/skimmer, Vortechs and a controller.
For a newer hobbiest, it's understandable to have these opinions on certain equipment but in time, if you make through all the obstacles of reefing, you'll understand the value of such instruments. The trick is also not to get everything at once, little by little you can have a high tech tank, just think of all the bday/holiday present possiblities lol
And lastly, although certain 'cheaper' equipment gives the same performance as more expensive equipment, you should always think of why that is. Some companies aren't necessarily in the market for the long run, thus, buying something that's cheaper may just end up costing you double later on.
Just my .02 cents.
Happy reefing,
Fortunato
Reefs fr life I totally agree with the fact that you should always buy the best once instead of crap 3 times. However I've been in hobby for about 2 years. I had 2 skimmers $300 media bags . Reactors filter socks etc. I realized over a year ago its all a waste of $ . I only do 10%month WC and that's it not even a filter floss or chemi pure or non of that. Less is more IMO . I keep sps Lps no problem I don't know my alk nor do I care about ph ammonia nitrate nitrite. A guy who own an aquarium store in manhattan put me on to this. He said he s done it for years w no issues so I tried and what do u know everything is fine.
I like the wp40 I have and ordered a wp25 but they aren't nearly the same thing as vortechs. Controller looks nice. My mp10 has more modes sleeker. The wp has wave, else, and constant high and low?
At the end of the day it's like complaining why a Ferrari Cost the same as 10 civics. High end costs more because of the styling, performance, technology, material, craftsmanship, etc.
Not everyone needs to get it and you get it if you can afford it and justify it. I have an rkl for $150. Does everything I need.
Just my thoughts on it.
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- Location
- Mahopac NY
Some (but not all) of the chinese imported led fixtures are extremely effective. Reefbreeders/Evergrow are my favorite example of value/performance lights with an actual warranty. I've run them and tested them extensively, and preferred them to my Radion Pro. The latest ones I tried (Sosci) looked awful out of the box, and customer service was nearly non existent. Lots of factors at play, so its good that forums are around to get word out on experiences.
My tank is thriving w SPS/LPS/softies, and that's what matters most to me. I thought that I was having lighting issues with brain corals, but it turns out that my Copperband finds them tasty.
- Location
- Flushing NY 11355
I worked with China companies a lot and it's hard for them to make a finished product like Apex. However, an individual in USA can EASILY create something similar to Apex because Apex is a very simple electronic device in the view point of an EE in USA. Of course, to ask an EE to stop his 80,000K a year job just to create an Apex look alike is not easy.
It's the culture of manufacturing and engineering. The guy who did the controller in RC and release info for FREE, can design, build, and debug something similar to Apex in less than a week, I would say. But to ask a China company to do something out of their normal of mass production, it takes 2 3 years. That's what happened when I dealt with them. I even gave them the schematics(note I know about how mass production works too) and why it would be competitive in the US market, they just don't wanna go out of the the norm. You see, they have TONS of workers waiting for salary, they cannot stop feeding them for 1 second, so the general idea of management is not to rock the boat. Worker revolt is very common in China. Do you know how many owners of factories in China continuously jump off the building when the worker revolted?
The most expensive cost in making the Apex controller and/or many consumer grade electronics is start up cost of the case, not the electronics. If you can put up the cost of $10,000 to manufacture the custom case, you can make an Apex for less $30 bucks in electronics.
When I set a $1000 budget for my reef, I thought everything was overpriced.
Once I did a lot more reading, gained a lot more experience, and successfully grew and kept SPS colonies, I learned that buying cheap pumps, not having a flexible and very good aquarium controller actually cost me a lot more money.
The Jebao WP-25 and MP10 are not even in the same league as far as features, integration, and quality are concerned. The WP-25 is more comparable to the cheaper Tunze solutions.
Once I did a lot more reading, gained a lot more experience, and successfully grew and kept SPS colonies, I learned that buying cheap pumps, not having a flexible and very good aquarium controller actually cost me a lot more money.
The Jebao WP-25 and MP10 are not even in the same league as far as features, integration, and quality are concerned. The WP-25 is more comparable to the cheaper Tunze solutions.
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As someone who has a degree in EE, I can tell you that designing, building, sourcing, contracting, and making the software for an APEX unit is a monumental task. The most expensive part of it will be writing good, dependable software then the next most expensive part is providing the level of support Neptune provides.
The actual manufacture of the physical parts themselves is trivial compared to those things but as someone who has contracted companies in China to build things, you'd be surprised how difficult that actually is to get great quality work with a low rejection rate. Then not have your designs stolen.
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- Location
- Flushing NY 11355
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