So far, here's how I feel about it:
As you all know, it's very expensive. Even the president of Seavisions said he feels it's an expensive piece of equipment to put on a small tank. Honestly though, knowing what I know now, I would still spend the money on one. I'm sure some computer savvy guys could probably build something similar for around $1000 if they used top quality parts, but it just wouldn't be the same. The accuracy of this thing is amazing. Efficiency of salt use cannot be compared with regular water changes. As Dean had said with expendable money for the hobby. It's great, if you don't put yourself in debt buying one.
Construction: The labels are cheesy and look like they were printed on a computer that was running out of ink. They forgot to label the outlets on the back of the unit, so I had to figure out what each port and outlet were by trial and error.
The frame itself is pretty cool and durable for salt water applications. All of the Johnny Guest fitting are neat and clean and color coded makes it easy to see where each line goes. The dosing pumps are bulls. Top notch. The LCD display is sweet and the function controls are good.
Set-up: Hooking it up was easy. Color coded is idiot proof. The computer itself, is not. The instructions aren't very detailed. I had a hard time with programming, but I had a hard time programming my Octopus and Doser when I got them. Once I figured them out (with a little help), it's easy to use and I feel it's very user friendly.
Operation: The thing works great. Amazing accuracy. Leave it alone. Once programmed, it does everything for you. Every 30 minutes on the dot it dialyzes water. It does your auto top-off directly from a water line so there is no need to store water. It measures SG accurate to 0.0001 and doses salt accordingly. It can detect a system leak in the unit itself down to a drop of water and shut down. It does water changes for you. If you remove salt water from the tank for any reason, it will replace it. The audible alarm is loud and beeps every time the Dialyseas performs a function, so it's very annoying. I had to shut it off. The pumps are a little louder than I expected. I would not like having this thing in my stand.
Company Claims:
"Reduced maintenance by 75%": I'll call that an exaggeration. I'll say 40 to 50%. It has been giving me more time for my son. I really do feel the maintenance it has picked up and time it has saved me is worth it.
"Efficiency of compared conventional water changes": They say that 150 gallons of salt mix will yield 250 gallons of water changes. The computer keeps a record of how much water is changed and so far, it's on point. It also keeps a record of how much top-off water it adds, so if you go way over your average, it will alert you to check for a possible leak on the tank itself. They go on to say a 200 gallon bucket of salt only makes around 150 gallons of salt mix for conventional water changes if you keep your SG at 1.025. Not to mention time consumed performing changes and the shock to a system performing large water changes. The Dialyseas changes water 48 times a day, equaling 2.5 GPD. That's 75 gallons per month... but they call it "one glass at a time". Well, I never changed 75 gallons per month and by their figures, I'll need 150 gallons of salt every 2 and 2/3 months. I buy 200 gallon boxes for $45. So I lose money in salt, but I now do much less on supplements, as you'll see in the next company claim.
"Reduced need for trace elements" You get what you need from the salt. I'm not sure about this one, but I will say that my CA, MG and alk have gone through the roof since adding the system, so I had to tone down my dosing pump. I still dose amino acids, potassium and coral food, but in much lower amounts. I'm not sure how much of this cost will be made up for because of the additional need for salt.
