Do you have a di on your ro unit? Having a ro is not enough usually to obtain 0 water. Use a TDs meter to test. You may have to ad a di canisters. Also don't advise running lights for the first 2 months of the cycle. Imo it prevents algae problems at the beginning. Once you get nitrates do some large water changes, if you have a Sand bed vacuum it.
Yes lights off. The only thing that will grow at first is algae. Then you'll have to deal with that issue. When you get your nitrates down and low phosphate it will be safe to start a light cycle. And you'll skip that ugly algae stage...imo
This is the beginning of diatoms or algae stage
If you cut the lights for the 2nd month you should be fine. Water changes with 0 water and test nitrates. At 8 weeks put some light on. But if you don't have corals yet only a few hrs a day maybe like when you're off work so you can enjoy.
Don’t let it bug you, you don’t have ammonia in the tank. If you ever read through some of these forums, people actually talk about the same issue with api ammonia...including myself having the same .25 test result.
