Is Hydros right for me?

DHill6 · May 12, 2022

Previous Apex user. Liking the Hydros setup, x4 with xp8, definitely works together. Hydros ATO also.

reefiniteasy · May 12, 2022

Hydros user here and I love it! Does everything I need and more. The bonus is it looks great. LOL

F&S reef · May 13, 2022

I did go with the hydros. I statred a build thread in the other forum. Its not very far along, just a couple of preliminary steps done and im trying to juggle some other projects right now. As soon as those are done though its full steam ahead on the aquarium.

I have installed the XP8 on a dedicated 20a outlet that is GFCI / ARC fault. The first thing I did with the XP8 though was open it up and shorten the cord.

WVNed · May 13, 2022

My only advise with Hydros is make sure the unit or units you buy has the ports for what you want it to do.
Probe ports, Sense Ports and drive port are populated differently on each controller.
An XS and X4 together give me the ports I want. I am about to use 4 WIFI strips. If I used X8s for security it would be somewhat costly.

F&S reef · May 13, 2022

WVNed said:
My only advise with Hydros is make sure the unit or units you buy has the ports for what you want it to do.
Probe ports, Sense Ports and drive port are populated differently on each controller.
An XS and X4 together give me the ports I want. I am about to use 4 WIFI strips. If I used X8s for security it would be somewhat costly.

I have the x4 as well, it will be mounted inside the cabinet though. I'm going to add just what I need as I figure out exactly what that is.

DHill6 · May 13, 2022

F&S reef said:
I did go with the hydros. I statred a build thread in the other forum. Its not very far along, just a couple of preliminary steps done and im trying to juggle some other projects right now. As soon as those are done though its full steam ahead on the aquarium.

I have installed the XP8 on a dedicated 20a outlet that is GFCI / ARC fault. The first thing I did with the XP8 though was open it up and shorten the cord.

Did you just void your warranty since you opened it and cut the cord?

DHill6 · May 13, 2022

F&S reef said:
I did go with the hydros. I statred a build thread in the other forum. Its not very far along, just a couple of preliminary steps done and im trying to juggle some other projects right now. As soon as those are done though its full steam ahead on the aquarium.

I have installed the XP8 on a dedicated 20a outlet that is GFCI / ARC fault. The first thing I did with the XP8 though was open it up and shorten the cord.

That red lt went elsewhere I guess. Did you just void your warranty by opening it up and cutting the cord?

polyppal · May 13, 2022

F&S reef said:
I did go with the hydros. I statred a build thread in the other forum. Its not very far along, just a couple of preliminary steps done and im trying to juggle some other projects right now. As soon as those are done though its full steam ahead on the aquarium.

I have installed the XP8 on a dedicated 20a outlet that is GFCI / ARC fault. The first thing I did with the XP8 though was open it up and shorten the cord.

will also need to make sure you get the command bus cord and put command bus terminators in any remaining command outlets to setup a collective. My setup was delayed like a week when I found out I needed the stupid terminators and had to order them online.

polyppal · May 13, 2022

DHill6 said:
Did you just void your warranty by opening it up and cutting the cord?

Most def…

Ashish Patel · May 16, 2022

I just got the Hydro (since im going on vacation), I got the kit that came with the original 4 outlet wifi strip. i wanted to the get the XP8 outlet strip (since it has its own controller), but they where out of stock. I love the controller but the wifi devices continue to not respond. The ATO i hooked up last night and seems to be working excellent. I am constantly getting PH and temp alerts so thats good but if the wifi strips dont work then i doubt the heater will kick on. Which is why I dont trust it fully to monitor Heat alone. So i have one heater stand alone, one heater on a finnex, and one heater on the hydro.

The feeder in my 4 days of testing proves to not be reliable enough to trust so i just ordered a eheim feeder. Which my current one has been going on 5 years non stop without issues.

n2585722 · May 16, 2022

Ashish Patel said:
I just got the Hydro (since im going on vacation), I got the kit that came with the original 4 outlet wifi strip. i wanted to the get the XP8 outlet strip (since it has its own controller), but they where out of stock. I love the controller but the wifi devices continue to not respond. The ATO i hooked up last night and seems to be working excellent. I am constantly getting PH and temp alerts so thats good but if the wifi strips dont work then i doubt the heater will kick on. Which is why I dont trust it fully to monitor Heat alone. So i have one heater stand alone, one heater on a finnex, and one heater on the hydro.

The feeder in my 4 days of testing proves to not be reliable enough to trust so i just ordered a eheim feeder. Which my current one has been going on 5 years non stop without issues.

Do you have one of those mesh networks. The Hydros has issues if you 5ghz and 2.4ghz channels have the same name and password. This is one of the symptoms of that.

rtparty · May 16, 2022

My XP8 is a piece of junk. 2 dead outlets so far. Less than a week of use.

CV was great about getting a new one sent out but still sucks as I will not trust Hydros to run important parts of my tank. Apex will be transferred over as soon as I can. 7 year old Apex items and not a failure to date. So far I've had multiple items from Hydros either DOA or die shortly after setup. Not impressed with their touted "better hardware" marketing

The WiFi strips will always go on and off your network. They are good for certain things that don't really matter but that's it

n2585722 · May 16, 2022

Ashish Patel said:
I just got the Hydro (since im going on vacation), I got the kit that came with the original 4 outlet wifi strip. i wanted to the get the XP8 outlet strip (since it has its own controller), but they where out of stock. I love the controller but the wifi devices continue to not respond. The ATO i hooked up last night and seems to be working excellent. I am constantly getting PH and temp alerts so thats good but if the wifi strips dont work then i doubt the heater will kick on. Which is why I dont trust it fully to monitor Heat alone. So i have one heater stand alone, one heater on a finnex, and one heater on the hydro.

The feeder in my 4 days of testing proves to not be reliable enough to trust so i just ordered a eheim feeder. Which my current one has been going on 5 years non stop without issues.

I forgot to add that if the wifi strip looses communication with the controller it will stay in whatever state it is in. So if a outlet is on it will remain on. If it is off it will remain off. The exception is a power interruption. That will cause a reset and the outlet will be in the off state after boot up and remain that way until power is restored. I have almost no wifi issues with my setup. My big issue and it is not the Hydros is I loose internet several times a day. Some are for a long enough period for me to get alerts for all nine controllers I have. Then when restored I get more alerts that the connection has beed restored. Below is a screenshot of my wifi devices. There are 5 of them. After that is screenshots of all my alerts for the Hydros. They go back to Wednesday. The only alerts I see for a wifi device were when I was messing with one and had it unplugged for a while,

Ashish Patel · May 16, 2022

Thanks. Maybe the programs I set never saved or something or lost connection when I was making changes during the 1 day it was working. I only have until Friday so don't have any confidence in relying on this feeder so will use a eheim

n2585722 · May 16, 2022

Ashish Patel said:
Thanks. Maybe the programs I set never saved or something or lost connection when I was making changes during the 1 day it was working. I only have until Friday so don't have any confidence in relying on this feeder so will use a eheim

Yes, less than a week is not enough time to make any major changes. If you are going to use the ATO do you mind posting a screenshot of how it is setup?

Ashish Patel · May 17, 2022

Yesterday night my controller was working better after I turned of my mobile wifi and used my mobile data.
Another things that got me worried is 2 times I have noticed my return pump turn of and then turn back on. The logs dont highlight that it has ever been of so not sure what is causing this. Once I get back from vacation i will go deeper into this and post pic and go full in. For now I am thinking i should just leave the return pump on a regular outlet.

The ATO on the hydro is so far working good so happy about that.

n2585722 · May 17, 2022

Ashish Patel said:
Yesterday night my controller was working better after I turned of my mobile wifi and used my mobile data.
Another things that got me worried is 2 times I have noticed my return pump turn of and then turn back on. The logs dont highlight that it has ever been of so not sure what is causing this. Once I get back from vacation i will go deeper into this and post pic and go full in. For now I am thinking i should just leave the return pump on a regular outlet.

The ATO on the hydro is so far working good so happy about that.

You might be interested in this video about vacations and the tank here

F&S reef · May 18, 2022

DHill6 said:
That red lt went elsewhere I guess. Did you just void your warranty by opening it up and cutting the cord?

Maybe? I gave it about zero thought before I opened it. If it breaks and they won't honor it due to a reason that has zero to do with it breaking then I'll just move on.

F&S reef · May 18, 2022

rtparty said:
My XP8 is a piece of junk. 2 dead outlets so far. Less than a week of use.

CV was great about getting a new one sent out but still sucks as I will not trust Hydros to run important parts of my tank. Apex will be transferred over as soon as I can. 7 year old Apex items and not a failure to date. So far I've had multiple items from Hydros either DOA or die shortly after setup. Not impressed with their touted "better hardware" marketing

The WiFi strips will always go on and off your network. They are good for certain things that don't really matter but that's it

I'm being dead honest when I say that I wouldn't put an Apex or trident on my tank if it was given to me for free. Just in my local area I see a different full setup with thousands of dollars in add on parts for sale on a near daily basis. If it works for you then great, I won't have anything to do with it though. So far I've zero connectivity issues since it's been connected to my home network. My router is tri band 2.4 / 5 ghz and all on one password. YMMV obviously.

DHill6 · Jun 26, 2022

n2585722 said:
I do auto water changes with the Hydros but I don't use their AWC regimen since I use a dual head dosing pump. Their regimen requires separate drain and fill pumps. It also requires using the ATO built into the regimen for it to work. It works great though. Since I use a dosing pump to do it I use a dosing schedule so it is the same as dosing to the Hydros.

Which dosing pump do you use and it it used as a water change throughout the day at a minimal amount or you run it on and off? Is that even possible?