After taking an almost 10 year break from reefing I decided to pick up a BioCube 32 for my son as he was showing a lot of interest in ocean life. After 7 months I'm into the hobby again and my son has become obsessed with it. His aspirations and honestly mine are too big for the BioCube so I've been doing research on larger options. After originally thinking I was going to pick up a Red Sea 525XL I'm now leaning towards the Cade S1200. So with that in mind I have compiled a list of equipment I was thinking about using and would love some feedback from anyone who has experience with the various components especially in a Cade or has suggestions for alternatives from what I'm thinking. I want to try to automate a fair bit of the work so that when I travel for work (usually just a few days) my wife only needs to really feed the tank as she isn't particularly interested in doing any more than that.
Tank & Stand: Cade 1200 S2
Wavemakers: 2 MP40 wQDs with the limpet wide flow pump guards
Return Pump: Ecotech Vectra L2
Skimmer: Reef Octopus Elite 200 SSS
Heater: 2 Ehiem Jager 200W
Lights: 2 AI Hydra 64HDs mounted with flex arms
Fuge Light: AI Prime Fuge
Controller: Apex. Thinking about just picking up the controller at first and then adding modules later as I get more comfortable with it and things get established in the tank
Ecotech Battery Backup
Tank & Stand: Cade 1200 S2
Wavemakers: 2 MP40 wQDs with the limpet wide flow pump guards
Return Pump: Ecotech Vectra L2
Skimmer: Reef Octopus Elite 200 SSS
Heater: 2 Ehiem Jager 200W
Lights: 2 AI Hydra 64HDs mounted with flex arms
Fuge Light: AI Prime Fuge
Controller: Apex. Thinking about just picking up the controller at first and then adding modules later as I get more comfortable with it and things get established in the tank
Ecotech Battery Backup