Mobius is junk

[BeanAnimal]

I'm setting up a new Tank and will be most likely using modified a8 China fixtures on it. For the cost of fixture and about 60$ dollars and two hours time will have two lights that are 100% controlled via reefpi and will have more adjustability and probably higher par then the name brand China black box known as ecotech lol. Swapping a few diodes a new 0-10v meanwhile driver and 7 pots to control channels bingo xr25 radicals made

But that is not a business model... and nobody wants to fiddle with electronics or hacking around Linux to make things partly work... save a very very tiny few people.

 

[Cpc83]

I agree there are very few businesses that actually Care about end users. But that said most in hobby tinker with everything look at the mountains of hacks for apex and reefpi and others it's just like why people buy a car and change cam headers tune etc the same is and will happen in reefing more people are starting to look into the less expensive black box fixtures and adapt them to there needs. Hell look at the evolution of the durso to herbie to beananimal

 

[BeanAnimal]

I agree there are very few businesses that actually Care about end users.

It is not purposeful callousness, rather it costs money (a lot of money) to provide top notch customer service and support. Many of these companies don't have the revenue to provide it.

But that said most in hobby tinker with everything look at the mountains of hacks for apex and reefpi and others it's just like why

That is a misconception. Most people just want to buy something and have it work. They do not have the time, skill, patience or desire to DIY, especially code, electronics, machining, etc.

This hobby is extremely small and the the bulk of sales in this hobby not to DIYers. High costs may push more to DIY but not in significant numbers.

 

[LeDart]

I use Kessil A360Xs on both my tanks, on my 40B, I have a Kessil A360X, and an Aquatic Life Hybrid T5 Fluorescent. Nothing on my tank is connected to wifi, just the way I want it. Don't get me wrong, I love tech, and I am a very techy person, but I don't want to have to put up with the hassle of Wi-Fi connected to my tank. I have no reason to do it either way, it's very easy to tune (the Kessil knobs) and they are on a Save-A-Watt timer from BRS. I manually dose, of course soon enough I will have to buy a doser because of vacationing, but that will be the only Wi-Fi thing I will ever put on my tank.

 

[BeanAnimal]

I use Kessil A360Xs on both my tanks, on my 40B, I have a Kessil A360X, and an Aquatic Life Hybrid T5 Fluorescent. Nothing on my tank is connected to wifi, just the way I want it. Don't get me wrong, I love tech, and I am a very techy person, but I don't want to have to put up with the hassle of Wi-Fi connected to my tank. I have no reason to do it either way, it's very easy to tune (the Kessil knobs) and they are on a Save-A-Watt timer from BRS. I manually dose, of course soon enough I will have to buy a doser because of vacationing, but that will be the only Wi-Fi thing I will ever put on my tank.

I think there is a clear distinction between equipment that MUST have a true internet or bluetooth connection to program or run and equipment that can run independently of a connection.

Where the Radions (have always) failed in my book is that they REQUIRE an app to setup. If the app becomes obsolete or unsupported, so does the appliance.

The worst case products are those that do not have standalone software but 100% rely on a web service for programming, or worse operation. This hobby is beginning to migrated toward the later model. It is cheaper to deploy and often done so via a subscription or even ad-based software. The issue is that most of these companies will not be around in 5 years and/or they will get tired of paying hosting services.

Take GHL for example. The Profilux will 100% run without an internet connection, but much of the dashboard reporting requires their cloud service. This is something that GHL pays for every day, and does not charge for. So for every Profilux sold, they pay to host the users' data and bandwidth. The hosting is expensive and it (frankly) sucks and is slow. Making it faster costs GHL money, so that does not happen. This is not a sustainable business model, long term. GHL made a poor choice, in favor of not having to deal with higher end storage on the device and figuring out how to support people connecting an app to their own profilux instead of a cloud service. At the same time, nobody wants to spend the premium for GHL AND then pay them a subscription cost.

Anyway....

 

[siropa]

I think there is a clear distinction between equipment that MUST have a true internet or bluetooth connection to program or run and equipment that can run independently of a connection.

Where the Radions (have always) failed in my book is that they REQUIRE an app to setup. If the app becomes obsolete or unsupported, so does the appliance.

The worst case products are those that do not have standalone software but 100% rely on a web service for programming, or worse operation. This hobby is beginning to migrated toward the later model. It is cheaper to deploy and often done so via a subscription or even ad-based software. The issue is that most of these companies will not be around in 5 years and/or they will get tired of paying hosting services.

I'm never buying another aquarium related product that falls into that require category. I might miss out on some stuff, but so be it.

 

[areefer01]

but I don't see Bertram staying in this long term, at least the hardware side of things, and these manufacturers can't stand on their own.

None of us know their plans. Just arm chair quarterbacks and opinions. And some companies did stand on their own. Neptune has been around for many a good year. I think I purchased my first controller from them back in 2001 give or take a few years. X10 relays and basic Boolean logic.

 

[rtparty]

None of us know their plans. Just arm chair quarterbacks and opinions. And some companies did stand on their own. Neptune has been around for many a good year. I think I purchased my first controller from them back in 2001 give or take a few years. X10 relays and basic Boolean logic.

Bertram bought everyone on a 3-4 year plan. It’s how they operate their VC. Aperture will be sold this summer or next if they have a buyer

 

[BeanAnimal]

None of us know their plans. Just arm chair quarterbacks and opinions.

You don't really need to know their plans, all that you have to do is look at their actions, the state of the products, support and this market in general. It is all in trouble.

And some companies did stand on their own. Neptune has been around for many a good year.

That was then... this is now. Small mom and pop operations may survive and rollup ventures (Bertram) may stick around for a bit longer, but the pressure from inflation, imported crap and knock offs is canalizing the small market that this is.

GHL always manufactured their own high quality stuff... their new return pumps, stream pumps and feeder are not made in house, but rebadged pumps from another manufacturer.

Royal Exclusive no longer has the customized RD3 pumps and simply sells 2 models of rebadged imports that everyone else sells.

Mobius is a bare minimum effort aimed at reduced manufacture and integration costs among child products and the quality of the new products by many accounts is not on par with past products.

There is piles of competition and brands are going to start to buckle... this hobby is just not that big.

 

[rtparty]

You don't really need to know their plans, all that you have to do is look at their actions, the state of the products, support and this market in general. It is all in trouble.



That was then... this is now. Small mom and pop operations may survive and rollup ventures (Bertram) may stick around for a bit longer, but the pressure from inflation, imported crap and knock offs is canalizing the small market that this is.

GHL always manufactured their own high quality stuff... their new return pumps, stream pumps and feeder are just the same rebadged china imports that everyone else uses.

Royal Exclusive no longer has the customized RD3 pumps and simply sells 2 models of rebadged imports that everyone else sells.

Mobius is a bare minimum effort aimed at reduced manufacture and integration costs among child products and the quality of the new products by many accounts is not on par with past products.

There is piles of competition and brands are going to start to buckle... this hobby is just not that big.

The new GHL pumps and power heads are Sicce pumps. Not rebadged Chinese stuff everyone else uses

 

[kken6217]

I just got back in the hobby and trying to figure which LED fixture to get and then to pick which channels and the % is daunting for a newbie. I liked it better when I had my MH with VHO on one tank, and ATI T5 on my other.

 

[BeanAnimal]

The new GHL pumps and power heads are Sicce pumps. Not rebadged Chinese stuff everyone else uses

Very good good catch, I will edit my post... but still rebranded stuff available to others, that saves a ton in R&D and manufacturing. I am not saying it is a terrible thing either and there is a value add (the integration to Profilux), my point is that running a manufacturing operating to produce products for this hobby is expensive and becoming less viable every day.

 

[Tahiti]

My XR15's never shut off when they're supposed to. Always 5 minutes before. Is that normal?

 

[iiluisii]

My XR15's never shut off when they're supposed to. Always 5 minutes before. Is that normal?

Check out your date and time setting.

 

[Poochaku]

Also here to say i have problems with mobius. 5 XR30 gen 5 and 2 blades. Blades work fine, XR30's have random time sync problems. Also only 4 of them show up in mobius but changes to the program seems to control all 5 so i just left it because i am tired of fighting with ecotechs horrible app.

 

[BeanAnimal]

My MP10s show as MP40s in the app.

I have one as parent and one as child... anti-sync mode. There is no way, whatsover that they are following the program or each other. They are set to go to 35% flow overnight... and one runs full blast and the other does its own thing. I just laughed... and walked away, no time to deal with it.

 

[mattdg]

I too struggle with the Mobius App. My issue is not always being able to dial up my dosers. I get the "wheel of death" and a frozen screen, where I have to wait for 20-30 seconds for the app to tell me my Versa's are unavailable. I bounce around from doser to doser, in the app, until one finally responds. Once I get one to work, usually the others will follow. What a PITA. I have AI Hydra 64 HD's, which I have not moved over to the Mobius app, due to the unreliability. I do have a G5 on my frag system, that uses the app. No issues with that, so far.

 

[trmiv]

Unfortunately, I doubt it will solve your issue. The mobius control module (mxm) is just a gateway to fusion.

It still runs via mobius.

It does solve the issue actually. Even when my Radions have clock issues, the mxm still runs them on schedule. If i unplug the mxm and let the Mobius fallback schedule take over the clock issue will mess up the schedule. Plugging mxm back in will bring them all back inline.

 

[Cpc83]

I too struggle with the Mobius App. My issue is not always being able to dial up my dosers. I get the "wheel of death" and a frozen screen, where I have to wait for 20-30 seconds for the app to tell me my Versa's are unavailable. I bounce around from doser to doser, in the app, until one finally responds. Once I get one to work, usually the others will follow. What a PITA. I have AI Hydra 64 HD's, which I have not moved over to the Mobius app, due to the unreliability. I do have a G5 on my frag system, that uses the app. No issues with that, so far.

MyAI is way more stable then mobius

 

[mattdg]

MyAI is more stable IMO, but to be transparent, I have had issues with the AI Hydra 64 HD's sticking on over night. Since this is an app specific conversation, we can somewhat blame the hardware / firmware for the issue. Issue happened a few times, even after firmware and app updates. Either way, I had to come back from vacation to fix the issue, as the app was unresponsive. I have since added the lights to a channel on my APEX, so I can re boot them, the next time the error happens. Or did I forget to do that. Yeah. I still have to do that. BUT.. I PLAN TO. Either way, what the heck? We pay so much money for this "top tier", unreliable hardware / software. The entire point of a reef tank is stability and not being limited by faulty VERY EXPENSIVE equipment. That is why we spend the money in the first place. TBT I had worry free stability with my NO APP black box lights, for the first 4 years of keeping my 120.