Apex=Boom

[Aquattro]

Well, after many years, my Apex decided to leave me tonight. I've run it so long I forget how to set up the tank without it. It's been fun for the last couple hours. Now to get a new base unit shipped here by Saturday. That should be fun.

[Ryanerickson]

What caused the death ?

[WarDog]

I think Brad looked at it the wrong way.

[Aquattro]

Age I guess. It just started cycling on and off. I updated firm ware, no help. It wouldn't stay online more than 4 minutes.

I've ordered a new one, and need to suck up to Jeff in the morning to get it here yesterday :) I don't even own a timer anymore, so kind of dead in the water with out it.

[Aquattro]

Anyone ever replaced a base and have tips to no EFF it up?

[Delphinus]

Can't help you with the "replace a base with no eff" but FWIW my tank ran (albeit inhabitants-less) without a base unit for several months until I decided I wasn't quitting, then I just sent my base in for repair. It actually was surprisingly cheaper than I thought it would be, the biggest cost of the whole affair was the shipping both ways (which itself wasn't really THAT bad either).

Anyhow, so bearing in mind that I didn't experience actually replacing a base unit .. my understanding is that your EB8 unit will itself have some memory that will probably make it back into your base unit. Ie., whatever each outlet was running, it should probably remember. It will basically be your base unit functions such as alarms, virtual outlets, timers, etc. that you'll need to reprogram.

You may wish to consider sending your old one in for repairs. Then you can either sell it or keep it as a spare. After my Apex meltdown, I can say that for myself if money was no object I would buy a second controller and have them as a redundant pair and possibly arbitrating or watchdogging each other in the case that one goes berserk again that there would be a way to catch this sooner.

The "money not an object" thing not really having worked out yet, my more immediate solution was to put my heater on two controllers - the Apex AND a Ranco. That's just me though. I've also come to the opinion I need a smaller heater for my tank, which is now on the list of equipment to-buy as time rolls forward...

But I digress. Back to topic: good luck with the reprogramming..

[Aquattro]

I got some good advice on the neptune forums, most of my stuff is answered. Apparently support has some special setting you can use as well. So I asked for that, we'll see.

I have a backup.cfg and only 2 EB 8 and a feeder, so hoping it will be easy enough. I have to reset fusion somehow, not sure on that part yet.

I will probably send this one for repairs once I'm not mad anymore, as having a spare would have saved me hours of grief last night. And I couldn't go to the gym, and that ****es me off.

Anyway, the big thing now is getting J&L to ship that to me by last night. Yup, that's a challenge, but I'm sure they're good enough.. although opening at 11 puts me behind right out of the gate. We'll see.

[Delphinus]

I couldn't go to the gym


https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/36/07/c6/3607c6c676ce5e20d84a87a63a5fe519.jpg

[Aquattro]

Frankly, that's more important to me than this stoopid box of water in my house. I almost just left it unplugged last night. So close to done.

[Delphinus]

I hear ya.

For the most part I'd be tempted to just run barebones until the new unit comes. Tank will live without lights (or just turn them on/off by hand), you can feed by hand for a couple days, run a subset (or all) of the pumps on manual for a little while.

For me the biggest concern would be the heater if yours is oversized for the tank (like mine is apparently). If you don't have a secondary means of controlling it then maybe just go without. It takes a while for a tank to cool down and it's not going to cool down past room temperature anyhow so unless that is really cold then it's probably fine. I ran my tank without the heater for months after the disaster and even without the tank lights on, the couple urchins and tigertails that I couldn't remove seemed to do just fine. (And so did the 2 million aiptasia that sprouted up once all the predators were gone. On a side note, man I love my butterflies, one month of two butterflies in the tank and not a single aiptasia left. But I digress again.)

Anyhow that's my advice. KISS and go to the gym!

[Aquattro]

I have 2 big heaters, and I guess my control is a bigger chiller :) One RW15 running, return, skimmer and reactors running off default On from the Apex bar. Lights will be manual until I get the replacement. Which I still want today. Tomorrow latest.

[Aquattro]

Anyone here ever set their unit to "replacement mode" ? Grasping here :)

[Aquattro]

God I hate this thing.

[Dearth]

Ain't it fun trying to remember how you made it work the first time....

[Aquattro]

Way worse than that. I got it going, had 16 modules listed. Figured that out, had to reprogram everything, twice. Now two of my outlets say they're running Profiles, which isn't possible. Not sure how to correct that.

[Dearth]

Way worse than that. I got it going, had 16 modules listed. Figured that out, had to reprogram everything, twice. Now two of my outlets say they're running Profiles, which isn't possible. Not sure how to correct that.

One word

DYNAMITE

It solves everything

[Aquattro]

I think I mostly have everything operational. Been at it since 6am. Making sh1t up as I go. Still have to rebuild pump profiles, and top off schedule. Feed schedules. Alarms. Probably other stuff.

[The Codfather]

Brad,
Does Apex have a transfer file? I know with my profilux I just save it to my computer any time I change something. Something goes sideways and I can just transfer the file back and it's done.
I've often thought that one day I'd swap out to Apex, but it seems I'm hearing more problems with this system. Might just be growing pains as they have brought out a ton of new equipment and pumps lately. Have to work out the bugs somehow.
At any rate, I just bought a $90 cheapo refurbished laptop and use it. Makes life easier, nothing like having to do things twice or three times to make you pull your hair out.

[Aquattro]

Bob, we have backup .cfg files, but I think it needs to stay current to FW revision. It didn't work, other than restore my user ID and email setup. Nothing else carried over.
Hoping I can view info in the file, because some stuff I just don't recall how I set it up :)
I had to update the FW to get a setting that would make replacing a unit easier. That went horribly wrong. Almost there, just some fine tuning to do, and run a new backup lol

[kien]

I'm not much help here, but YIKES. Can't imagine the headache if my head unit went kaput. Definitely would need a few "reefers", if you know what I mean. :wink:

[Aquattro]

I'm 4.5 hours into this now, and I think I just got it setup reasonably close to what I had.

If you're ever in a position to have to mess with these, do it during weekday business hours so you can get a support guy on the phone.
Not to bash other boards, but the Neptune forums suck for any type of assistance. As in, don't even attempt it -lol

If you flash FW, create a new backup. Take screen shots of your dash board in the old web page, and module setup under Configuration>Modules. These screens saved me even more time. If I had to trace cords and figure out what each outlet was, I would have been another hour.

[WarDog]

Glad to hear it's dealt with. You've really earned your nap today!!

[Aquattro]

Glad to hear it's dealt with. You've really earned your nap today!!

Apparently earned a killer headache too. sigh.

Still have to set email warning, feeder setup, take new back up.

Pump profiles set, looks like most function restored. 5 hours in. [edit]

[Myka]

Jeez, I know it's bad when I have to edit another mod's post! :eek:

[Aquattro]

Jeez, I know it's bad when I have to edit another mod's post! :eek:

I must be getting old. Figured Warren would have got that first. Hmm...

[WarDog]

I must be getting old. Figured Warren would have got that first. Hmm...

Oh I saw it. Had too many vowels in it to concern me.

[Dearth]

In Brads defense he had just spent a few hours banging his head into a brick wall with no head protection

[Aquattro]

Oh I saw it. Had too many vowels in it to concern me.

By purpose, to avoid that pesky filter. Me smrt.

Also, if you come by my house, you'll immediately notice that it was a family friendly phrase, my kid has been repeating it all morning. It's been a very colorful and animated morning in my house today :)

[Myka]

:lol: