instant ocean or reef crystals?
 

i went to big als today to buy some salt and noticed there was an instant ocean and a reef crystals option. the reef crystals is more expensive but is there a benefit?

Weekly water changes with Instant Oceans... My perfect situation.

reef crystals has a higher ca/mg/alk as wel as more trace elements. I use reef crystals as I don't need to dose as much.

Generally speaking the more you pay for salt, the higher values you'll get on certain parameters such as Calcium, Alkalinity and Magnesium. Some will go further and claim to have better mixes of other trace elements.

I have tried just about every salt there is though, at least once, and to be honest, I'm really happy with Instant Ocean. 1) Can't beat the price, and 2) Everything needs to be added at some point, I add Ca, Alk and Mg, and would have to anyhow, so I find my money seems to go further just going thrifty on the salt and spending the extra on the additives. It works for me.

thanks for the advice guys

BINGO for me.

I used to feel the same way as Darryl and Tony about Instant Ocean, but having made the change back and forth between IO and H2Ocean 4 times I've noticed a significant change in my reef tanks each time. I won't use IO on my reefs anymore, I've decided IO is for FO tanks only. I haven't used RC on my reefs in many years, but every once in awhile I use it on my FO tanks when I can't get IO. Besides, H2Ocean is natural sea salt - there has to be a difference using natural sea salt as opposed to synthetic sea salt...there has to be. :neutral:

What changes do you notice when switching between the two? I have been looking into trying H2Ocean but figured it was likely not worth the extra cost.

I've just gone backwards from Reefers Best to IO and don't notice any difference, other than having to up my Ca a bit. I'll stick with IO for a while, see how it works.

When I switch from H2Ocean to IO I don't notice any changes. I think this is because the changes happen slowly. After 4-6 I notice I start having troubles with cyano, sometimes even hair algae pops up. Test kits show extremely low nitrate ("zero" to 0.5 ppm) and phosphate (<0.08 ppm).

When I switch from IO to H2Ocean I notice an increase in SPS color within a couple weeks. Over a month or so the cyano recedes away, and polyp extension increases even though the test kits read the same as above.

I take lots of pics of my tank and I document changes and test readings, so I have lots of data to go on.

I used to be all for IO. In fact, if you do a search I used to say the same thing - buy IO, add a bit of calcium, mg, and potassium to it and you're golden. It's still cheaper than the others even after pre-dosing it. I've changed my mind now, just recently since I have now documented the same results I saw the first time I made the switch from IO to H2Ocean (in 2011 I think...going off memory right now).