Hehe, I just re-read the whole thread.
To be honest, no, I don't truly feel hugely different now. I feel the choice of a sandbed, or more generally "substrata", is still somewhat dictated by the choice of animals you intend to keep. It could be that 99% don't care. But it's not 100%. Jawfish, for example, deep substrate. Not necessarily a DSB however. And the large granular substrate is still good for infauna production.
But with creativity there are ways to manage some of those issues.
My tank with a DSB didn't get much of a chance to get old, stupid thing sprung a leak, so I'll never know if it was a time bomb or not. In a sense, it was, but not for the reasons laid out in the no-DSB camp. When I moved the rock and animals over to a new tank, I kept only about 5%-10% of the sand, because, well, the "ant farm look" doesn't appeal to me. I like a uselessly thin skiff of sand on the bottom, but hey, that's just my thing.
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-- Tony
My next hobby will be flooding my basement while repeatedly banging my head against a brick wall and tearing up $100 bills. Whee!
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