Apex head unit

[ss95003]

My apex head unit went out. Have an rma number to send to in to them.

Does anyone have a back up head unit? I just need until mine is repaired. Will pay a fee and or buy a reasonable priced used one.

 

[Sherman]

Do you have Fusion and a smart phone? You can't use that for the time it's in the shop?

http://www.neptunesystems.com/apex-fusion/

 

[ss95003]

Not the display. That actual head unit. The brains of apex. Wish it was just the display.

 

[melev]

When I spoke to Terence on Monday, he had suggested we keep a brain on hand for moments like these. It's not plug & play though, you'd have to call Neptune to have them reassign a serial number to the temporary unit but once that is done, it seems like your programming could then be imported (back up a XML file every month). I also wondered if Fusion would hold all your settings in the cloud, but it does not. At least not at this time. Perhaps for a paid service it would at a later date.

 

[ss95003]

I have my file backed up. I thought it would be plug and play. Didn't realize it was tied to serial number. That's dumb. Ill likely have a second unit one way or another and won't mind letting members barrow in this situation.

 

[DaveJ]

@ss95003 wrote:

Steve... tell them its for a back up, they will drop the price. I was quoted $200. I was the one hammering the rep for quality issues the on Monday I've had lock-ups and data issues where my port gets changed etc. That was his suggestion, to have a backup. It's a solution, considering how critical these things are.... but would be better if it was never needed.

 

[ss95003]

Yep $210 plus shipping plus up to $150 to fix mine. Was hoping to barrow one for now then purchase a back up down the road.

 

[melev]

Makes sense. Now that you texted me asking if I had a spare, I feel like I need one! lol

 

[Mike M]

I have a spare Apex Lite so unless you absolutely need the 0-10v or 2nd pH/ORP port it should work fine for you. Send me a PM with your info if you want to borrow it and what's a good time to call. Looks like I am relatively close to you too.

 

[ss95003]

Mike thank you very much. Took me about an hour. But I got everything coded.
It's been so long since I've messed with the code in mine. Reminds me how much of a pia it is.

Thanks again!

 

[pjracer]

Nice mike. Where were you when mine went out twice. I always had a quick turnaround and their customer service was great. Good luck with everything. I found all my stuff runs 24-7 anyways lights on a timer and I was good to go.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Mike M]

Glad I could help Steve.

PJ - Ironically I think I picked this up maybe a week or so ago figuring I have too much of my system that relies on that one piece of equipment. It still concerns me if I am out of town on business or vacation where I would not be able to physically swap it out though. I guess there's not much that can be done about that. I would have added a Apex head unit and EB8 to the list of emergency club equipment if the rescue team ever got off the ground but didn't really have any volunteers when I posted about it. Perhaps we can get one for the Apex demo class we are planning and just keep the head unit around for when something like this happens again.

 

[Grant]

@Mike wrote:

That would be great. If I was gone and mine went out I could probably walk my wife or a house sitter through replacing it and hopefully loading my backup file to it. But I don't know if I could talk them through replacing everything it does with a manual form, and then have them remember to turn the lights on/off, what pumps to turn on and off for feeding and for how long, etc.

 

[ss95003]

Grant loading the back up file made it harder for me. The addresses are all messed up. I end up reverting back to what was there then just edited. To be honest if it wasn't my tank it would be hard to get me to walk through it. Setting up profiles sucks.

 

[melev]

Hmm. Good to know, Steve. Sounds like we need more about what to do to swap them out and make the transition as little easier.

 

[ss95003]

Marc here is what I recommend.

In a word doc list out all your outlet locations not their address in apex their physical location when looking at the EB8. If you have more then 1 EB8 then you need to do something like Top EB1 = Light, Bottom EB6 = heater.

After that you need a usable back up for each outlet. Again in a word doc name each outlet and then copy and past the program into word. If I use the default program then make sure you list out each value for each input. If you use advance then copy the program you have.
Do not forget to save copies of your profiles too. if you have a Vortex you likely have a lot of profiles and would not want to go figure those out again.

So now if lose your head unit, plug in the back up unit.
Go to module setup and delete and modules listed that are missing and or you don't have.

If you only have one EB8 you can just go to outlet set up and go to _1 rename to your name and copy and paste in your program, Go to profiles copy and paste your profiles in. and your are to go.

If you have more then 1 EB8 you need to first find each number 1 outlet so you know the address for each.

Now that I have done this I think I could get mine back up to speed pretty quickly and/or walk someone else through it.

Oh yea don't forget to reset the clock.
And you will also need the untilies program (download from apex website) so you can find the IP address for the unit.

 

[Mike M]

Yup, this is what I do. I keep a running Word doc with any changes made to my various programs and settings including all my network connection information.

 

[melev]

That is one serious beating - copy and pasting each one? They really need to offer a full backup and restore option. I can see getting each power bar wired up in the correct order being the paramount starting move. Thanks for typing that out.

 

[Grant]

@Marc wrote:

I can't imagine that there isn't a way to use a scripting language like Perl to read in the old configuration files and then, assuming this is just a head unit replacement and everything else remains the same, have it identify any address changes and recreate the original setup to a working state.

At the risk of just inviting a bunch of work for myself... if I had a second Apex I could attempt this. I'm not trying it on my live one, though. Ben, why don't you have an Apex? You'd be faster at this than me. [smilie=lol.gif]

 

[washingtond]

My base unit crashed last week, after over 5 plus years, and got it back from Neptune this past Friday and got it up and running yesterday. I also ordered a back-up unit that should arrive sometime this coming week. The repaired unit still has a major problem however and that is on the of pH inputs is totally dead so it looks like it is going to have to be returned again. I will be discussing with Neptune in the morning but not returning until I get the back-up online. BTW it took half of Sat getting the unit up and running again, included getting it operating on my home network first, then re-programming the unit.

I would suggest getting a back unit just to remove another single point of failure.