The first thing on the Steve's kits is that you MUST prevent salt spray from touching the LED's. ?Unless you have a lid, plan to make a splash shield, or are 100% sure that salt water will NEVER touch them I would not go that route. ?I had the unfortunate experience of trying to fix a Steve's kit for someone who had used them over a tank where they were exposed to a minor amount of mist for a long period if time. ?I finally gave them away rather than continue to try to fix them. ?The joints were all corroded and the LED emitters were literally falling apart from the salt.Additionally consider the difference between "hand made" and "home made". ?"Hand made" implies character, craftsmanship, etc. ?"Home made" sounds more like "My third grader made this in art class". ?The Steve's kits are in the "home made" category. ?They look like someone grafted a computer fan to a chunk of 1" aluminum square tube they got at Home Depot, then used dad's pop rivet gun to attach the LEDs. ?Now mind you Steve (whoever he is) is correct in the sense that his design is probably the most cost effective route. ?From a value standpoint it is a beauty of using off the shelf parts in a way that works well. ?Unfortunately it also looks like you cobbled it together in high school electronics class*. ?I would call it a good system for a Biocube or other situation where it is hidden from view. ?You could get away with it in your canopy, but you really do need to plan in a thin acrylic splash shield to keep the salt spray off of them.The Rapid LED kits are a bit nicer looking and come with a built in acrylic spray shield. ?If you don't mind putting it together yourself and figuring out how to make the wires look nice you can save some money by getting the dual puck dimmable aurora kit. ?You could also get the non dimmable kit, although I think you will want to dim or turn off the whites to get the color a bit more on the blue side.For a bit more you can get Rapid's Corona fixtures and control it with the FishBit app. ?This gets you a computer interface for dimming, takes care of the wiring issues, you don't have to mount ballasts or buy a controller, etc. ?Mind you FishBit has been very flaky and flat out won't work some days, so there is a risk there. ?Rapid supports their products, but they do not support FishBit. ?My one friend who uses these has not been able to get a response from FishBit despite many tries, so consider yourself warned. ?The dual puck Aurora kit is in the range of a Gen3/Gen3Pro Radion in terms of light output. ?The Corona is the same thing just already in assembled in a nice package.The good news about Rapid is that free shipping and a 10% or 15% off sale is always around the corner. ?The downside is that you're talking somewhere around $350-380 (on sale) per fixture. ?At that price point if you are willing to buy used you can get a Gen3Pro Radion with some looking, or a Gen3 non-pro Radion any day of the week.The folks at Ecotech will tell you you can put 3?XR30 Radion units over your tank, personally I would use at least 4 as I find they tend to err on the low side to make their units seem effectively cheaper due to not needing as many. ?If you want fast SPS growth in the bottom of the tank, in the back corners, etc then I would say 5, although in reality most people don't pack high light stuff in the back corner. ?I will say that the Gen3Pro Radion fans at 100% are much louder than the other options above. ?I don't know if they run cooler or not. ?You see very few complaints about this and I think it is because nearly nobody runs all channels at 100%. ?Dim the whites down by using the built in programs and they are much quieter.If it were my money I'd probably stop at 4 and throw on the T5HO bulbs on the front. ?Use good reflectors and keep the salt spray off of them!The supplemental T5s will cut down a lot on shadowing. ?I've found that most people don't find the shadowing to be a big deal until they add something more uniform like a T5, and then it stands out just how many fewer shadows there are with the T5s on.I can't speak to a comparison to the Hydras, so hopefully someone else chimes in.?*Yes my lights are hanging from unfinished 1x2s and propped on spare chunks of 2x4 that I threw together in a hurry one afternoon, it looks awful, guilty here too.
. ?Personally my next big build will be Gen3Pro Radions as (after a lot of hunting) I was able to get them at 1/3 the cost of new G4Pro units. ?Aiming for 1/2 of new cost is probably a more realistic goal, but still saves a lot over new. ?The only complication of supplemental T5s is mounting aesthetics, and this isn't an issue if you have a canopy to hide them in.I've heard many good things over the years about Giesemann's T5HO bulbs, but I have no experience with their fixtures.Hopefully someone with a bit more LED experience than me will chime in here.?Edit: I've also gone the DIY route. ?Certainly more cost effective if buying new, the PAR on my RapidLED Aurora pucks is pretty close to the Gen3Pro Radions, although the aesthetics and controls are not as good. ?No clue how they will hold up long term as the Aurora pucks aren't that old in comparison to the Gen3Pro units I have.