What single thing...
 

... has made a huge difference for you in the hobby?

For me, plumbing my RO into my top off. Life is so much simpler.

Honorable mention goes to my water change hose and refractometers :)

Biopellets! Only way I could have sps dominant and 22 fish:) in a 90g

~Tony

Internet info and forumns!!, hands down giant hobby changer.....good and bad lol :)

LEDs. ;)

That is a good one. No such thing when I started, we only had usenet forums at the time. alt.aquaria was it -lol

Auto top-off, simple, effective, priceless.

Would probably have ended up spending wayyyy too much money listening to lfs if not for the forums!

one thing
 

books-knowledge is king

my controller
 

My wireless aquarium controller and my web cam. I can watch over my tank from pretty much everywhere, so it's peace of mind.

This^^^^. After you finally figure out who the people are that actually know what they're talking about.

Denny nailed it. I've met so many great reefers without Canreef I would have probably tossed in the towel.

And prodibio


On the down side. If I could mainline acros.....

The Internet is something that has made my life so much easier so much help available online if the Internet had been around when I started fresh water 18 yrs ago I probably wouldn't of made a lot of the mistakes I did along the way

Canreef. Without it I wouldn't be here and my tank would probably be another failed experiment. My tank is 100% built up from what I found and learned on The Canreef.

Canreef and RC for sure. Wouldn't have built a whole house around a tank otherwise.

Forums absolutely! Equipment wise I would say the BP reactor. Tremendous outcome in my tank from it!

Honestly.... Oceanic corals, almost everything I know I've learnt from them

Auto daily water change and auto top up.

For me reading forums forsure , no shortage of Info and inspiration, equipment my ato

Forums and the fact my wife is into the tank lol

I tried putting my wife into my tank once, didn't go over well.... Apparently she was afraid of our sharks

+1 ^^^ Gotta totally agree with you Craig, I have my wife's complete support & she also has her own reef set up.

Yea, was slow to start but letting her pick some corals out and the sexy shrimp and now she's feeding the corals and scraping the glass more than I am some days

I have met you both input and I must say its great you both have beautiful tanks

Thank you hillegom, she is definitely more involved now also. I would have to say the forums have definitely taught me a lot, especially Canreef. We have met quite a few good people from here also.

Buying a RO/DI unit helped me with my algae problems which would have driven me out of the hobby. Looking back at various problems since it seems nothing is getting me out of this hobby....:rolleyes:

1. Quality live rock
2. Sulphur reactor
3. Understanding Wife

In no particular order.

What single thing...

Canreef, I'm sure I would have quit the hobby without this wealth of knowledge...

I think without 3, 1 & 2 might never be :)

I'm going to second Brad's plumbing the R/O in to the top off. The only reservoirs I need to worry about being filled now are my dosing reservoirs, and they're 4 gallons each so they last a pretty long time (though, less and less time recently. stupid sticks). In the last tank, going out of town meant hauling out a 20 gallon bin, filling it up with water in the middle of our living room, and re-plumbing the entire top off system so it had a bigger reservoir. It took over an hour to test it each time. My 'out of town routine' now consists of directing the skimmer drain hose to the sewer drain under the tank and opening the gate on the auto-feeders a little.

But also the internet and forums. I was groping in the dark when I started this. Books are helpful, but there's so many obscure "what about 'this' in 'that' application?" questions that you'll never be able to find a book that covers all the questions or problems you'll face. Without being able to ask people and get real and immediate feedback, I probably would have killed way more things than I have.

The internet has affected many aspects of our lives and not just reefing, so I don't know if it qualifies...

BUT having understanding wives who let us be reefing nuts in their everyday lives, that has to affect us being able to carry on our hobby :)

+1 ^^^^ on the understanding/supporting wife :)