"Pop"...ugh.
Can't decide whether to abandon LEDs has some good stuff in it, including some stuff I added about Buyer's Remorse that address your feelings on buying once. Most folks don't use very real criteria for selecting their lights....this hampers critical thinking and leaves them open to this. Read that thread.
I think you will be able to lay the whole concept of pop to rest by realizing how many people with T5's are looking to LED's for "pop"....how many people with LED's are looking to T5's for "pop"......and even metal halide users looking to LED's for "pop" and LED users wanting halides for "pop". It's beyond silly.
"pop" to the best of my reading ability, is a word used to describe a non-existent condition of someone's corals looking better than they do.....no matter how they look.
If you can find threads where people have brown corals and actually made them colorful, you will mostly see how rare
that thread is. (You will need photo-documentation, of course, because no two people have the very same idea of "good looking" or "beautiful".) Healthy, growing corals under any purpose-built reef light will look really good. Beautiful. Florescent and iridescent.
If you want more than that you have to leave reality for the realm of DSLR cameras and photoshop. (I hope you take my meaning here...it's a bit sharp.)
So if more "pop" is all you're after in the change of lighting, I think you can reconsider your upgrade altogether if you want to. If the T5's have been working and you don't hate them, keep using them and go after what's really preventing the corals from coloring up. Light, nuntrients and flow all come together to make a happy coral....get one or two of them wrong....or all three.....and you'll have less-happy-looking corals as they adapt and keep on surviving in the non-ideal circumstance.
I would post some tank photos online to see if other folks concur that your corals need a change first though....just get an "aesthetic sanity" check.
You might get even more non-upgrade advice.
Doing a setup something like
@Duke4Life has where you use the Orbit Pro
along side the T5's is a very good option. You can try both out....then just the CurrentUSA.....you may decide you like the combo so well you won't change, but you can also take your time deciding if you like the Current well enough to go alone with it. And if you wanted a really bright tank (which is arguably not
necessary for anything) there's nothing really wrong with using the 72" DUAL Orbit Pro that comes with two strips – it's pretty common to use more fixtures than recommended, though shouldn't be necessary. You won't have to run either strip nearly as intense that way, which will make the LED's last longer...and you'd have the capacity to make your tank much brighter than most tanks you see pictures of. (You can search out some truly high-light tanks where surface irradiance reaches >80,000 lux or >1800 PAR....nothing at all wrong with them
if done right....just that it's not necessary to have that much light for most corals. 1/10th that amount or more will do it.)
The real key is to listen to your gut – which if you're smart, will be telling you do go slow every step of the way. You
cannot add fish or coral too slowly. Allotting yourself extra time in between additions allows you to make mistakes and learn from them without compromising a whole tank full of livestock.
It can be hard to be that patient, but try to think about fish and corals more like dogs – as pets.
Taking Your Time
Fish and coral both have
a much longer lifetime than dogs in most cases, so you're going to have
a long time to spend with these critters – even the very first additions you make to the tank.
So don't get in a senseless rush to fill up the tank in the firs year or two when you still don't know jack – it is not justified.
That's the pattern that most newbies follow to their chagrin.
There would be nothing wrong with still having only one fish and a few corals at the end of your first year with this reef, for example. Adding one or two critters a year after that – you'd have a blast stocking the tank for years to come.
(My tank was full since year one....nobody to give me this advice....and it's a little boring when there's no room to add. I've had the chance to add lots of cool corals to the tank over the last 6 years or whatver, but never had room to add them. Not the end of the world, but stocking the tank is definitely part of the fun....and I could have taken my time.)
Unloading Used Gear
Online sources like R2R's for sale forums, raigslist, Bay and local reef clubs will be your best outlets for used stuff.....I agree I don't like the bother of dealing with that though.....buy once if at all possible.
Not to the point of stressing over it though....just, as you are, research and take your time. If you get to the point of stressing about any of this, slow down – you're rushing! We make our worst mistakes/decisions when we're in a hurry.....personal experience, but you can read all sorts of confessions from other folks on here too. "Nothing good happens fast in a reef tank." is the most under-rated/under-used saying in our hobby.....yet it holds more keys to success than any other thing you can do.
)
