Mindstream

[SDJustin]

whoa @lexinverts i'm impressed by your oxygen levels (measured with the Neptune O2 setup (Oxyguard). I hover between 6 and 6.5 mg/L and I have plenty of flow.

Doing anything special to get above 7?!

Here's my MS dashboard from this morning. I have had mine for about 2 months and it is working well for me.

They ran into a bottleneck with making disks and had a bad run of disks, so I think that is what slowed them down. Hopefully, they are turning the corner.

 

[roberthu526]

I wish I could give you some first hand experience but I have been waiting for 2 months and half. Asked seller when my order would ship and got a response saying there was no estimated shipping date. When I placed my order around MACNA they said 2 months lead time so go figure.
I am starting to get worried to be honest.

 

[Murica]

I wish I could give you some first hand experience but I have been waiting for 2 months and half. Asked seller when my order would ship and got a response saying there was no estimated shipping date. When I placed my order around MACNA they said 2 months lead time so go figure.
I am starting to get worried to be honest.

Too bad this is the case, because i think this unit had a lot of potential, especially since Ill be running a ca reactor so a doser won’t be needed. Definitely see why you’re getting worried.

 

[Opus]

My whole issue around this product is the company itself. They have botched this thing thru the entire process the 4 or 5 years it has been going on. The entire time it was in "beta" the only time you heard from them is when they wanted to promote their product or wanted you to vote for their company for being one of the best in the state. Never answered people's questions. Now they want us to believe they are surprised their product is so popular when all this time they have been promoting it as the next best thing for the reef tank since the aquarium itself was invented. I really wouldn't be surprised if they aren't having financial issues. I still stand by my original theory that they had hoped they would get this out first and be bought up by one of the big boys so they wouldn't have to go thru all this.

 

[Murica]

My whole issue around this product is the company itself. They have botched this thing thru the entire process the 4 or 5 years it has been going on. The entire time it was in "beta" the only time you heard from them is when they wanted to promote their product or wanted you to vote for their company for being one of the best in the state. Never answered people's questions. Now they want us to believe they are surprised their product is so popular when all this time they have been promoting it as the next best thing for the reef tank since the aquarium itself was invented. I really wouldn't be surprised if they aren't having financial issues. I still stand by my original theory that they had hoped they would get this out first and be bought up by one of the big boys so they wouldn't have to go thru all this.

That’s a reasonable theory. Not saying this in a derogatory way, more of constructive criticism, but they clearly don’t have business experience.

Still if things greatly improve i will still be looking into getting one.. a lot needs to happen though.

 

[Oldreefer44]

Actually, even more troubling is that they have plenty of business experience. IMO, as having owned one, is that people are getting this wrong. IMO, the issue is that they are really still in the Beta testing mode and trying to adapt to unanticipated complications. It is my impression that the original tests didn't account for the fact that most reef tanks include things like carbon dosing, calcium reactors as well as other things that complicate the ability to accurately measure water parameters. I think they are in an all hands on deck mode trying to adjust to these unexpected complications that make it very difficult to manufacture discs for individual monitors. I hope they figure it out and are successful as when working, it is a very useful tool, but at this point I am not optimistic.

 

[Silver14SS]

In the CEO update thread, the latest is that they are making a machine to make the discs...

If their core business plan was making monitors and discs, my assumption is making a robotic assembler will add substantial time to the wait.

They can’t tell you because they have no idea when the automated disk making system will be complete. They are literally making it from scratch and it involves robotic arms, optical readers and a battery of tests that need to be done by a simulation machine. My understanding is that all the parts have been put together and they are now busy writing software to drive it and software to do all the tests and create calibration data for each disk it produces.

i 100% agree that they could at least give us twice weekly reports saying the machine is at stage X or Y and let us know a bit of what is going on.

 

[robbyg]

In the CEO update thread, the latest is that they are making a machine to make the discs...

If their core business plan was making monitors and discs, my assumption is making a robotic assembler will add substantial time to the wait.

This is really not new news. I mentioned weeks ago that they were working on disc production changes. The substantial amount of time you refer to is probably true, but based on what I was told they should be about 90% done by now. This is based on the estimates I heard at the time.
As with any process one never knows what delays may be encountered, so I currently have no idea how far along the process actually is. I do know that the idea of making Disks by hand flew out the window on July 1st when they saw how many orders came in.

 

[Oldreefer44]

But we really don't know haw many orders they have do we? When I talked to the CEO I urged him to be transparent about the challenges they had and to be more open as to how many orders they really had etc. He quickly changed the subject.

 

[robbyg]

But we really don't know haw many orders they have do we? When I talked to the CEO I urged him to be transparent about the challenges they had and to be more open as to how many orders they really had etc. He quickly changed the subject.

No we have no exact numbers but we do know that it was a magnitude higher in number than they expected. On one of my first calls to MS I was talking to a regular employee and he was expressing how shocked they were at the roll out numbers. I think we reefers have a small part to play in the blame game and I will explain.

He said to me that during Macna and other events everybody loved the MS but most people said that the price and the monthly subscription fee was a non starter for them. So based on potential customer comments and how badly the Kickstarter campaign went they figured that the number of people who would sign up to order one would be only be maybe a couple of hundred people at most.

When the real numbers came in on July 1st they were in shock. It seems like most of us will balk at the price of something but when it comes down to crunch time we will open our wallets up without hesitation. While I never attended Macna I am also guilty because I balked at the price and said only a brave man would spend that kind of money on a device that has so many unknowns. Then 24 hours later I had ordered one!

 

[bam123]

I have called and emailed. No response. I contacted my CC company and cancelled. Good luck everyone.

 

[robbyg]

I have called and emailed. No response. I contacted my CC company and cancelled. Good luck everyone.

I just got an email for one of their techs telling me that they will be back in contact with the community on either Tuesday or Wednesday with some news. He sounded very upbeat but said he could not tell me what it is all about.

 

[TARHEEL78]

Actually, even more troubling is that they have plenty of business experience. IMO, as having owned one, is that people are getting this wrong. IMO, the issue is that they are really still in the Beta testing mode and trying to adapt to unanticipated complications. It is my impression that the original tests didn't account for the fact that most reef tanks include things like carbon dosing, calcium reactors as well as other things that complicate the ability to accurately measure water parameters. I think they are in an all hands on deck mode trying to adjust to these unexpected complications that make it very difficult to manufacture discs for individual monitors. I hope they figure it out and are successful as when working, it is a very useful tool, but at this point I am not optimistic.

Did you sell yours? Your text reads as is you don't own one anymore.

 

[bam123]

I just got an email for one of their techs telling me that they will be back in contact with the community on either Tuesday or Wednesday with some news. He sounded very upbeat but said he could not tell me what it is all about.

I hope you are right, but I am done. Ryan said he would send me an email 2 weeks ago that never came. Ryan has not returned phone call or email placed yesterday. Decided to get an APEX for auto-water changes and also converting to the trident method. I think mindstream will be great when they get their act together, but I love the idea of auto water changes, being able to better control my tunzes, and the live Ph and temp. ORP and Salinity pretty much not worth it. I am not a fan of the apex salinity or orp measurements and am only using it for trends.

 

[roberthu526]

I just got an email for one of their techs telling me that they will be back in contact with the community on either Tuesday or Wednesday with some news. He sounded very upbeat but said he could not tell me what it is all about.

Well I hope it’s good news and not “we don’t know when...”

 

[adamsfour]

I’ve been searching the mindstream endlessly on multiple sites and still can’t tell whether the dang thing is worth it or not. I understand that they’ve had an absolute terrible rollout, but to those who did receive them, are they worth it? I haven’t read one forum yet that shows consistency in people’s reviews/opinions.

I’ll be in the market for one next spring and I’m still unsure if i should look into getting one or go ghl/apex

Advice is greatly appreciated considering how much money they cost

I have now tried to get an update from mindstream via FB, messaging and even called. No responds. I too have been looking for feedback from real users. As bad as the neptune trident roll out was at least there were dozen of comments from real users daily. The lack of communication makes me wonder if they are even in business anymore.

 

[TARHEEL78]

They are still in business, I spoke with someone there a few days ago. I won't go into details about anything I was told but I would expect them to be completely caught up and accepting new orders no later than February. What this means for existing orders I don't know but I would think he wait times should start to drop soon. That's just my personal opinion though so take it as such.

 

[Oldreefer44]

Did you sell yours? Your text reads as is you don't own one anymore.

Sent back for refund

 

[chicago]

Ordered mine July 8th. Nothing yet.

 

[User1]

One person cancels it is 1,000.00. If 10, it is 10,000. 20? You can do the math... I'm not buying the "we didn't expect this much demand" line either. Anyone with half a brain knows the hobby has been anticipating the automated product be it reagent based, disc, or probe. Heck, they could have sat back, ate popcorn, and read all of the trident threads about their demand issues.

They should never have opened orders and they shouldn't have requested money up front if they couldn't fulfill them. That is a executive management decision miscue (and I'm not talking about pool) which very well could have cost them the company. Just my opinion.