Hi folks, just wanted to put this out there about my experience with the Eheim PowerLED+ Fresh Plants (LK1) with the WiFi controller.
These lights are really awesome and the controller is great too! I find having a wifi, rather than bluetooth based controller (like the fluval lights), is better as it is easy to just go into the browser and adjust the settings. It also recovers from a power cut well, unlike the fluval which resets the timer. The colours are great and the spread of the light is also very good with no dark spots in the corners at the top.
There are some issues though and I wanted to make people aware before they consider them. It seems the colour channels in the controller are wrong. The lights have a white, yellow (gold) and blue channel, all of which are very good. The issue is the yellow and blue channels are the wrong way round! This means you end up with blue sunsets etc.
It states in the manual you should have lights with a "Serie" (serial?) number over 17xx05 and mine were 17xx02 or something, so I thought that was the issue. I contacted Eheim and they said they are aware of the problem but have no idea when they will fix it with a firmware update. I have seen some other posts of this issue on German sites from a good few months ago, so I have my doubts as to when, or if, they will fix it - disappointing for a top brand really.
I replaced them with a newer set of the same lights, this time with an 18xxxx serial number (way higher than the manual stated) but the exact same issue is happening I am waiting for a response from them now. It's understandable that issues happen, but this would seem like a fairly straightforward thing to fix - even a basic toggle in the settings page "flip yellow and blue channels" would suffice. I
t's a bit disappointing from a top brand at this price point, but I hope it gets resolved soon. Will update this thread when I know more.
These lights are really awesome and the controller is great too! I find having a wifi, rather than bluetooth based controller (like the fluval lights), is better as it is easy to just go into the browser and adjust the settings. It also recovers from a power cut well, unlike the fluval which resets the timer. The colours are great and the spread of the light is also very good with no dark spots in the corners at the top.
There are some issues though and I wanted to make people aware before they consider them. It seems the colour channels in the controller are wrong. The lights have a white, yellow (gold) and blue channel, all of which are very good. The issue is the yellow and blue channels are the wrong way round! This means you end up with blue sunsets etc.
It states in the manual you should have lights with a "Serie" (serial?) number over 17xx05 and mine were 17xx02 or something, so I thought that was the issue. I contacted Eheim and they said they are aware of the problem but have no idea when they will fix it with a firmware update. I have seen some other posts of this issue on German sites from a good few months ago, so I have my doubts as to when, or if, they will fix it - disappointing for a top brand really.
I replaced them with a newer set of the same lights, this time with an 18xxxx serial number (way higher than the manual stated) but the exact same issue is happening I am waiting for a response from them now. It's understandable that issues happen, but this would seem like a fairly straightforward thing to fix - even a basic toggle in the settings page "flip yellow and blue channels" would suffice. I
t's a bit disappointing from a top brand at this price point, but I hope it gets resolved soon. Will update this thread when I know more.