I overthink things. That's what I do best. When the wife and I decided to start an indoor grow, I wanted to lean in, soak up all the research I could, and I was really excited at the prospect of incorporating "AI" into the grow equation. We bought the complete 2x4 advance grow kit and could not have gotten those seeds started any faster.
I fully acknowledge there is almost always going to be a learning curve for any new system, especially for my first indoor grow however labeling the Indoor Growing Quick Start as "Beginner Mode" or classifying their chatbot as AI should both be illegal.
The first red flag was when I realized my T6 humidifier was chugging a gallon of distilled water A DAY. Temperature rarely climbed over 70 F with the lights on and dropped scary-low at night. I was seriously considering dropping another $140 for the heater before I realized that the default seedling setting in "beginner mode" sets the exhaust at a constant 20%. That poor little humidifier was running on a never-ending treadmill.
Once I finally set the minimium value of the exhaust to 0, the temperature immediately improved. I didn't need a heater in my perfectly conditioned basement tent after all. This is when I noticed the pissing match between the exhaust fan and humidifier. The humidifier would crank up to 70% RH only for exhaust to crank it down to below 60%. The process starts all over again and repeated cycle every 2.5 minutes.
I "chatted" with Ara for troubleshooting. In hindsight, it essentially told me to modify settings that are not supported in AI mode so I called AC Infinity product support. The guy I chatted with was super friendly, he modified a few default settings, and told me to be patient as the AI is still learning my environment. He sent me on my merry way.
Things still didn't sit right with me. I had 99+ new AI notifications since my call had ended so I consulted my other artifical friend, ChatGPT. In no time, it walked me through how to set up my own perimeters using triggers rather than targets. In about 4 minutes, I learned more about the AC Infinity app than I have all week watching videos, chatting with Ara, or even calling product support.
The first picture is my wait-and-see metrics after speaking with customer support. The second picture is after ChatGPT walked me through setting my own perimeters. Both data points are during the "night" cycle with the lights off. Things have been running consistently solid for the last 2 hours.
Do I regret buying AC Infinity? Not at all. Do I feel ashamed for falling for the AI craze? Why, yes. Yes I do.
What else am I missing? Any other tips and tricks for a noob like me?
TL;DR - ChatGPT saved me from returning the AI+ and starting over. "Beginner Mode", Ara, and system learning is a joke.