PV charge controller brand recommendation?

[halfcrazy]

I also thought I would throw out here for those that do not know the same 2 guys that owned outback and built the MX/FM controller own MidNite and have been designing and building the Classic so have no fear it will be even more robust and dependable as the FM series. We have also listened to the Installers/Users and added a lot of function as well as making the Classic use an openly published ModBus protocol. 

The Classic will also have the ability to bridge ModBus commands through it so say you wanted a Morningstar Tri star plugged in as well as a relay driver and want to write your own software the Classic will pass there language through.It will also be using this other language to show stuff on the Local App as well as My MidNite when we go live with that.

The general Idea here is to have a monitoring system that will be flexible and user programmable to monitor anything we can read. Unlike we did when we designed the Outback by making it a proprietary language 

The Classic can also do data dumps out of its USB port as well so we have multiple ways of communicating with the Classic. The USB has a few functions and can have many more based on whatever people ask for.

Keep the ideas and suggestions coming that is how we tailor this product to everyone's needs.

Ryan

[tomw]

Ryan;

The open protocol approach is actually quite a good model in many ways.

You may sacrifice a little cash flow on the front end not selling proprietary software, devices, etc to communicate with the device. Anyone sufficiently interested could reverse engineer almost anything so "secrets" don't really last.

In the long run you enable a pool of developers when people massage your devices for more functionality. This leads to enhanced sales as the devices become more useful to a broader group.

Been an advocate and user of open source software for decades and I am convinced it is better in many ways than proprietary usually because users expand and extend the functionality to suit unseen needs in the original. I predict your products will benefit from this open approach.

While I may never own one of your products I applaud your approach and the posts on forums keeping folks abreast of your process getting it all going.

Tom