Have any of you used the reef crystals? Pros and cons?

IO reef crystals is all I use. I haven't found any con's. when and if you switch salts do it slowly.

Will do. I was hoping that it would be a good choice for my tank! :) Right now I have just the Instant Ocean sea salt and I'm supplementing with the Instant Ocean reef accelerator to provide the trace elements and calcium.

If you use the reef crystals, do you have to worry about adding anything like trace elements, etc or do the reef crystals provide everything you need? I'm such a worry wart about my tank and I want to make sure I don't mess something up! LOL!

First and foremost... never supplement anything you can't test for. Water changes will replace your trace elements in most cases. Reef Crystals over IO really (imo) boils down to the elevated magnesium. A lot of people really seem to like it. I just use IO. I have a separate dosing scheme to maintain alkalinity, calcium, and magnesium levels in my system according to what my tests indicate is needed. Because I use the IO I always buffer my change water to what I want those levels to be.

Keep a diary of your parameters, your observations, and anything relative to the system.

PS If you're running all softies your regular water changes will keep your calcium levels straight.

different corals consume trace elements at different rates like SPS in your case you should be fine with the salt mix since you are planning zoa's softies and some LPS in the future but you should have a good test kit on hand.

I've got the API reef master test kit... having a hard time getting my calcium to 400 even with the reef accelerator... with the soft corals and polyps is this lower calcuim a problem? I can always get a calcium supplement if need be... My calcium right now is around 370ppm. I'm dosing for a 60g tank since I'm also trying to encourage the coralline algae to start to grow....anything to get rid of the diatom brown!

Not sure. There's no pH test in my kit. I'll see if hubs can find a pH test kit on his way home tonight. Do they flourish in more alkaline conditions? If so, how do I lower the pH?
Told ya I'm a dingy !!!

It's a KH test. PH you want around 8

OOooooh! For water hardness? KH (carbonate) test I have! LOL! I tested for it back on the 13th and it sat at 10dKH (179ppm),

I keep a daily journal on my tank and while it's still getting itself established I'm testing every few days for Nitrates (which has been my biggest problem, even after removing the E 400), and once a week for Ammonia, phosphated and Calcium, and only the once for Carbonate thus far. Every morning I check the water temp and SG.

I write and detail everything from water color/clarity to how the fish and critters are acting/eating. I'm completely insane with documenting, but I want to know if something doesn't seem quite right so I can go back and look and see what's been going on and ask questions if/when needed.