MPP Solar & Hybrid LV2424 - bad unit/website or just bad 1st impressions?

[conospIst]

I'm newish to solar equipment & setups. I bought the Hybrid LV2424 based on favorable reviews, but the product and the website seems to have obvious issues that I haven't found generally acknowledged. I don't know if people just overlook them and carry on because the unit more or less does the job.

Just to list a couple issues out of the box and initial experiences:

1. My up and down buttons on the unit are reversed. Is everyone's like this for this model? Is it fixed in a firmware release? Are there any firmware releases?

2. The included CD can't be read. Probably just poor quality CDs (but anyway who uses CDs any more?)

3. The software isn't available for download. It seems that it used to be at mppsolar.com, but now the site asks you to email "sales" to get a copy.

4. The website is horrible in general. Mosts link open in a new tab. So after just navigating to the product page, I had SO MANY tabs open. Also they bizarrely try to prevent you from cutting and pasting content. I went to copy their email address, and it gives me a message "copy disabled". Seriously?

Like I said, these could all be minor gripes once the unit it's up and running but talk about bad first impressions. I kind of want to pack it up and send it back because I don't know what else I will encounter later.

 

[MichaelK]

I don't have this unit but I did visit the website. Now about your concerns....

1) Could this be a left brain/right brain issue? Maybe they just have a different mindset then you. Do all the menu items you scroll to work?

2) You might try cleaning the CD with Windex. I've had CDs that didn't read till I cleaned them. But in this day and age, you'd think they could send you a USB stick instead?

3) Did you contact "sales"? Were you ignored? Maybe the lack of access has something to do with preventing hacks?

4) It seems that most of what is on the website are graphical elements rather than text. Yes, you can't copy the email, but I think that's because it's in a graphical element. I've run into this problem before with people posting greeting cards in another language. You can't copy and paste them into a translator. I had to hand type someone's New Year's greeting into a Spanish translation app this morning. Uhhh!

This is after all, a lower end company, so you can't expect them to invest a lot of money into the best web designers. Is the unit functioning as expected? If it actually works as advertized, I guess you have to accept the inconvienences as getting what you pay for.

 

[conospIst]

I wanted to post an update. MPP Solar said the "reversed" buttons is by design. That up/down is in "logical flow" order - whatever that means - and that I shouldn't expect when I press the up arrow that values should go up, but they should go down?! I replied that's ridiculous & asked for a reference where anyone defines something called "logical flow" order in that way. It's been a few days, and they haven't responded.

Re the software, it IS available for download, but it's just poorly labeled/placed and the messaging to contact sales for it is meant to be updated. I went back and forth with a few other suggestions for their website, and they said they would forward the feedback to their web site editors (FWIW).

Re the unit, after ~10 days of usage, it seems to be operating within specs. I was able to hook up an old raspberry pi (3b) to monitor the stats via this project, so that was a free solution vs their $100 wifi module.

Overall, it was a frustrating out of the box experience, but now that I've solved/understand the initial hiccups, I'll probably keep it. ?‍

 

[MichaelK]

What loads has it demonstrated it can handle? Have you plugged in the frig, or washer, or other motorized products that have a significant startup surge? Try plugging in a big circular saw and see what happens. Resistive loads like a toaster or electric frying pan should be easy to run. An air compressor might show problems?