softened or hard water

right tangster, so would it be better to use a water softner with a reef tank?

 

There is also contribution from GH (general hardness) that sums up all kinds of calcium salts.

It always depends on the quality of your tap water and performance of your water softener! In principle you would like to get rid of chlorine (in every form), silica, trace amounts of phosphates and heavy metals from your water. The trick with softener is removal of above + partial removal of calcium and magnesium salts. It's important that some of these ions are present. Otherwise you end up with RO/DI like water that should not be consumed. It's not tasty at all and definitely not healthy!

 

a water softener uses salt to soften the water. wonder if those salts are good or bad for a reef

 

The whole dKH thing confuses me. I think I will start a post to ask abotu it elsewhere...