Unboxing the Orphek Atlantik Compact

It’s unboxing time once again, with our newest toy to play with being the Atlatik Compact WiFi LED fixture from Orphek. This compact light is essentially a shorter version of the popular Orphek Atlantik, offering the same spectrum and efficience but packaged in a smaller light. It sports a whopping 42 emitters broken down into 8 different colors and spread across four channels of control. It has wireless capabilities built-in, allowing users to control each of those color channels via any Android powered device running the Orphek app.

As for the colors offered in the fixture, Orphek uses 18000K white, 450nm blue, 470nm blue, 420nm – 6000K dual chip, 410nm – 18000K dual chip, 395nm – 6000K dual chip, and wide spectrum red. Of this offering a total of twelve LEDs are of the dual chip variety, a not too common feature of aquaruim LED lighting but one that opens up all sorts of color blending possibilites.

Speaking of all the possibilities, with the use of the Orphek app and an Android device (tablet or phone), each of the channels on the Atlantik Compact can be individually controlled. The light features eight pre-installed programs, full dimmin capacity on all channels, the ability to create and store custom lighting programs, elaborate dawn-to-dusk programs, cloud simulator programs, and the ability to control up to 252 Atlantik fixtures simultaneously. Other benefits associated with the fixture and its software are the face that each light fixture is assigned its own IP address, aquariums can be located in different areas as long as they are in the range of the wireless router, and a built-in calendar lets users store up to eight programs per month. Man that seems like a mouthful. Unfortunately, there is no iOS version of the app, which is a disappointment since that’s all we use. We really hope that changes in the near future, but if you’re in a situation like us, Orphek does have a nifty Android tablet they can include in your purchase.

As for our thoughts on the Atlantik Compact…much like any Orphek fixture, the Compact sports a really sleek design that sets the LEDs behind a clear acrylic cover and wrapped in a white acrylic housing accented with stylish metal accessories. These accessories include the hanging bracketry and the metal surround that runs down all sides of the light. There is no large driver/timer box that was saw on the PR-156 fixtures, since all of that control is now handled wirelessly. A great move for Orphek, no doubt, as it really cuts down on the amount of large hardware to run the light.

Regarding the light output of the Atlantik Compact, the one thing about the Orphek fixtures is they are ridiculously bright. Thank goodness for the added dimmability. When the light first arrived, I decided to play a little joke on my wife. So, I removed the lid from the 12-gallon nano aquarium that sits on my kitchen counter and set the Atlantik Compact directly on top of it and turned it on. She walked by, squinted her eyes, and commented that it was just too bright. After all, it was competing with the stock lighting from a JBJ LED Nano-cube, which are perfectly suitable for maintaining coral growth but are obviously not all that bright. I informed her of the prank, not wanting to stay on the couch (I kid, I never have to sleep on the couch), and proceeded to give the light a good once over before finding the next aquarium over which it would stay.

Unfortunately, we haven’t gotten the opportunity to play with the adjustable settings and the Orphek app. I’m an Apple fanboy, and apparently just about everyone in my immediate aquarium keeping circle is too. But, we will be adding to the review with an in-depth look at thsoe capabilities very shortly, which will include some video footage of the app, how the light looks, and all the other juicy details of the light.