Trying bleach and borax for the first time

[Watermom]

How do i find out if someone commented without having to hunt my original post?

You can go to 'settings' in the upper right hand corner and then 'general settings.' On that page there is a place to subscribe to a particular thread and you can set it to send you an email when a new post is made in the thread.

True confessions...I am using the test strips, but water is beautiful and clear for 2 months. So, we are good to go. What is the significance of the other more complicated kits?

With test strips you cannot get an accurate reading for most values. On chlorine, they can tell you if you do have chlorine or don't but not really what the level is. On CYA, they can't give you anywhere near the accurate reading and if you don't know your CYA, then you may not be chlorinating at the right level and you risk an algae bloom. If you have high CYA and need to run higher than usual chlorine readings, (see the Best Guess Chlorine Chart in my signature below), you can't test the chlorine with test strips because first of all they can't test that high and secondly they will bleach out. With the Taylor FAS-DPD test, you can test chlorine levels up to about 50. Test strips cannot test for CC which is an important thing to know when you are trying to determine what is going on in a pool that is having water issues of some sort.