DigiQ vs Flame Boss?

They are all decent and depends on wants/expectation IE WiFi reporting etc etc...Why was last nights cook almost ruined? A pit controller does not cure things that may have caused a failure.

I have a Stoked, like that its expandable, but I find myself not using any of the features anymore, I set it and forget it 

I've had my DigiQ for about 7 years. The only thing I've ever used it for is all night butt cooks, never for short cooks like ribs. I'm not all that comfortable going to sleep with a fire burning outside anyway so it hasn't seen a lot of use, but it has worked well. 

However, I haven't used it at all since my first turbo cook! Put a 7-8 lb butt on at 320° at 9-10 AM and it's ready by dinner time. Easy to walk outside from time to time and make sure things are on track (they almost always are). Even before turbo cooks, I never left the house when egging so I never felt the need for wifi. 

Try a turbo cook during the day.You might decide you don't really need a crutch.

Flameboss hands down.  The Guru is 10 y/o technology with a 4 character calculator screen.  FlameBoss is 2018/today's technology with a 32 character backlit screen (no scrolling).  When I say "today" I mean that it updates the firmware automatically, free of charge.....a lot of companies will charge you to upload the newest program to an electronic device (my radar detector, GPS, etc.)  The wifi is worth every penny.  You may not think you need it now, but once you use the app or webpage, you're really going to like the graphs and ability to monitor/control remotely.  You still won't need it, but you don't need a BGE either--both just damn nice to have.

I would recommend spending the extra money on the 300 though.  There are some improvements to the newer unit that are advertised and "under the hood", that you may benefit from (or wish you had) in the future.

FWIW, If I were to replace my Stoker, I would buy a Smobot. 

Flame Boss  has great customer service, had a issue and contacted them , they offered to force an upgrade to my unit. I chose to wait until the next use, upgrade on power up no more glitch. They have always been very responsive to any and all questions or concerns. I think that is worth a few bucks !

Hungry Joe said:

I think they are similar but I went with the newer Guru because I liked having the ability to close the damper as opposed to always being wide open on the FB. The FB has a variable speed fan and the Guru is single speed. Other then that I think they are close.

Does anyone know if the Guru fan would work on the FB?

The Guru has the dampered adapter because it has a 10 CFM single speed fan, and .....
The FB does NOT need the damper because it has a 6.5 CFM variable speed fan.

It doesn't have a damper, because they designed it not to need the damper--the unit has the logic to control this.  6.5 CFM is running at 10-20% is a lot different than 10 CFM at 100%

Having the 1/2" square open in the draft door "wide open" does not change anything because the air has nowhere to go if the daisy wheel is closed or nearly closed.  Closing the little hole further may be a bad idea because if the fan has to ramp up maintain temp after a lid open or other event, it may not have the flow to feed the fire if you start mechanically blocking it.  Again, use as designed.  

The guru fan will work with the FB, but remember the FB learns are it goes.  If you start screwing with the damper mid cook, you're only going to confuse it.  The guru fan is also a higher CFM, so keep that in mind too.  The stock FB fan works great, no real reason to use a Guru fan unless you already have all the hardware or need it for an adapter for a different smoker that the FB kamado or universal kits do not fit.  Even in that case, you can probably fabricate something a lot cheaper than spending the money on their fan and adapter.

baychilla said:

Much as Im not a fan of firmware with a hard lock for updates (my gen 1 cyberQ) I would buy another one before a flame boss.  Why?  I've never seen a thread where any Guru product needed to be opened up and soldered back together (and apparently that isn't a novel issue with the flameboss).

That was an issue with the 200's, it's been fixed on the 300's.  It's not like they told their customers to pack sand either......they sent a NEW unit to the customer first, with a prepaid label to send back the old one.

As a former Guru dealer, I can tell it's night and day when it comes to customer/dealer support.  Exact opposite--you pay to send the unit to them, then wait a week and they'd send it back *if* it was determined it was warranty.

Why knock a company over ONE acknowledged problem.....they fixed the existing units for free and corrected the new units.  Glad you like your CyberQ, but you have ZERO experience with a FB and didn't need to take a swipe at them over a corrected issue. 

I got a flameboss 300 in January and couldn’t be happier with my purchase. I’ve done an overnight brisket and pork shoulder on it so far and haven’t had any issues at all. Having to run out to the store or running errands isn’t an issue at all since I can monitor and change the pit temp and meat probe from my phone. 

Dont know much about any of the other temp controllers but the Flameboss is well worth the cost just due to the amount of sleep I gain on low and slow cooks.

It's not a fan based controller, but have you given any consideration towards SMOBOT?  I love mine!  It's a little cheaper than the Flameboss.  I believe they got their start here on this forum.  You can search for some old posts to see the history.

www.smobot.com

get the FlameBoss from @stlcharcoal. It will be the lowest priced among all retailers. Also FlameBoss just sent me a brand new unit when the fan input port of my FB200 broke. I've owned this FB200 for more han 2 years now .. excellent customer service from the greatest state in the Union .. FL :-)

I have the FB, I like the variable speed fan, I don't want to have to figure out how much of the damper I need to keep open for different type of cooks.  I like the graphs on the FB, I like that I can connect it to my WIFI and sit inside with my ipad and see exactly what going on whiles watching TV, or lying in bed.  I like how one screen shows both meat and grill temp.

I can chime in one more time and say that Guru had great customer service. I contacted them a few times after getting my first unit, and several times afterwards; once again when the one I had malfunctioned. Each time I contacted them I got a response back within an hour and got a new unit sent out the very day we confirmed there was a problem. I also noted in the two cooks I recently did with my new unit that while my fan speed is considered not variable, my controller tells me what % of fan use is, and I saw it deviate from 40% to 100% so there is some degree of fan control. I have never seen let alone use any other controller but I am really happy with my Guru as well as the customer support.