Funny story, I have a Herpstat, a few iPowers, a Jumpstart, and a couple Zillas back from when I had no idea what I was doing. The only thermostat I've had problems with so far is the Herpstat. I used it in a homemade styrofoam box incubator and got an error a few weeks into incubation. The heat turned off and the temp dropped to room temperature for a couple days. I lost two eggs and had one kinked hatchling that died in egg, but the other five eggs hatched fine.
Later on (after a google search for the error) I learned that It's not a good idea to let the probe get too wet, or to put it near other cords. Oops. Maybe that should have been obvious, but I had no idea. Since it was difficult to maintain steady temps in the tiny styrofoam box anyway, I made a new incubator out of a wine cooler and kept the probe out of the egg box and away from other cords. Problem solved. I used the Herpstat again and got no errors this time. Every egg in my second clutch hatched without issue. Six beautiful babies.
That said, none of the other thermostats I've used are nearly as accurate as the Herpstat. Proportional vs. on/off makes a big difference. And that's the main reason I used the Herpstat for the eggs. I didn't want fluctuating temps during incubation. None of my existing snakes seem to mind a 2-4 degree difference, but I still intend to switch entirely to Herpstats over time and phase the others out.
The big thing is that Herpstats turn the heat source off if something goes wrong. Cheap off/on models let the heat source blaze at full power if they fail. High temps have a much greater chance of injuring or killing snakes than temps that are too cold. I've heard of a few people over the years losing snakes to a cheap thermostat that malfunctioned. Usually it's the Zillas, but that might just be because they're readily available at most big box pet stores.
I've gotta admit though, out of all the "cheap" models I have, I like the Zillas the least. They're overpriced for what they are and it's hard to set correct temps with a dial. They also seem to fluctuate more than the iPowers and the Jumpstart. Digital displays are so much better. I kinda perfer the iPowers over the Jumpstart because they're been really consistent for me, but Herpstat rules them all. Haven't tried the Century, but it looks pretty similar to the iPower.
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