I back up my herpstat 4 but I often question if it is needed with the features build in. the same could be said about the 1. I would never try to talk one out of a failsafe as I feel it is important to take every measure to protect the animals in my care. But with the safety features of the herpstat 1 (+) it does call it into question. I find the VE series disappointing personally, with all the features available on the competitors (helix, ecozone, herpstat, and herpkeeper) they choose to re build the simplest and oldest model (helix), it feels like a step backwards we went from great features to no features.