how many people use beersmith?

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NIZZLE

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Just started using this program so I'm not entirely sure how to use all of it's functions seems to be good software from what I can tell or is there a better program out there?
 
Beersmith is the gold standard. Take some time to get your equipment profile right, and the program will be invaluable for you.
 
It is a phenomenal program for building your own recipes. As stated above it will take some time to dial in your equipment (3+Brews) and you specs will change with outdoor temp if you happen to brew outside.

It is also a great tool if you are interested in fitting a style for a competition.
 
I wouldn't be half the brewer I am today without it. It is a great program for designing your own recipes and executing other people's recipes on your system.
 
Love it! I spend as much time messing around, making imaginary beers as I do brewing.
 
I like the Beersmith software as well. Easy to get started with and depth when you want to do more. The cloud feature is also great, to push your recipe up on the web for your brewing friends to look at. The recipe is stored in XML format so I can easily read in my recipes to the software I use to control my brewing equipment.

And, for software nerds, it runs on Linux!
 
I do. I used it for the 21 days of the trial period and when the trial ran out I wanted to play around with designing some beers. Without beersmith I was totally lost. It's totally possible to do the math on paper using the basic formulas you can find in How to Brew but come on, it's 2013. I'm not using pencil and paper to do math when I have this laptop.

My only regret was that I didn't know one of the vendors here on HBT has it for a discounted price. I could have saved 7 or 8 bucks.
 
I'm also a big fan. I have a folder just for crazy brew ideas... It makes it so simple to construct a workable recipe and document what you've done. Also, if you find out you're out of your typical bittering hop as you come up to a boil it only takes 5 sec to calculate how much to sub for another hop.
 
Does it estimate mash pH based on water profile and grain bill? I got beer alchemy and it doesn't; kinda regretting it...
 
Does it estimate mash pH based on water profile and grain bill? I got beer alchemy and it doesn't; kinda regretting it...

No. However, there are other calculators that will... I like EZ Water Calculator (free downloadable Excel spreadsheet).
 
Do yourself a favor and watch all of their videos on using it a couple of times. Those really helped me set up my equipment and get a solid understanding of the program. Am still learning new things on it, but absolutely love it.
 
Outstanding program. Money well spent, IMO.

It's great for recipe formulation, of course, but it's also got little applet tools for most brewday calculations. Once it knows your equipment well enough it will almost scare you how close it gets with things like sparge water temps.

-Rich
 
I've got only 10 batches under my belt and about the cross over to AG. Is it too soon to explore an app like this? It's my thinking that if I start it early it may benefit me when I really need it later.

If you had it your way would you have tried this early on in your brew life?
 
I did try it early in my brew life, right before my first ag batch. I believe it has made ALL the difference!
 
I've been using BeerSmith for the last year and a half and found it to be invaluable in designing recipes, tracking brews and results. Just to back up what people have said already, take the time to watch the videos on setting up your equipment and mash profiles. Then change the profiles provided to match what you do during your brew day. A good number of people who have problems rely too much on the stock profiles provided as being 'how they should do things' instead of making the program match what you actually do.

It certainly saves time over hand cranking numbers for small recipe changes....
 
I've got only 10 batches under my belt and about the cross over to AG. Is it too soon to explore an app like this? It's my thinking that if I start it early it may benefit me when I really need it later.

If you had it your way would you have tried this early on in your brew life?

Similar question...

I'm just starting out (just did my first batch - 5 gal full boil extract kit from LHBS). I plan on sticking with 5 gal extract for a while and perfecting my technique before switching to All Grain. Is beersmith worth it when not doing AG?
 
Similar question...



I'm just starting out (just did my first batch - 5 gal full boil extract kit from LHBS). I plan on sticking with 5 gal extract for a while and perfecting my technique before switching to All Grain. Is beersmith worth it when not doing AG?


It's worth it if you want to design your own recipes. If you're brewing kits, you can get along fine without it.
 
I have BeerSmith 2 for my iPhone, do I need to delete the preset equipment profiles to leave the one profile for my system? How do I select the equipment profile that I am using?
 
Just a great program. Invaluable for dialing in IBUs among a zillion other things.
 
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