Parameters Testing

[cds]

I wanted to post this as a question from a relatively new member. I thought water parameters are very important for
the cichilids so I bought a api freshwater test kit with drops and tubes and charts. I found that as i tested my nitrates seemed very high in almost all my tanks (5). I ran out of the nitrate testing drops so I bought a nutrifin Nitrate test kit. After testing all my tanks they are testing signifigantly lower then the api.
 1) which kit do I believe?
 2) is some of these parameters and testing and adjusting just snake oil to get us to buy buffers and test kits?
Thanks for all opinions

[Ron]

For both kits, did you make sure to do the "shake the &%$# out of it" steps? I had screwy readings for nitrate until I learned that should be done prior to adding the drops and then again to the test sample after adding them.

[cds]

yea, I did that part. Was thinking of suing api for carpaltunel from shaking that test