The fake stuff is ok. But gotta say with all the money being spent should have gone real. It's not just hte color guys.. it's the motion of the corals with the water flow. It moves, sways. Even the SPS (Hard Corals) soft mouths that come out and pulse and sway.
Trust me it's VERY easy to tell apart, VERY VERY VERY easy. Just go to a LFS and hold plastic parts next to the real stuff.. looks like a yugo IMO.
Awesome tanks eveything else is great.. just should have topped it off and made the tank a 10 out of 10. Not to mention how the coral GLOWS under the right lighting. No paint in the world can even come close