I just got it through my head after years, that I should start taking a good multi vitamin. I was going to go to gnc and get the mega man sport, which is closest to berokka (sp?) that i used to take all the time that you cant really buy in the states or whatever. I am on a limited budget so i bought equate brand multi. It seems to have everything your centrum and everything and in the same qty's although this seems to be about half if not more below what something from gnc uses. Could, should i double up on the equate? Should I switch to a Major brand? What do yall take? The equate is like 6 bucks for 200 tablets, i like that price, would you expect a huge difference in cheap and expensive vitamins? Thanks guys.

If you're really concerned about your health, trade in a fast food trip, a movie, or something else and invest in the real thing. The cheaper vitamins are cheap for a reason. Don't trust the labels - there are plenty of independent lab reports you can Google that show the majority of manufacturers don't actually put in the bottle what they claim. They're often inferior quality and more often than not in doses and forms that are harmful in the long run.

Do yourself a favor and invest in a good, quality, pharmaceutical grade or at least reputable brand like GNC, Universal, or Beverly. You might pay $10 - $20 for a supply but it's well worth the investment.

It's sort of like saying, "Hey, I found out I can buy a can of gasoline for just $1/gallon - sure, it's mixed with water, but it's cheaper." Apples to apples, if you truly can't afford it then they are certainly better than nothing but you'll receive more value in my opinion from the better brands. I wouldn't double on any cheap multivitamin because that's doubling the contaminants.

Here's a great article ... it shows that while we know from the label that Centrum's vitamin contains barely anything (it's based on the RDA, which is the minimum for survival and a far cry from the optimum for best health) it at least adheres to label claims:

http://www.consumerhealthjournal.com/articles/2007/10-vitamin-contents.html

But the part to be disturbed about is that over half of the ones sampled "were either unable to be digested properly, contained largely different amounts of nutrients than the label claimed, or were contaminated with lead."

Jeremy

I just got it through my head after years, that I should start taking a good multi vitamin. I was going to go to gnc and get the mega man sport, which is closest to berokka (sp?) that i used to take all the time that you cant really buy in the states or whatever. I am on a limited budget so i bought equate brand multi. It seems to have everything your centrum and everything and in the same qty's although this seems to be about half if not more below what something from gnc uses. Could, should i double up on the equate? Should I switch to a Major brand? What do yall take? The equate is like 6 bucks for 200 tablets, i like that price, would you expect a huge difference in cheap and expensive vitamins? Thanks guys.

thanks I appreciate it. I guess vitamins are something I have just really been to lazy to look up, with all my research and reading on weight training, proper diet and the like. I think ill hit up the real vitamin places like the vitamin shoppe, they seem to be cheaper than gnc. Just a general good quality multi vitamin should be great right?
thanks again

I've heard alot of good things about unversal animal pack. Would this be considered a decent multi by good standards? After reading the ingredients the thing that caught my eye is the amt of pills. 11 ! Is this normal?

It's normal to take quite a few ... the USANA vitamins I take come in packs with six and I take one pack in the AM and one in the PM. Any of the others are similar. It seems a lot of the higher quality ones are distributed through MLM (network marketing) but I've found a few outside of that which are high quality and have been tested a bit and came out with good marks ... these include Beverly (Animal Pak, Ultra 4) and Universal as well as the GNC line. Jarrow is another reputable company and ISP Nutrition has a good multi as well.

Jeremy

I've heard alot of good things about unversal animal pack. Would this be considered a decent multi by good standards? After reading the ingredients the thing that caught my eye is the amt of pills. 11 ! Is this normal?