Tropical Dude;3010796; said:
Okay, maybe I was a bit harsh on the FX5 but I think Bio is priority over polished water. Then again, those sponges hold BB so...
I agree with you 100%. Of course I don't want nasty chunks floating in my water, but water quality is far more important than clarity. In all honesty, I don't care about a little bit of crud here or there- it makes the tank look more natural. So set up your tank to be easy to clean. There's a tough one. Use less gravel, or sand. Tough call.
My latest effort at the best of both worlds was to add a sponge prefilter to a powerhead. Now I have awesome biological capability with the sponge, and it holds a TON of crud, plus there's great water flow. You can buy a powerful powerhead dirt cheap to do this job, and you can add a micron filter instead of a sponge if you want truly clear water. I can't use HOB filters on my tank because of the lowered water level (gar & bichir in it), but those do wonders for mechanical filtration, too, and they're dirt cheap. So, go with the filter that will provide better biological services, then look into something cheap for mechanical. Or, be prepared to do water changes a lot more often.
Drs. Foster & Smith has great deals on Eheims right now, and PetSmart.com has a great deal on the 2213. Between those two places, Eheim Classics are now one of the cheapest filters on the market! They're only a couple bucks more than Renas, which have dubious reviews.
Another one to look at here is power usage. Don't just buy the cheapest filter to find out that it's twice the price to run compared to something else. Eheims are really efficient- I believe my 2217 uses 24 watts, or something close to that.
And one final thing here- I agree with the above comments about not trusting one filter. I would never trust one filter alone on a tank. Even if the filter is a true beast, there's always the chance of something happening. An impeller can break, o-rings leak, something can be dropped when you cleaning, whatever. But, I'm in the same situation you are- I don't have a ton of money. I'm a married college student and we're flat broke. So I went the cheap rout and added a sponge filter for $6. I have an extra sponge filter that floats around between tanks. If I ever lose a filter on one tank, I can put that sponge into that tank. Even if it's not great, it'll keep my fish alive. Eventually I'll replace it with something nicer. And the idea of the powerhead with the sponge pre-filter does the exact same thing, but a little better.
