OMG... where do I start. You aquaclear fanboys are kind of rediculous in your blind loyalty to aquaclears. You guys see only what you want to see and don't see the flaws, its like a religion where you all hail the aquaclear as god of the HOB's! There's no thinking or room for improvment and any other option is or must be bad/wrong! If they made a true upgrade with the same design that cliped in to prevent floating/dealt with sand/ stronger less fragile housing/more secure motor housing clips you guys would still say the older aquaclears were the best because they worked for so long for you and your standards! To Plecostic your statments are made with absolutely NO research. If you go to amazon.com you can see that the retail suggested price is definitely higher on the Fluval C series! I think you may have mistaken your comparisons between the C4 and the aquaclear 110. The aquaclear 110 is a much larger model that pushes 500 gph and not comparable to the C4! The C4 is comparable to the aquaclear 70 in dimensions and gph as well as price... If they made a C5 then maybe we could consider a comparison between the aquaclear 110. The Aquaclear 70 is retailed at 78.99 and on sale for 34.99 while the Fluval C4 retails at 87.99 and is on sale for 39.47... As for your GPH info on the Fluval C4 it is listed EVERYWHERE at 264 gph. In response to 1974Pantera the comment about finding another hobby is unfounded. I have kept my "wet pets" for almost twenty years. Sure I lost a few fish when I first started and didnt know much (like most of us we weren't born knowing how to care for fish) but I have many fish that have been with me at least for the last 15 years and counting and they are large, happy, and healthy. I can't remeber the last time I had a fish die on me that wasn't way past there supposed listed lifespan... I really shouldn't have to rinse the sponge once a week or two to avoid a flood! That indicates a poor design flaw on the aquaclears and another definite reason why they arent the best/most perfect HOB on the market. For example when you buy a canister or any filter for that matter do you want to buy one that is desined to HAVE to be opened and cleaned once a week or every two weeks? I sure don't. I want to spend my hard earned money on something that I can TRULY rely on (even when I cant be bothered with it) and doesnt warn me it's time to clean with a FLOOD! On my 125 I got busy with LIFE and didn't have time to maintain my marineland penguins/emperors for over a YEAR! Just those so callled "stupid and ineffective" biowheels and regular replacable cartridges which I admit were really nasty and fell apart easily just rinsing them. NONE of the fish in that tank died of poor water quality (I still found time to change the water every once in a while). You make the aquaclears sound so easy to clean! NOT! You mean I have to weekly reach in the small area behind the tank and take out all the filter materials and clean them one by one! That would entail at least 3 aquaclears on my 125 with a ladder or step stool to help me reach. Then I have to take out two packets of things just to get to the sponge LOL! I am trying to make things easier on myself, after a while this would end up being a real pain/chore and I would really go find another hobby. People complain that the biowheel sucks because they gunk up and won't spin anymore. If I spent time cleaning them every week I would bet they would never stop spinning especially on the emperors. If you do your research it has shown that wet/dry biosystems are MUCH MUCH more effective at biological filtration than submerged - I mean they use that idea in waste water plants! Your not gonna find submerged biological systems similar to the one you are forced to deal with on the aquaclears in waste water plants (I can DIY submerged biological in just about any HOB - all the ones that I know of). I think after research you will find that aquaclears do a great if not one of the best jobs of mechanical filtration for a HOB filter (when frequently maintained) but gets absolutely KILLED in the biologial sense. Think about it what's more important great biologial filtration or mechanical. One makes the water seem clean and clear while the other actually makes the water safe for your fish to live in! 1974 Pantera must be someone afilitaed with aquaclears and bigals. Just to let YOU know they are still cheaper on Amazon.com at 58.95 with free shipping (even to Hawaii!) compared to 64.99 deal of the week at bigals. To JFT I have marineland brand HOB's that are 15years old or even older than that. It doesn't mean they are better than anyother filter out there. ALL HOB's last a looong time some are just better than others. I still have a Whisper that has lasted longer than 15 years - does that make whispers the best most reliable ones on the market? I have read aquaclears have a real problem with sand and will break if sand gets to the impeller. On some of my marinelands when I have had/found time to thourougly clean them I have found sand in the impeller housing and guess what? They still worked! Sure I have had broken/loud marinelands and whispers but from my research the aquaclears aren't bulletproof (in fact their shatter prone and not really thought out well enough) and they do have complaints with broken filters and on noise level (death hum of aquaclears) and "duds" just like any other brand of HOB on the market. To think about it, out of the many marineland HOB's I use/have used I only have two of them really broke on me (dud's) in my whole experience of fish keeping. That must speak for marineland LOL! Remember the fluval C4 is made by the same company as aquaclear-Hagen...I went by one of the best fish/pet stores on the island today and guess what I saw! Two aquaclear 110's! The sponges were both attempting to float up, one of them was really bad and they even had large pond rocks trying to hold that one down. With them floating up the one thing that they were great at (mechanical) was really poor. The water was dingy and cloudy with lots of floating debris but to be positive their fish still looked okay and healthy. On the bottom tank instead of an aquaclear they had a regular newer model penguin 350. The water filtered by the penguin 350 was the best out of/much much better of the three tanks in clarity (with dingy and old looking cartridges that gauranteed have been rinsed a few times)(the clarity was all I could judge without a test kit) and that tank had beautiful expensive large messy cichlids in it! The aquaclear tanks had fishes like clown loaches and large angelfish (and not particularly highly stocked)... Those fish have been in those tanks for a while too as I have noticed them for months as they are priced a bit expensive and didn't sell. Looking around the store and noticing their filters, they seem to be much more inclined to use marineland filters, as out of ALL the tanks only those two had aquaclears (they were also the dirtiest- brown and cloudy). It speaks leaps and bounds when you can actually see the aquaclear sponge floating up and rendering the mechanical almost useless. The tilting of the media in the aquaclears make the problem of water bypassing the media a HUGE problem. Then I get into the comparison between the noise level... All of the filters were quiet enough for my standards but upon putting an ear to the filters the Aquaclears were the LOUDEST! Making this slight grinding/humming noise. The Marineland that was on the bottom tank and all around were almost silent except one of them (a really old model) which made a comparable noise to the loudest aquaclear of the two. To BigFishMommy and importracer I thank you as those comments were very useful in my decision! To the others while not very helpful they have made me understand their are many closed minded people that arent really willing to look/experience/learn new things. To think about it the "others" were helpful in deciding NOT to buy an aquaclear as your extreme biases/lack of knowledge make the product seem less and less apealing. If you want to know I have decided on buying the C4's (too bad they dont make a C5 comparable to the 110 or even the marineland 350/400). As I have said I want to try something new as I KNOW that marineland makes a great, sound design, tank of a HOB (for fun since I got the cash and was even looking at getting an eheim or fluval canister. *leaning towards the largest eheim classic - less leaks/flood complaints). I can now look at the C4 as the upgraded Hagen brand HOB because it seems that all the problems I have with buying an aquaclear has been though out thorougly. What your comments and actaully seeing them at the petstore have actually done is influence me to NEVER buy an aquaclear. They are just aren't designed right. Even the fact that the water flows from bottom up (which I initially really liked), I now see as a true design flaw (floating media!!!!)or why else would the design the new Fluval C4 that way? You think when Hagen made the C4 they didnt think of using some of the designs of the aquaclear? Well they did they used what worked such as the adjustable flow but even that they fine tuned. The C4 is well thought out. The water goes through the mechanical is directed then to the bottom where the chemical is (in my case more substratpro/matrix) then flows up to just touch the bio. On top of that they have an integrated wet dry system and a cleaning reminder WITHOUT overflowing the filter on my floor and all over my stuff! I can't see why you guys can see that this makes for a much better filter except for blind loyalty/ignorance. Like importracer many people that use aquaclears only use them on their mechanical basis and they are/have to be suplemented with an extra biological filtration system. Sure you can load them with more biological material- but I can do that to just about ANY HOB filter.... Just because something works great for you doesnt mean there isn't someting better or there can't be room for improvment. Check out the reviews on youtube and think about it with OPEN minds.
