Well you decide.....

I have always been VERY happy with Marineland's bio-wheel filters. I've only had the Penguin series so far, but they've been great (provided that they have the right gph for goldies!!...). I'm planning to get an Emperor 400... or two... when I upgrade my tank.

Eheims and Marineland's

eheim

i like hagen aquaclear for hob filters and rena xp's for canister's

Jebao all the way!!!!!

Slugger

i have two hagen aquaclears now

I love my emperors! I'm still waiting for my 400 to collect enough bacteria so I can take off the one that came with the tank and add another 400.

A wet/dry sump system.

MarineLands. I have a Penguin Biowheel 330 and a HOT canister. Both work excellent. But I am saving for an Emperor 400. I have a 55 gallon and am just in the range of 10x per hour.

aquaclears!!!!

Hands down, My favs are penguin and eheims! I REALLY like the canisters tht eheim makes and the bio-wheel filters are by far the cheapest, most effective and reliable filters on the market.

I am in the market for a new hob filter for a tank that is right outside my bedroom, so I want it to be quiet. Which filter do you folks think is the quietest?

I have heard RAVE reviews about the new Penguin bio-wheel series. They've made the return slide dip into the water further so the water doesn't splash as much. The bio-wheels are 35% larger and theres the option for buying extra media baskets to slide into an extra filter cartridge slot. This is great because the water is forced to go through the media-basket rather than the basket sitting there passively like the old 330's did. The lids have also been designed so that the splashing water on the bio-wheels is silenced as well. Not to mention that the new lid keeps water from getting on/around the lid and hardwater deposits forming.

They come in 100gph, 150gph, 200gph and 350gph.

Tthey've strengthened my opinion that they are the best with the new design features.


So, whatcha got in this tank and how big is it?

It is my 66 gallon tank that has 4 medium sized goldfish in it. I am currently running three hob filters on it lol! I would keep the AquaClear 300 and I want to add another filter to replace the two small ones that I have running along with the AquaClear.

I sooo like talking shop about filters and stuff!

Here's a link to the media baskets for the 350 or the old 330's: Click here and scroll to the last item on the page


Anyway, here's a link to bigalsonline and their 350's. To get a 350 for less than 30 bucks is quite the deal too! Penguin 350

This might be a little overboard but, theres a way that you can stretch the life of your filterpads for the penguin line of filters to 3-4 months. You only need a boxcutter and a steady hand. Cut out the little ribs on the backside of the plastic frame of the cartridge. Make sure you dont press hard enough to cut through the floss underneath. It might take an hour to do all six pads but once your done, its a breeze. It'll look like this when its done:
[attachmentid=6839]

Once your bio-wheels are getting nice and gunked up (and your media baskets are well colonized), you can spray the heck out of the cartridge floss (handheld showerhead on pulse or a hose sprayer, etc) from both sides and get 95% of the stuff that builds up. You should easily be able to stretch a 6 pack of filter cartridges into a year of use with this method.

I run two 330's on a 55 gallon and have never, ever had a spike due to cartridge cleaning with this method. I added it up and I'm saving something like 150 dollars a year!

I have a couple of old Whisper filters that I use quilt batting on the plastic frames rather than buy the biobags, so I would certainly use your method to save money.

I am in Canada, so I will take a look at the Big Al's near me and see if they have the new Penguin line in stock.

Thanks, toothless

Wow, a 350 for under 30 bucks? My lfs sells 330s for 70$!! Does that website have any emperor 280s? Are those good filters too?

Phreno,

Click on the link I provided above and go to "filters" then click on power filters at the top of that page. You should see a nice looooong list of different filters for VERY cheap. Heck, the 330's are actually less than 20 bucks now. The new 350's are the ones that are less than 30.........


I wonder if the canadian prices are comparable to ours?

I just checked bigalscanada and it seems the 350 goes for 53.99!

At the current rate of exchange.......thats $42.90 US.

So, thats not too bad. It's twenty bucks more but I'll betcha it's still going to be $70 canadian in your local fish shops............

That's awesome. How's the shipping costs?

just to put my two cent in, i have had the best expirience with a fluval 304 easy canister to maintain, lost of compartments, easy to store no noise, and ever since i have had this canister my little friends are happy.... but thats my opinion, so if you have the chance to try one, go for it...

Canadian prices for fish stuff are always higher, sometimes twice as high. I have never been able to figure that out, since it doesn't reflect the current exchange rate. So, the Big Al's price is a good one , well, all things considered it is a good one

IMO, the best filter is the penguin bio-wheel filters.

Woohoo! I picked the Koko-approved filter without even realizing it! Go me!

FTB