which is better, a hang on back filter or a canister filter? the ones on ebay im looking at on ebay are ending soon and i want to know. the HOB filter could go up to 300gph, the canister filter 125gph but it seems like the canister has more filter area.

im really confused. someone tell me the answer

thanks

I prefer the HOB filters because they are easier to maintain, where a canister usually has to be partially disassembled in order to clean it. As far as which one to go with (considering the flow rate), it would depend on how big your tank is and how many fish you have in it. The hob could handle a 30 gallon and the canister could handle up to 12 gallons. That's assuming you would be using one filter on your tank.

ic. well i bidding on the 300gph HOB one. i have a 15 gal tank and want to upgrade it to a 20. so i think its more than enough.

but besides maintenance, are there advantages of canister filter? i mean, theres got to be a reason for their price.

anyways, i got myself an aquaclear 300/70 filter off ebay! im really pleased with it! im glad i bought it! its a bit over kill for my tank. its 15 gal and the flow rate is 300gph, but the water turbulance dont seem to bother the fish. i could see a lot more crap being sucked into the filter!

and the best thing is, i could empty a whole box of biomax and stillll have room for more! super bio filtration here i come! just waiting for those babies to turn brown!

When I added Biomax to the media baskets on my Emperor (established tank), it took about a month for the biobugs to start turning the cylinders brown. IMO, you can never have too much biomedia.

I adopt both canister and hang-on but I would opt for a canister over any other kind of filtration. They hold much more media which houses more good bacteria. This in turn means the biological filtration (ie. water parameters) is much better

that is true, but im happy with what i have so far! the new filter is 3 times larger than my old one. im waiting for the biomax to be covered in brown crap...i could see signs of brown on them right now