what do you personally think is a better filter? what is better? the canister or a hob filter? i have an undergravel filter with 2 power heads and a penguin 350 hanging on my 55 gallon tank. it does the job pretty good, but was wondering if the canister filter is more cost efficient and does a better job? thanks for the responses in advance!

i personaly KNOW canisters are better ......... depending on the one you get of course ... LOL

I dont know about HOB's but canisters are excellent filters

hob are good for smaller tanks but for larger tanks a canister is definately the way to go1

This is something I have wondered myself. ...but why are canister filters better? better flow? less eneregy usage? filter replacement and efficiency?

I haven't used a canister filter before but I'm thinking about it since it seems to be the superior method according to most.

HOB's are really best suited for smaller tanks. All my tanks 75g and below (with the exception of my 72g tank with which i use a canister) have HOB filters. The reason is simple- Can you imagine putting a FX5 on a 10g? LOL. anyways, i use canisters on all my large tanks and my saltwater tanks.

mrziggz wrote:



your right on a few counts. canisters are a better choice on larger tanks because they can hold more media than a hob. since they hold more media they dont have to have the water flow that is required by an hob and therefore become more efficient and use less energy. the same principle applies to the differences between sumps and canisters.

basically it come down to the application of the filter that will determine which system is best.

X2..... the size of the tank is always being considered when
deciding about the filter size and type.

im totally canister filter fan i run one on my o tank and i run one on my planted tank i think the marienland cannisters are so beyond the best, water has to pass all media before going back to the tank. just like a sump is great on 100+ tanks.

from my point of view canisters are much better for medium (100g+) size tanks with large messy fish. for very large tanks(200g+) sumps are the answer, a 50g tank isn't really large or medium so the filters you have probably serve well. the only way to really know is to weight up a few things.

1 are your current filters removing all the ammonia and nitrites.(water test)
2 how often are you cleaning the current filters.( if every month its too much work)
3 dose the water look free of particles.

These would be my main questions. if you are happy with the way the system is working there may not be any reason to change and wast money. as for the electric cost i leave that up to you to work out, most canisters use about 30-50watt/hr, i think but i will probably be put right now)))).

I only recently switched to canister with the new tank, and so far it seems to be a whole lot better, and easier to live with.

Not only is my water clearer, and maintaining the filter is dead easy.

even though my main filtration is done by canister or sump, i still use hobs on all my tanks.
on my setups the purpose of the hobs though is strickly a mechanical filtration role. because of the high flow rates i find them efficient in keeping the water clear. all i do is load them with sponge and fiberfloss and generally speaking my tanks stay clear.