AquaticLife T5 HO or Marineland Reef LED, which one to buy?

Hi

I'm sort of new to the hobby. Today I finished building the furniture for my 55g tank. It will be a fish + reef tank. I read about everything else, but the lighting.

After searching on this forum I found two: Marineland Reef LED and AquaticLife T5 HO. Can you guys help me select which one is better. The cool night light is something that matters to me a lot. Please tell me also if one could be "made" better than the other if I changed bulbs or etc?

My tank is 21" in height. Please suggest other LED fixture that is better than the one I listed.

Thanks in advance.

 

what do you plan to keep as far as corals go, that is a big factor.

 

do a search for the marineland fixture..not long ago someone got one and posted reviews about how much he liked it and was surprised it was what it produced..so i would try the leds..if you want alot of sps i would get halides or super strong t5s..depends on tank depth too..

with ati bulbs and single reflectors on the t5s would do great prolly..but thats gonna be putting and extra 100$ in the fixture..

if those leds are what they say they are, then they will work great..just by going what the specs are on the site..and depends how deep your tank is..and im not sure if you can dim the leds, but you could get a controller and dim them and then have the moonlights with the blue leds on..a controller runs about 100$ and it does way more than controlling lights, you can change flow and monitor ph and temp and whatever else depending on what kind you buy..

 

Between those, I'd stay away from the Marineland, and I'm an LED believer all the way. That particular fixture is way behind the competitors at this stage, let alone a DIY fixture.

Check out out LED sponsors to find some much better choices in the LED world.

 

Tank is 21" in height.

I do not know technically as I'm new to this thing, but I want to buy a lighting fixture that would cover 90% of coral let's say (clams, and whatever is pretty and colorful).

This is good info, but it confuses me with the experience I have so far. This is the part that is new to me:

Does this mean moonlights and the blue leds are two different lights? Which light would the controller dim? The moonlights? I'm assuming the dimming of one type of light and having two at the same time creates a nice light?

Controlling temp and PH electronically would be cool.

 

I would choose the T5HO unit. You will want to replace the stock bulbs after 3 to 6 months with bulbs like Saints fan stated. The Marineland LED is about 2 generations behind the pure LED producing companies like Orphek and such.

 

Go with the t5's I have the 6 lamp version with the built in timer and I love it just replace the bulbs right away, they aren't the greatest go with ATI's made an enormous difference in my corals

 

Lighting Fixture.

If I go with t5's how much more electricity wise does t5 take over similar LED unit? And how often do you replace your bulbs on the t5, plus how much is the new set cost?

 

pretty sure clams would be in the top 10% of light demanding-ness (sp??).the T5s(6bulb single reflector) would be your best bet for cost effectiveness and color. many have the built in moonlights too. very easy to get a color you like and prolly wont need a chiller if you have central air.

LED would be a good forward thinking choice but there is very little long term evidence that they will keeps coral happy. price is also a consideration tho i have heard great things about diy kits. the marineland is not capable of maintaining coral.

 

hard to say wattage wise, i believe led is about twice as efficient as t5 or so the stats say.
bulbs should be changed once a 9months to a year and cost 20-30$ each.