Is the Aqualight Advanced Series HQI Metal Halide Fixture any good?

[CyberGuy]

Should I get the Aqualight Advanced Series HQI Metal Halide Fixture pictured below or Tek T5's?

I have a 40 gallon tank with dimension 24 inch length x 22.5 tall (height) and 18 inch wide.

http://a1272.g.akamai.net/7/1272/1121/20051026212538/www.drsfostersmith.com/images/Categoryimages/normal/p_22943_31330P.jpg



Several questions about the MH above:

1. Is the fan noisy?

2. Does it still produce a lot of heat even with the fan on?

3. Does it comsume a lot of electricty?

[newtophish]

I only know of one person who uses one of those and he really likes it. To try to answer your questions.

1. I did not notice any loud fan noise, but I was not paying much attention to it.

2. With the open top the heat produced did not effect the tank temp much.

3. I don't know.

HTH

[IndyReefMan]

It's an okay fixture but the UV shielding isn't very good (it's a semicircular glass shield that covers the bottom of the bulb only so substancial amounts of UVR still get reflected down into the tank). Coralife claims that their DE bulbs include UVR resistant properties and I never had any UV issues with their bulbs. But, when I changed to a 150W Phoenix 14,000K bulb, I had immediate bleaching problems even after carefully acclimating with screens for three weeks.

[CThomas609]

The corlife fixtures are ok IMO, however the bulbs = garbage

[Henry22]

I vote for T5s, they run alot cooler, and I heard its hard to get the HOT MH light to get where you want it, and it may leave the ends of the tank a bit dim.

[nosferatu51]

I have one and am pleased with it. That said, I just got my new 75 set up with 2 250 Aquamedics and there is a HUGE difference between them. Supposedly both are 10k bulbs, but I really like the coloration on the AMs better. That said, the Coralife has done good things for my 20L over the past 6 months or so and I have no complaints.
The fan is not that loud, but if it's in a quiet room you will hear the whirring noise. The light is pretty yellow for the 1st month or so which I found odd, but it's shaped up nicely now.
I'm curious about that UV warning....I have a frogspawn that has suddenly started closing up recently and he is about mid tank directly under the light....is he getting UV burned? (Not that it matters much I guess since he's moving into the 75 soon, but I thought I'd check since that light will be over my QT tank soon).

[IndyReefMan]

It's possible. Do you still run coralife bulbs in it? If so, I doubt that it is UV. Coralife claims that their bulbs have UV protection built in and this was confirmed to me by a Coralife Representative in an email that I received when I was trouble shooting the UV issue. But again, this only occured when I changed to a Phoenix 14,000K bulb. I never had problems with the Coralife bulbs and I ran their 20,000K and 10,000K bulbs in that fixture. I know that a lot of people are skeptical of Coralife's claims of built in UV protection (ELOS now claims to have a DE bulb with built-in UV protection as well). But, I saw the evidence first hand. So, either Coralife's claims are true, or their bulbs have such a low PAR output that there is just not much UV to begin with. I've never seen any studies done by Sanjay on their bulbs. Either way, beware running a different bulb in this fixture.