EQUIPMENT:
Test kits for ammonia, nitrate, PH, alkalinity, minimum. Phosphates maybe, and Calcium if you're keeping corals.
A Refractometer for testing salinity.I bought mine off of ebay, it's the same kind sold by marine depot and most other places for twice more.
An RO/DI unit for making pure water. filterguys makes great units for a decent budget.
Eheim Jager heaters.
Koralia or Sicce voyager powerheads. Or maxi jets if you're on a budget. (ultra reliable!)
If you're going with a sump, you'll need a return pump and hang-off-back overflow. Mag drives are cheap and reliable pumps, but loud, while eheims are extremely quiet, but expensive. Tunze just came out with a couple of pumps which are supposed to be really good. As for an overflow, an eshopps overflow is just fine, or lifereef if you have the money. Glass-holes if you want to drill your tank and want to plumb PVC. At the very least, I recommend a HOB overflow and sump setup. This way, your tank *always* looks full, no matter how much water evaporates, and the nasty crap that sits on the surface of your tank will never be there. Then you just have to keep an eye on your return chamber for evaporation.
With a 30g tank, if you keep up with your water changes, you probably won't need a protein skimmer. Reef octopus' seem to be the board favorites. I have a bubble magus which is awesome.
Something to read temperature. I have a 'little time and temp' digital one I bought at petco, works excellent.
A light timer, to control when your lights come on.
A mixing bucket for water. A couple of nets, tongs, tweezers, and a turkey baster. A *good* powerstrip, and you might want to change your wall outlet into a GFCI outlet, or get a portable GFCI outlet.
A magfloat or one of the algae free pirahna / shark floats for wiping algae.
Several feet of 1/4" hosing, for starting siphons, acclimating animals, etc.
And depending on what you're keeping, a good lighting system. This can be another thread by itself. T5's should be the minimum. There are many advantages to T5's and no drawbacks, and depending on how many you put over your tank, you can keep corals and anemones. Since you want an anemone, you'll need strong lighting. Probably 6 T5's. If you want a really sexy shimmer, go metal halide or LED. Metal Halides pack a ton of heat and use a lot of watts, LEDS uses very little watts and produces no heat, but are very expensive. Since you have a small tank, I'd push for a good LED setup if you can afford it. Either an ecoxotic, or aqua illuminations setup.
That should just about cover most of your needs. I'm sure I forgot something crucial. :mrgreen:
:sfish::sfish::sfish::sfish::sfish::sfish::sfish::sfish::sfish::sfish:
Now, for LUXURIES. Stuff that's awesome but you don't need.
Vortech MP10 powerhead. Has wavemaker functions built in and you only need one.
A reef controller, such as an apex or reefkeeper lite. You can buy probes for these that read your ph, salinity, and temperature, that can send you updates to your cell phone, control your pumps, lights, etc.
An auto-top off system, such as the tunze osmolator, or any of the switch based ones which are more affordable. Allows you to keep a container of freshwater on the side, and makes it so you don't have to top off your tank, (or sump, if you have one) each day.
