Over the water. It comes with brackets that hold the lights about a half inch over the rim. I have a glass lid though. I move it when I'm doing a water change so that I have light to work by when I'm doing that. I have never noticed any change in color (unless I was messing around with it myself).@sharkweek178 what do you think of the Hygger? How long have you had it and is the unit directly over water? I noticed today that the output on my main tank is a bit variable (visibly changed colour several times while I was watching). Its 7 years old so I'm not upset about it. Light is part of the lid so it will be directly above the water...
Options are
Currently leaning towards the Hygger unless someone says its a bad idea. Not paying twice the price to be forced to use a mobile app when all I am going to do is set it and forget it. Its for the tank in my signature.
- new Aqua One replacement @ £200 - timer only no intensity control, and the timer is only on / off. Plants and fish have been thriving and I do have an external Nicrew controller for the intensity.
- Aquasky 2. £130 and I need to use their app, but I know it will be waterproof
- Hygger @£65 - does all I need and includes the controller. Blurb on Amazon says I can place directly over water and no reviews that contradict this. Similar output to the Aquasky
- Nicrew @£47. Nicrew recommends not to place directly over water and several reviews back this up. Suppose I could use silicone and I already have the controller - but that's still a faff...
There's a lot of room to customize the lighting time and intensity. I start at 20% and work up to 50% at the highest and then back down over the course of the day. It used to be a little brighter but I was getting algae so I cut the intensity. Plus I have neon tetra so I want the lighting to be a little dimmer. Once you get the hang of it, it's easy to set. My plants are doing well. The fish and plants are the bottom line and I think it does well by them.
