CURRENT USA 18-24" Inch White Full Spectrum Freshwater LED Aquarium Plant Light 10 15 20 25 Gallon | Satellite Plus RGB+ for Aquariums | Wireless 24 Hour Timer Remote Fish Tank Planted Lighting (4320)

This is a great fixture with many fun functions and add on options. I love the programming capabilities! I never turn anything on or off, it does it all!

Novelty, the quality of being new and unique. Does this apply to this product, or is this product actually useful? Let's find out.I originally evaluated this product last month. At that time, I was comparison-shopping (cross-shopping) this product with the Finnex Ray 2 DS. I liked both products, but eventually chose the Finnex because of its higher light output and the superior design of its fixture. I carefully compared the two fixtures prior to making my decisions. Fortunately, I had access to people who owned both brands. And while their tanks were different from what I have, the dimensions were close enough for me to clearly discern the characters of both lights.What I wrote down on my review of the Finnex Ray 2 DS still holds true today. And for that particular tank, were I choosing today, I would make the same choice. The Finnex simply had what I needed on that tank. Namely, to supply life-giving light energy to some very challenging plants like Dwarf Baby Tears, Needle Leaf Rotala, and Dwarf Hairgrass.However, I was also intrigued by the Current USA Freshwater LED +. So, when the opportunity came to set up another tank, I ordered it. Amazon delivered the package, I received, unpacked and installed. The Current now sits on top of a 30-inch tank, with adjustable legs extended from the 24" body of the fixture. The tank has one dwarf, flame gourami. No gravel. Yes, this tank is a work-in-process. The plan is to eventually populate this tank with Peacock Gudgeons.The fixture of the Current is not quite as nice as that of the Finnex. The black body and those bent-wire legs do not make an aesthetically pleasing appearance. It is clear that Current USA spent their money, or focused their money, on the product's ability to be controlled by a wireless remote (included) and its ability to change light colors. There are also some dynamic light effects, like flickering lightning. With the remote, you can change the color of the LEDS and adjust them to better enhance the colors of your fishes and plants. This fixture provides a lot of entertainment value. The remote is fun to use.This light fixture would be ideal to use in a tank that has only low-light plants like Anubia, Java Fern, and Marimo Balls. The light intensity is fairly low. If you wish to grow plants that require high light levels, this fixture would not be a good choice. That is, unless you want to buy two and run them together. This basically comes down to what you have in the tank. If you have plastic plants, then this fixture will do very nicely. On top of a non-planted tank full of rift lake cichlids, this would do just fine. And you can adjust the light to enhance the bright colors of the fish.I gave this product five stars. It was not designed to function in a system that require high levels of light. For that, you will need something with more intensity. But, for what it was designed to do, which is to provide a remote-controllable LED light fixture that has the ability to change the colors of its light output, it has succeeded.In terms of price, the Finnex was just a little bit more expensive. Both lights are a bargain. Depending on your needs, either one will serve you very well. Just know ahead of time what you need the light to do.I wanted to evaluate a "Build My LED" brand fixture, but could not find one. I have seen them before, and their housing is aesthetically superior to the other two products mentioned in this review. However, they are also quite a bit more expensive.Those novel features, like the lightning effects, do they benefit the fish? Probably not. Strictly for entertainment, I think. However, this middle-aged adult is not above having fun and cycling through the available lighting effects on this fixture. So, is it simply novelty or is it practically useful? You will have to judge that for yourself.One little bit of advice: If you are planning to use this for a 30-inch tank with plants, try to get the next larger size.UPDATE (Feb. 18, 2014): The light intensity is less than I had originally thought. This fixture is being used on a 30-inch, 20-gallon tank. My opinion, after having in the tank for over a week, is that the light output will only be enough for this combination if the plants are truly of the low-light requirement variety. An example of the type of plant that can grow well under this light, on a tank of this size, is the Anubia species. I am considering purchasing a second unit in order to be able to grow a wider variety of plants. This would become an expensive set-up, for a 20-gallon tank.

Great light easy to set up

Mostly I really like this light bar, it's very slim and unobtrusive and I love the adjustable colors which is an extremely important feature to me. It took me a while to get used to the missing gigantic light hood I used to have for my florescent bulbs, but now that I've had it a few weeks, it really looks amazing to me. And running cool so no fan is needed is fantastic, I used to have to run my fish light during the day when I wasn't home because the fan was so loud, but I can have this one on any time I want.It's come up in a lot of reviews that it's not bright enough, but I find the light level to be perfect for my 48" long, 20" deep aquarium (without plants). For a larger aquarium it might not be sufficient. But that's just for fish viewing, if I had live plants I would probably need two of these to supply enough light for them.Flicker effect--I suspect this issue is true of all LED lights so this isn't necessarily specific to this particular item, but I find the flicker effect to be unpleasant. Since the "flicker" is based on the surface of the water moving as the light shines through it, because I have mine moving quite a bit, the flicker effect is more like fast flashing light. Unless I decide to stop disturbing the surface of my tank (highly unlikely), it's quite annoying. Luckily I am having some luck learning to ignore it and my fish don't seem to notice.The storm lighting effects are pointless because they are nothing but various flashing light colors. They scare my fish so I can't use them even if I did want strobe lights on my fish tank. I didn't take off any stars for this because I wasn't planning to use them anyway, but if I was then I'd be pretty mad about it.Now for why it's 2 stars--it has no controls whatsoever except for the remote.....and the remote doesn't work! This is a HUGE problem! Even if I hold it a centimeter away from the IR sensor sometimes it takes 50 presses of a button before it responds. It took me 10 minutes to get it to turn on when I first installed it because it would not respond to the power button on the remote! Luckily I don't have to adjust it after setting the colors and plugging into my timer or it would have already gone back. It still might--I'm concerned that it will stop working altogether and I don't want to have to buy a new one if it happens after it's too late to send back. But I'll try a new battery first in case the one included was defective.Edit: I replaced the remote battery with the second battery that came with the light and the remote works much better. It still has to be less than an inch away from the sensor but now the light responds 2 out of 3 times I press a button--huge improvement! Since a bad battery is easy to fix, I've upgraded my rating from two stars to four stars. I can't rate it at 5 stars because there's no on/off switch on the light itself, and the performance of the remote is still less than satisfactory. Outside of those issues though, this light is fantastic and the price was quite reasonable compared to similar products from other manufacturers.

[UPDATE 1/20/2021]I upgraded my review to a 4 to reflect Current's Customer service. 1 star for MY light, 3 stars for their service. The day I reached out to them about the issue (via email), I was given a support ticket number and 2 days after that I was informed a new light was being shipped out. Yesterday I received a tracking number for the light. Although I purchased a new light in the interim to keep my plants alive, I am impressed by their quick reply time and actions. Great customer service.I purchased this light for a new 29gal planted tank with a few angels, barbs and cory's. It works GREAT at growing medium to low-light plants.The profile is slim (which I loved) and the different scenes and LED colors are fantastic. I set ours to come on and go off at various intervals throughout the day, with the expressed purpose of providing the best growing environment for the plants. I did this using an Alexa enabled plug.Sadly, I bought this light on 6/17/2020 and it is completely dead now on 1/14/2021, just a mere 7 months after I received it. The description had said it was water resistant, so I figured that'd mean it be resistant to the small bubble splashes from the air-stone in the tank. I'm guessing this was not the case. The attached pic shows how much condensation accumulated and the damage caused.If you are using any air in your tank, you might want to stay away from this particular light :(