Hydroponics Growing System Indoor Garden 12 Pods Indoor Gardening System with LED Grow Light Height Adjustable Plants Germination Kit Quiet Smart Pump - Hydroponic Planter Fresh Harvest Black

I bought an off-brand hydroponics kit back in 6/2021, grew about 3 cycles & put it away for 1 to 1-1/2 years until las week. Pulled it out & pump isn't working, so bought this & got it this morning. Took inserts with seeds out & moved to the new unit. You need to know some basics to succeed:1. pH OF WATER: You really must test the pH of the water before planting, which should be 5.5-6.5 for lettuce, herbs, etc. I try to keep it near 6.0 generally. You need a pH meter kit to do this that has solutions to mix with water to calibrate it. Tap water here in Colorado & bottled water like El Dorado and Arrowhead usually test 7.5-8.5. I use General Hydroponics pH up & pH down to adjust. To adjust your water, just add 1/8 tsp at a time of Up or Down and retest, etc. until you reach near 6.0. This pH adjustment is important when growing hydroponically. Check the required pH for growing because certain plants grow best with a more acidic or alkaline environment. Everything I've grown before & now are around 6.0 pH.2. HYDROPONIC FERTILIZER: I bought a 3-bottle kit of General Hydroponics hydroponic fertilizer (organic) after using what came with my 1st kit. Very easy to use & they have charts on what mixture for each stage of growth. The mixture changes from seedling to green growth to fruiting. The solutions don't go bad & they have worked fabulously for me.3. NO TALL & SHORT PLANTS TOGETHER: If you try to grow tall plants (peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers) with low-growing plants (lettuce, herbs like thyme/oregano), the tall plants will kill off the low-growing plants as they mature, so think ahead. My jalapeno peppers & tomatoes killed off all my lettuce & herbs the 1st time.4. TALL PLANTS NEED PRUNING: If you grow tall-growing plants like peppers & tomatoes, you will have to constantly prune to keep the growth manageable & to get flowers & fruiting.5. POLLINATION: Certain plants have to be pollinated or cross-pollinated by hand, so do your research. You can do this with a paintbrush or even with your finger (called tickling the flower). I had many flowers on my jalapeno plant that never fruited. I did actually get some cherry tomatoes, but these tomatoes would normally grow to 4-5', so it was a chore of pruning & pollinating flowers to get just a few tomatoes at the time. If you don't do this, you will get flowers & no fruit at all. Plants like tomatillos need 2 different plants to cross-pollinate (male & female).6. OTHER GENERAL: I don't soak seeds generally. Certain harder seeds can benefit from soaking. As well, what temperature certain plants grow well at can vary & you need to keep this in mind. Leave the caps on growing seeds until you can see at least 2 leaves & a bit of height (like in my picture); leaves reach top of dome over them. I planted these seeds last week in the old unit where pump wasn't working. On the left, I have 5-6 loose leaf lettuce plants. On the right, I believe it is arugula showing. The thyme, oregano, marjoram & spinach all have small sprouts coming up under the caps. Apparently I have one I'm not sure of at this moment, but I will know when it comes up, and 1 empty slot.7. PUMP: I will edit the review if something happens with the pump. It is very quiet compared to my other one. I can feel the vibration when I put my hands on the side, but I don't see moving water when I look into the water. Without a working pump, the plants will die before maturing.8. CLEANING: Keep an eye on the water. As plants mature, the roots will be too long & tangled to safely take out individually. Keep an eye out for a lot of algae (greenish), too much sliminess, etc. Brownish color doesn't necessarily mean you need to change water. I think I had to change water once in the first 3 growing cycles I did. You will have to take the whole top off, dump the water, clean out base, & then fill with new pH adjusted water with new fertilizer, then put base with plants back on. ALWAYS thoroughly clean and sanitize the base & plastic inserts between growing cycles (mild soap & warm water should be fine, but check your instructions).I hope this helps some newbies as I often see newbies leaving comments that nothing grew or died halfway. Measuring the pH is really important because tap & most bottled water is too alkaline. Invest in a pH meter & calibration kit. I just put the seeds in, fill up the water, & let it go. This is my 4th cycle of growing and you can see the seeds are all coming up. I may add pix after the plants start to mature more.Even though my last off-brand hydroponic system had 14- and 16-hour cycles, it only cycled 14 hours and everything was fine. As well, the timer didn't work well & time on/off would increase about 15-20 minutes probably every week; I just reset it if I was up early enough to turn it off/on again. So cheap, yes, but it worked just fine overall.

I unpacked the product and filled it with water and plugged it in. I powered it on and the lights immediately turned on and worked on all settings, the light by the pump button was on, and the pump was plugged in but it was not working no matter what I did, I have 2 units so I tested it with the other pump to double check and sure enough the new pump was broken.This is the second time I have bought this uruq 12 pod garden, and while the first one has been working, I can hear the pump making more noise and struggling to work as flawlessly as before even after cleaning it, so it seems these pumps may be a MAJOR weak point of these units and I expect the other one to fail shortly….. Without the pump they are nothing more than a glorified plant holder.The light measures from the counter not where the plants grow, it also is 17 inches not 21 so be cautious!!I really like the product but 1 unit being broken upon arrival and 1 unit showing similar signs of failure after only a month makes me think there is a serious flaw with the pumps.I have emailed support and heard nothing back.EDIT: The seller reached out after emailing them, and leaving the review. They provided a full refund for the broken product. Although the product was broken upon delivery the company made it right as best as they could.BE PATIENT WITH THEM if you have any issues. They will resolve it, but the process itself did take about 5 days so just be patient and they will be sure to take care of you in an acceptable manner.

They offer a very complete kit, lacking only the seeds the owner wants to grow. I am very impressed with the light that is attached to the tank; it is amazingly bright and really gets your seeds germinating and keeps on providing what your plants need. Everything is high quality, and when the time comes, I will be able to get refills for the unit. Living in a high rise apartment, I can now grow real food like the leafy greens I need and want for good health, and know that they are organically grown with no exposure to pesticides or insects that would ruin a crop. I will clone all my houseplants via this method as well, because growing hydroponically, they will be far easier to take care of! This is a wonderful kit I would urge all households to own and use!

This is my second hydroponics system in about 5 months and the second pump that stopped working. The system seems to be pretty decent in that is has multiple different settings for different types of plants you want to grow. My basil and mint also sprouted in about 4 days and the directions for set up and best sprouts are easy to understand. About one month and 1 day after delivery, I noticed my pump wasn’t turning on. I cleaned it, unplugged it and plugged it back in, turned it on and off, tried to manually turn the pump on and nothing worked. Since it had been one day past the window of return I had to call Amazon customer service for help. They gave me a full refund without having to return it. It’s very frustrating as the system seems to be nice and the seeds sprouted quickly, but the pump stopped working right after the return window. This is also the second time this has happened with two different hydroponics systems. Very weary of these hydroponics systems being sold on Amazon and I’m nervous to purchase a new one just for the pump to not work again.

I really like this system. It is large and functions as expected. I like the options for 3 different light selections and the large lamp. The only drawback for me, and why I gave it only 4 stars, was because it is very difficult to see the water level in the window; it just looks black, even when I use a flashlight to try to see. That being said, I had sprouts of my faster growing veggies within 2 days! Way quicker than the seeds I am sprouting in dirt.

It works well. It’s not as good or as easy to use as my other hydroponic system from the name brand. But plants grow well, the light seems to be adequate. It’s great for the money.