Hydroponics Growing System Indoor Garden: URUQ 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 have lots of herb seeds sprouting. They popped up almost overnight. The booklet doesn’t really tell you what all of the parts that come in the little bags are for so you kind of have to guess. I must be doing it right, though because the seeds are growing! The pump doesn’t work so I just got a small external pump with an air stone to use instead. I got the machine on sale so it wasn’t worth returning it. Read the reviews and learn from them. Like, you can’t reset the light so make sure that when you turn it on for the first time you do it when you are going to always want it to come on. The light is very bright! If you don’t want it on all night, prepare ahead!!! Overall, it’s nice and worth the pittance that I paid for it. This is an older model. Maybe the newer ones don’t have some of the quirks this one has. UPDATE: I played around with it a bit and the pump is working just fine now! It’s very quiet and my plants are thriving. The seller offered a full refund, but I turned it down because it’s working great now. I appreciate the sellers offer to make things right, but it wasn’t necessary. Updated from 3 stars to 5 stars!

I’ve had this for almost 2 years (March 2024), and at first it was a great thing to have, so that I could grow plants indoors. I’ve loved the led lights and the water pump was noticeable but not excessively loud (I had this in my bedroom and you can hear a hum coming from it, but it wasn’t too loud where I couldn’t sleep when the pump was running). I had this plugged up and running almost daily just for the led lights alone for my potted plants. But either in November or December last year (2025) the buttons started going out where I could press the power button and it was still on so I manually plugged and unplugged it so that the lights were off throughout the night. But as of now, I believe that this isn’t worth the money. It’s completely broken and I believe the motherboard on it is fried now where the lights or pump ain’t working. This didn’t even last 2 years and I’ve paid originally $45+ for this. I do plan on getting another hydroponics system but I plan on staying away from this brand/seller. Not worth wasting money on something that won’t last even 2 years.

Love this system, does wonders in helping me get my plants started for my garden. Also keeps growing herbs for me during the winter for my meals.

Love this, 2 days and my seeds were sprouting.....easy to use....turn on, pick settings and walk away.

Do not buy this, pump stopped working after 3 months, without the pump it will not work well. Complete waste of money and time

Looks great on a counter or table comes with everything you need, great for starting plants quick before putting in pots or soil or outside. I added a small air stone and pump for better root oxygen absorption. Easy cleaning light detaches

Finally started to use this, currently on week three and everything has begun to sprout! Works as described, low motor noise (can barely tell when it's on), different growing modes (lights are bright!) And formula provided. The A and B crystals did not fully dissolve as indicated. Even after more than 24 hours of the crystal being in water, so I am not sure if the full effects of the solutions are being absorbed. I am also not sure at what rate the water will evaporate. It continues to be filled to the max even after 3 weeks of use. (Not complaining, as it means less refilling, but curious to know if this is normal or not). Overall very happy with purchase, good value for your money and looking forward to seeing everything grow!