LIGHTING: T5 is arguably the best from what I've read. Any bright light will be good. If you get the right light, it'll come wih legs that will keep the heat from the light bulbs from causing salt to deposit on the underside of the glass underneath the light. Also, algae will grow there too.

FILTER: Use a wet/dry filter or canister filter. A lot of the wet/dry filters come with protein skimmers (which help A LOT with filtration). If you dont get one with the filter you buy, get a protein skimmer. Another nice option is to build a refugium filter with a deep sand bed (3-6 inches of sand in it) to pull the nitrates out of your water for you. You might even be able to use your 29 gallon tank for it!

SUBSTRATE: Best I've seen so far, is sand. With the particles being a lot smaller, it's harder for chunks of waste to sink into the sediment. It also provides more surface area for beneficial bacteria to form, and is *A LOT* harder for algae to grow on. The other benefit, is if you have a deep enough bed (3-6 inches), the bottom layers will form an aerobic bacteria grow due to the lack of oxygen in the water. And through osmosis, the bacteria will feed off of the Nitrate levels in your water (potentially keeping them at ZERO). Without some way to complete this process, you **will** end up spending a good amount of money on salt for water changes to keep your nitrate levels low. High nitrate=algae growth. Now just because you don't have any nitrate and your tank will stay a lot healthier, it doesn't mean you'll never have to do a water change, you just wont have to do one anywhere near as often...just to replenish the nutrients found in water.

ROCKS: The more porous the better (more surface area for bacteria to stabilize your tank). Depending on how you want to stack them, open style like mine to allow better water flow, or piled up in spots, etc... will effect how many larger rocks you'll need for the foundation. As far as color/type... you'll hear arguements about why each one is better than others, but it all boils down to personal preference and tastes once the biological "slime" covers it all. So pick what you think will look good!

POWERHEAD: You'll definitely want to get some way to add some water circulation to your tank. It will do 2 main things. The first is it will stabilize the temperature of the water, and the second is circulate the water across the rocks so the bacteria can do it's job.

FISH: Honestly, it depends on 3 main things. 1) How good is the filtration in your tank (Biggest one hands down). 2) What fish you're looking that will determine how many fish you can have in the tank at the same time. and 3) *WHAT* type of fish will also determine which fish you can drop in the tank. For example, you don't stick a stingray in a tank with a lionfish or something else with poisonous spines. The stingray drops, spikes go up...buhbye stingray. You also don't drop a small clownfish in a tank with a decent size lionfish...lunch.

Good luck. Just take your time, take a deep breath and be patient.