Questions about cycling...?

Actually, you really shouldn't be changing your filter at all, but the filter media sometimes needs some attention. Activated carbon should be changed out once a month IMO, and your sponge portion for mechanical filtration cleaned about every three months or so. When you do that, don't just replace it, take a bucket of your tank water that you'd be taking out during a regular water change, leave enough room you can put the filter in, and clean up your media in that. You won't lose all your beneficial bacteria that way and should avoid those recurring cloudiness issues.

JV

You can rinse your media in de-chlorinated water. I highly recommend doing it every month to keep the filter flowing free.

Eventually foam media does wear out and does need to be replaced. Instead of replacing it all at once, replace only part of it. Then next time you maintain the filter, replace the older portion and rinse the newer.

If you have a filter that takes those 'all in one' cartridges, and it has no bio-wheel, then the filter is poorly designed and one I'd never buy, because you have no choice but to throw it all away. In this case just rinse the cartridge and don't worry about the carbon inside it - carbon isn't needed anyway.

If your tank is new enough to be cycling, you shouldn't have to change the filter. Every time you do, the bacteria living on it will be lost. Instead, take out the filter pad and squeeze it a few times in a container of dechlorinated water to clean off the gunk that's caught in it. Then you can reuse the filter pad with the bacteria, so the water shouldn't cloud as badly.

Don't rinse under the tap, or forget to treat the water first though - the chlorine in the tap water will kill the bacteria.

(If your filter says to change the cartridge/pad every few weeks, just remember, if you do this, you'll buy more of their pads - you can reuse them until their falling apart!)

the only thing that i can say is that i would pull the filter out while your cleaning the tank so that you can instanly suck up and large debrie plus you really only need to change your filter if you have carbon in it once a month. just take out the filter and give it a good rinse and put it back in while you clean the tank. it saves money and works great :)

Get a penguin or emperor filter by marineland they use a bio wheel that you never replace unless your stop using it, this holds your benefical bacteria when you replace your filter. They are very good filters and won't crap out on you. If you leave the filter on while you remove the filter this will release detritus/debris into your tank making it look cloudy or dirty.

you mean changing the filter media?