NU Aqua 7-Stage Alkaline + UV Under Sink Reverse Osmosis System with Pump

I recently switched from using a Brita filter to this under-the-sink reverse osmosis system, and I couldn’t be happier with my decision. It’s so much more convenient, and I always have the peace of mind knowing that I’m drinking clean water. The taste is noticeably different and better compared to using just a carbon filter, and it’s especially important to me now that we have kids. The installation wasn’t too bad, and when I think about the time I used to spend filling my Brita and waiting for it to filter, I realize it was well worth the effort to make the switch. There have been no leaks, the water pressure is great, and the system runs quietly. So far, it’s everything I could ask for in a reverse osmosis system! First, here's why I chose a pump system over a no-pump system. The RO membrane needs pressure to work efficiently and get a good pure to drain ratio. The optimal pressure is 60-80 psi and the minimum pressure is 40psd. So if you have below 60psi water pressure, you should consider a pump system. If you have below 40psi, you should for sure get a pump system. If your pressure is above 60psi, you're fine with a no pump system. I did a bunch of research and chose this system over others on the market for the following reasons: Alkaline Filter with 5 Stages: The alkaline filter in this system has 5 different stages, whereas most other ones on the market only have 1-3 stages. The blend that this system uses produces some seriously amazing tasting water. I swear, I can put this water into those fancy $10/bottle waters they sell in glass jars and you wouldn't know the difference. The water being alkaline is a huge plus and was a requirement of my wife. 100-Gallon Per Day Membrane: Most other systems come with a 50 or 75 gallon per day (gpd) membrane, but this system has a 100 gpd membrane, ensuring a higher output of clean water daily. 3-Year Warranty: While other systems typically offer just a 1-year warranty, this system comes with a 3-year warranty. Additionally, nu aqua offers an option to get a lifetime warranty if you subscribe to their filter club membership, which ensures that you keep up with regular filter changes. Free PPM Meter: This is the only system on the market that includes a free PPM (parts per million) meter, allowing me to check my water quality on demand. 120-Day Satisfaction Guarantee: They are the only ones that offer a 120-day satisfaction guarantee, not that you’ll need it because this system is awesome. Fully Filled Carbon GAC Filters: I’ve heard reports that a lot of cheaper filtration companies will only half-fill their filter cartridges with medium to save money. Nu Aqua fills them completely up, and you can tell by the weight and how little the medium shakes in the housing. Virgin Coconut Activated Carbon: The carbon used in this system is virgin coconut activated carbon, compared to regular carbon. Coconut carbon is superior because it has a higher surface area, which means it can adsorb more contaminants. It’s also more effective at removing volatile organic compounds (VOCs), chlorine, and other impurities, resulting in cleaner, better-tasting water. Overall, I highly recommend this reverse osmosis system. I love it and you probably will too!

Okay, so I've been rocking this Nu Aqua system for a a week now, and it's a total upgrade from the seven year old reverse osmosis system I had from Costco. Seriously, the Nu Aqua is in a whole different league. The color-coded tubes are a lifesaver for setting it up, no way you can mess that up. Plus, all the stainless steel bits, like where it hooks up to the water, feel way more solid than the cheap plastic on my old setup. Changing the filters is actually easy now with the better canisters – no more wrestling matches under the sink! And it's got a leak detector that shuts off the water automatically. After my old system decided to flood my floor, that's a huge weight off my shoulders. The water pressure is insane too! It fills up my glass so much faster with that booster pump. The taste is seriously the best water ever. I think it's that remineralization filter doing its magic. Way better than my old system and even beats bottled water, hands down. The only little things that bugged me were that I had to hunt down a razor blade to cut the tubing – would've been nice if they tossed one in. And the written instructions were kinda meh, but the video they have is spot on, so just skip the paper stuff. But yeah, overall, I'm super happy with this thing. It's a massive improvement, and my water tastes incredible!

I am updating my review of a few months ago. My original review was a *** 3 star review... (deducted 1 star for a defective fitting, one star for incomplete assembly and 1 star for poor instructions included with the alkaline filter assembly.) You know, I'm not sure if I have ever gone back and added stars on a review.. taken away a few.. :-) NO.. I was not contacted by the seller and NO the seller did not send me free stuff to get me to "Update" my review. What prompted me to do this is I wanted to order additional stage 1 filters and could not remember the specifics of the part... Then I realized how HAPPY I am with the unit and HOW PLEASED I am every time I get a glass of water.... SO HERE'S MY UPDATE... :-) After a bumpy start and a few quality control issues I can honestly say I am delighted with my RO system. Once all the "bugs" got worked out of the system, it has produced abundant amounts of pure water that is a delight to consume. The included RO water tap is easy to use and has no leaks, drips or other issues common with "included" hardware. I have been keeping an eye on the first stage "tinted/transparent" filter stage and plan on replacing the 1st filter in a couple of months. AS far as the rest of the system is concerned it is working flawlessly... so in honor of my mid-term test results I am adding 2 stars to my initial review. I WOULD DEFINITELY RECOMMEND THIS UNIT!!!!!!! HAS PERFORMED FLAWLESSLY since installation. ALSO..... PLEASE, PLEASE do not install your unit under your sink. YOU will hate it come Filter change time.. Do your self a favor and learn form my mistakes.. Install it some place with EASY ACCESS!!!!!!! Over your mop sink, in the basement next to your water meter or well pump. Working under a sink is miserable, dark and cramped. No wonder so many plumbers have a "crack problem"... LOL ... For those that might take offense at me insinuating plumbers have a drug problem.. NO.. It's that embarrassing moment your pants slide down when you bend over and expose your butt crack... (bad when you have to explain your jokes).... anyway.... Remember installation is only the start. Just like a car you have to maintain it as well. ALSO.. its wise to invest in some additional line shut-off valves. Makes life simple to shut off and isolate the unit from the pressure tank and supply lines. It's also nice to additional T connector and valve so you can release any residual pressure form the system before you changes your filters. Hope this has been helpful. _______________________________________________ This is not my first RO system so I was very familiar with the installation and startup process. Overall the quality of the system appears good and the overall the installation was a straightforward process. Major issue: I did encounter a defective fitting that dripped constantly once the system was pressurized. Since it as a screw-in fitting on one of the final stages I could not use the system until I replaced the defective part. (the parts I had to replace are in the second picture, circled in red and highlighted in yellow). Its a pain to have to drain down the system once it has been pressurized. INSTALLATION: I decided to go for an in-basement installation for easy access and ease of installation. I honestly will never understand why anyone would go for an under-sink install. All you need is access to a water-line and access to a drain line and you have everything you need to install an RO system. Unless you like crawling into cramped dark spaces, I suggest a remote installation in the way to go. Please note that this kit does not include enough water and drain line tubing so you will need to purchase that separately. Also be aware that you will most likely need to purchase an Icemaker kit because this kit does not include a self-piercing tap to attach it to an existing cold water line. Overall the build quality on this kit is good. I opted for the kit with "mineralising cartridge" which was not shipped assembled and included no instructions. That was a bit of a surprise and an inconvenience. (that's the filter with the Red lines at the top of the unit.) I would suggest that you not follow the manufacturer's start-up instructions since the recommend that you drain 10 or so gallons through the system at start-up. I recommend that you fill and flush the 3 large filters separately at start-up. I disconnected the output line from the 3rd filter and drained the output into a 5 gallon bucket placed in the mop-sink. once I had run 5 or so gallens through those filters, I connected the line back up and flushed the RO filter and the 2 other filters again disconnecting their output line and draining it directly into the bucket in the mop sink. Those carbon filters will output a lot of gray colored water when they are first flushed. Once the water starts to run clear you should be good to go. My way also eliminates a lot of contamination of the system at start-up. One more thought: if you have a modern refrigerator you may want to consider a seperate storage tank and boost pump. That was the only way I could get an acceptable volume for for the water on the door... So overall the build quality is good, Assembly and testing a bit lacking and overall depending on your installation, additional parts may be required. Water quality is good, about 20PPM with mineral filter installed. About 8PPM without.

This will initially sound like a bad review but I am quite happy with the unit once I re-taped some leaky fittings. All I can say is whatever you do, you should remove all the factory installed threaded connectors, re-tape them with the supplied teflon tape and reinstall them before hooking it up to the water supply. I should have listened to a few of the reviewers that had leaks due to poorly installed factory fittings, but hooked it up right out of the box and had leaks all over the place. The fittings were snug but just were not taped sufficiently from the factory. After cleaning up the mess, I removed all the fittings and filters at the same time to make access easy unfortunately without noting how they were connected (do not do this, ha ha). I then had some difficulty figuring out how to re-connect everything once I re-taped and reinstalled all the threaded connectors from the factory. Because the manual and photos of the filter unit do not show it completely hooked up in any detail I had trouble figuring out what went where once I had it all apart and had to refer to other manufacturer's photos and manuals of different reverse osmosis systems to get it working. So if you do purchase this unit, I suggest you remove one connector at a time, re-tape and then reinstall exactly as it was so you do not end up with issues like I had (or make notes and label what connector goes where and what filter hooks up to what other filter etc). Had I done that in the first place I would have saved a lot of time. The other thing I would suggest is to perhaps purchase without the UV filter - in my case it resulted in warm water that had a plasticy/sulphury taste. Perhaps it should be installed before the polishing filter and that might address the taste but it was shown in the manual as the last filter in the chain before the faucet. Once I removed it the water tastes great. I probably would have removed it regardless as I do not like the first water out of the faucet to be warm, I just want to fill up a cup right away without letting it run to pass all the warm water. Once I addressed these issues I am very happy with it. I quite like the pump, very quiet (quieter that the permeate pump on my old unit that noticeably clicked under the counter) and it helps boost the pressure and the flow rate is strong. In closing, I would still recommend this unit as long as you re-tape the fittings first, as it is a good deal price wise and works quite well once hooked up. City water here in Sun Valley CA is about 305 ppm (yikes!) and about 18ppm after the filter. This reading is without the Alkaline/remineralization filter installed as I still need a new fitting for one that cracked when I re-tightened it. I suspect it will be a few ppm higher with the re-mineralization filter installed. Will update later once installed

I received the item February 15, 2018. I contacted Filter Central to let them know I had a little minor damage to the unit, the one side of the carton needs to be a little more reinforced (Amazon had put the factory box into a larger box, but I think the damage was already done before Amazon received it). One of the "T" fittings was broken during shipment and Filter Central (I guess the parent company of US AQUA) promptly sent out a new one. The people at US AQUA were extremely nice on the phone! I am a retired residential contractor and have done a lot of plumbing in my lifetime. I opted to install this unit in my basement and ran a 28 foot water line to my faucet upstairs. The booster pump provided plenty of pressure. I have looked at and studied quite a few RO Units before I settled on this one. I have to admit the quality of this unit is outstanding. Although US AQUA is an American Company, most of the components were made in Taiwan, which in my opinion is much better than China. I ordered the 6 stage unit with UV LIGHT and booster pump. If you are on city water you do not need the UV, but I would highly recommend UV for all well,cistern, and open water sources. It really does not matter what your water pressure is, the booster pump will make the RO UNIT more efficient, wasting less water, and you will have more water on demand. When I first turned the unit on I thought the booster pump was not working because I did not hear it running, lo and behold I touched the motor and I could feel it running (yes, it is that quiet). The UV light unit was extremely well built, it is almost a work of art. Quality on the whole unit is quite impressive and the price is probably better than anything out there plus there is the 5 YEAR WARRANTY. I also added a LiquaGen - Antioxidant pH Mineral Water Filter, I placed it after the post carbon filter and just before the UV LIGHT, you do not want to filter out the good minerals and things you just added to your water. I really could not think of anything negative about this unit. I would highly recommend this unit to anyone wanting a great unit at a great price, I do not feel as though you would be sorry in any way. I would not be surprised if they raise the price on this unit once it takes off. The bottom line is the water tastes GREAT and I have plenty off it.

I’ve had my system for 3 years. Up until this point I would give the system 3.5 stars. Questionable fittings that felt like they could leak and flood my basement, messy, very wet filter changes. Clutsy setup. But the water was very good. I kept up with filter changes and could live with the imperfections of the system. But recently I bought a year supply of filters again and after the filter change the water was no different than the tap water from my faucet. The filters looked different than the past ones, and they must have been different than them because they didn’t work. I’ve spent probably 12 hours messing with this issue, basically taking apart the entire system and checking everything. I flushed and sanitized the system but nothing worked. The whole time I have been in communication with NU Aqua and they have been the opposite of helpful. Automated responses, and unhelpful advice. In the end they demanded to see a picture of my TDS readings before I changed the filters. Seems like I need a time machine to satisfy them now because I don’t have a picture of that. Without that picture, they won’t help me. I’m very frustrated and dissatisfied now and regret every buying from Nu Aqua

I have been using this RO system for 21 days so far and love it. It puts out enough water for a refrigerator with ice and water, a bottleless water cooler, an auto fill dog water bowl and the drinking water faucet it came with. We love the taste of the water. The instructions it comes with are a little confusing as other have said and we didn’t watch the DVD but we didn’t need them much since we were doing a custom install. We had one issue when we unboxed the unit. The UV filter was missing its threaded push to connect elbows. We called the number in the box and they were very helpful. They offered to send us the parts and we asked if we could just get a partial refund so we could just get them at the local hardware store or big box home improvement store and they did. Their customer service is excellent. We have city water and it dropped the TDS from 167ppm to 23ppm according to the TDS meter it came with. This water was from after the ph filter which adds minerals back to the water so the number might be lower if that filter was removed. We even tested our old water filter that we thought gave us very pure water and it came out the same as our unfiltered tap water. We decided to install it in the basement and run individual lines to everything instead of under the sink. I think this is a far better way than stuffing it in the tiny space under the sink and wasting that space. It also is better in case there’s a leak and for changing the filters. After you are done installing everything and after you turn the water on to it and flush the air out check for leaks. A couple of the elbows that you have to install needed tightened more and were slowly dripping or seeping. We wanted more water storage for emergencies so we got a 20 gallon tank and hooked it up with the small one it comes with. The little tank it comes with was enough for our daily use with 4 adult and 2 dogs. So far we haven’t had and issues with the system and water flow is about as good as you can get from a small RO system. I would highly recommend this system and have no doubt that it will give me many years of trouble free use. If I do I am sure their excellent customer service will resolve them. If I have any issues I will update this review.

Update March 2020: filters are still good and getting good clean water. The Total dissolved solids came down from 150ppm to 24ppm when I tested the water from faucet vs this filter. Taste is very good. I drink water more frequently now. Other thoughts: I had a handyman install this and it took him about 3+ hours to install this. I think, unless you are really handy, it maybe better to get some help. But that wouldn't be different for any other brand of filter as well. Need to wait and see how long the filter lasts and the replacement costs for the same. If those are reasonable, i think this is a great filter.

It's extremely bad. I tried to return the product, but my sister didn't come, and the product arrived with missing parts and the box was extremely damaged. My electricity is 220V and the filter uses 110V. Your workmanship is very, very, very bad. I do not recommend buying this product.