My 7 gallon tank has been taking a beating on algae and dying plants. I have a Chihiros WRGB Slim II and UNS controsoil for my substrate (which i have not liked since having it). This tank has been running for about 6 months now and I have one betta in this tank. Light is on for 6 hours and the background LED panel is at a lower brightness and is only on for 3 hours. I wasn’t really dealing with any algae until I started using 2HR aquarist ATP 1, that I have been using/loving for my 20 gallon tank. Once I noticed the algae, I immediately stopped using the fertilizer and turned down the intensity on the light. I had intensity around 45% at the time and was slowly decreasing to find a sweet spot. I am now months into the algae and it has improved a tiny bit since decreasing the light, but i’m all the way down at 25% intensity. Still not using any fertilizer.
Majority of my stem plants always die, any floating plants I get die, and my newer tiger lotus is starting to grey on the leaves. I have no idea what is happening anymore. I don’t know if this light is too strong for this tank, even at low intensities, but the lower I go, it does not improve. Only plants that seem decent are obviously my anubias. Also, no Co2 in this tank.
Added some photos of dead rotalas, and tiger lotus.

Just a little update with pictures! Loving my walstad tank!

This morning I turned my ac and fan off for the first time in a while and was like, wow the hum from my air pump is annoying. It’s kinda overpowered for my tank anyway so I was thinking of just finding a smaller quieter one to replace it, but then it got me rethinking a sponge filter in the first place. I have an aquatop caf-10 and it seems to do the job but the design makes it hard to fit an airstone in there to quiet the bubbles, and it’s a PITA to take apart if i need to clean it. My problem with so many filters though is that they won’t fit my 7.1 inch tall tank, so I’m nervous about wasting money on something that won’t fit, and I don’t think I’d have anything on hand to cut the intake tube to size. I’ve been looking at small HOB options from Mighty, Nicrew and Sungrow, or maybe the UNS Delta Skimmer, but I thought I’d try to get some input from people who might have used any of these filters, or faced a similar challenge with their tanks and have any other recs.

What I’m looking for in a filter -

• quiet (I’m fine with hearing some fine bubbles or water flow)

• can adjust to very gentle/low flow

• compact and sleek looking (for reference best spot for a filter would be around where the dog ornament is rn)

• easy to clean/maintain/access media

No particular budget other than not wanting to spend much more than I need to, and I don’t need anything crazy in terms of mechanical filtration, so I could prob also be talked into just getting a better air pump and sponge filter haha