As another reviewer pointed out, it does take a little bit of effort to put this thing together. Getting those tubes onto the fittings was a lot of work, but at least there's no dripping.Once this was done, and the filter media was in the box, priming the unit was simple enough. Open the tube at the top, pour in some water, then power the unit on. It will not be silent right away. There's still air trapped in the system, and there'll be a few "burbs" from time to time when these air bubbles are pushed out. But once that is all done, it really is whisper-quiet.Now, changing filter media. The first time I tried this, I was a little worried, but there's nothing to it. Shut the filter off, pop up the lever on the hose-fitting assembly and remove it. It's sealed off, so no dripping water. Now just carry the whole container to where you want to be to replace the filter media, pop the canister open and remove the two media trays. Replace as needed.How easy was that?