Hey boston, I will be chopping in a few days and taking some more pics so i will take out a couple of the soilers so you can see the difference between them and the hydro.. its a huge difference, partially due to my incompetence as a soil grower haha.
whitenugz, the pump is the largest one in the eco line, i cant remember what the specs are exactly but it was the 150 dollar one.. the thing is that you do not need a huge pump as long as you use a larger diameter hose so that there is less strain on the pump.. i use a 1 inch diameter hose with a custom fitting i made from home depot so that the pump can use the maximum amount of power and is not constricting..
as far as controlling the flow it is quite simple. i pump the water to the top, which is the hardest part, and then let gravity feed the rest of them. in order to make sure that there is even flow between each plant, i have 1/4inch in-line adjustable flow valves so that each plant can be individually controlled. i got the all of the irrigation hoses and flow valves from an online irrigation supply company here in california. the res size is only 40 gallons, so when it is pumping about half of the water is running through the system, which makes it extremeley important to keep the res topped off.. i guess it is a good thing because it forced me to be on top of it every day.
here are the valves
http://www.dripirrigation.com/drip_irrigation_info.php?cPath=35&products_id=65
basically i used a hose punch to poke holes in the 1 inch hose, then used the 1/4 inch fittings to connect a hose to, and split the hose and put the valve in the middle.
here is the punch
http://www.dripirrigation.com/drip_irrigation_info.php?products_id=520
here is the connector which, after you punch the hole, put one end into the 1inch tubing, and connect your 1/4 inch tubing on the other side
http://www.dripirrigation.com/drip_irrigation_info.php?cPath=37_131&products_id=1273
then you connect the valve in the middle of your 1/4 inch tubing and run it to your pots. this way you can control the flow from each individual pot!
and here is the pump i use
http://www.horticulturesource.com/product_info.php/products_id/882
FLo