A sump is definitely the way to go...gets the equipment out of/off the tank. I made a point to have all my equipment in my basement sump this time and have no wires in my tank at all. All flow is from the sump return and a closed loop which makes it's nice and quiet and very clean looking. You have many more choices in the equipment you can run with a sump (most all
HOB skimmers are pretty wimpy). Also a sump will give you additional water volume which is never a bad thing (I would go with as big a sump as you can afford/fit. The only downfall to a sump is that your current tank is probably not drilled so you would need an overflow to go over the top of the tank (I would spend the money for the overflow on a drilled RR 75 and be done with it personally).
