My guess is it's some worthless safety precaution that you turn it off and turn it on to make sure that if what your are hearing is the filter working and not just making noise as it overheats and explodes.
Yeah,
those feeding rings are great. I think it cuts down alot on clogging of the filter, plus the fish don't have to run around the tank trying to catch the flakes. Maybe that's why their getting so fat LOL! A slice of a styrofoam cup would probably work great, so long as you anchored it to the side of the tank.
