You'll see coral tanks and reef tanks used pretty interchangably, for most purposes a reef tank will be populated with coral (and of course we need fish to entertain us as well).

As far as lighting goes, it is really dependant on what you intend to keep in your tank, if it's just fish only they don't have any special lighting requirments, one of the running lokes is you can use xmas tree lighting for all they care, so normal output flourescent tubes would be fine. However if you are planning to keep any coral or anenomes then you will have to step up the lighting significantly to keep them.

Filtration, I don;t think anything beats a sump/refuge combination with a good protein skimmer. But there are many alternatives, just stay away from anything using bioballs, they cause nothing but problems down the road.

Give us some more details and we'll try to help narrow down some of the better options and choices for you.