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What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

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Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#181

Post by tomjakubowski »

ErikVandeWater wrote: post #151
paxys wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where do they backtrack? The article is pretty clear about there being no editorial influence.

Did you read about the order of events?

> In it, the company claims that The Wirecutter initially picked NextDesk as an editorial recommendation but later downgraded the recommendation after NextDesk declined to set up an affiliate-revenue agreement.

I believe you're taking "after" in this sentence way too literally. The order of events isn't in dispute, what's at issue is whether Nextdesk's declination to enter a revenue sharing agreement caused Wirecutter to downgrade their ranking.

This comment by geofft convinced me Nextdesk (RIP) was in the wrong in this dispute. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22144078

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#182

Post by luisfmh »

Danieru wrote: post #132
superseeplus wrote: post #32

As someone living on the east coast and having a very sensitive nose, I have tried different humidifiers and sadly no humidifiers have been perfect. There are three main types of humidifiers: 1. Warm mist humidifiers boil water and generate steam which humidifies the air. But, they are a burn hazard and consume a lot of energy. 2. Cool mist (non ultrasonic) work like miniature swamp coolers. They are essentially fans…

> Any company making incremental improvements to existing cool mist humidifiers will probably get a lot of eager buyers. I don't buy that. Japan has a ton of high quality air cleaner combo cool mist humidifiers. We don't see these units sold in the US because Americans are cheap. The idea of paying 200$ for an air cleaner feels like a scam to American ears. And thus the American market continues to race to the bottom…

Are there any of those Japanese ones you can buy in North America? Any brands you're aware of?

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#183

Post by ashtonkem »

gnicholas wrote: post #80

A company accused Wirecutter of being pay-for-play, based on how how heavily affiliate revenue (allegedly) factors into Wirecutter reviews. [1] The Wirecutter responded here. [2] I wonder if this was part of the reason that the Honeywell unit was recommended. 1: https://www.xdesk.com/wirecutter-standing-desk-review-pay-to... 2: https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/our-response-to-nextdesk/

If true, this explains the awful towels we bought at the WireCutter’s suggestion.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#184

Post by ziml77 »

superbatfish wrote: post #152

I own this model, and use it to humidify a small room. I sympathize with the author's complaints with respect to the difficulty of cleaning it, though mine just doesn't need cleaning very often. And the wick DOES get moldy if you let it sit in wet water for weeks on end. But her other complaints puzzle me: I don't find it to be messy to refill. What is she doing wrong? It's even more baffling that she thinks it "does…

I was confused by that complaint about it not working too. If the water disappearing isn't enough to confirm it then a hygrometer certainly would do the trick.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#185

Post by Retric »

abiogenesis wrote: post #177
ErikVandeWater wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The rest of the Wirecutter article where it backtracks?

I think you misread this sentence: > In it, the company claims that The Wirecutter initially picked NextDesk as an editorial recommendation but later downgraded the recommendation after NextDesk declined to set up an affiliate-revenue agreement. These are NextDesk's "claims". Wirecutter does not acknowledge them. According to Wirecutter this is what happened: > Without the editorial team’s knowledge, NextDesk and our…

> That fact was never communicated to our editorial team until

That’s a overly specific denial, their saying the editorial team wasn’t informed. However, it doesn’t actually mean the events where unrelated, as long as the editorial team assumes no agreement was reached at which point nothing needs to be communicated.

If they had actually chosen a new pick before the deal was canceled they would have said that. Instead they refer to internal emails rather than the actual timing of the events. Which where #1 Pick, #2 request for a kickback, #3 no agreement reached, #4 new pick. They don’t even deny the actual content of the emails posted.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#186

Post by fma »

RobertRoberts wrote: post #87

After years of garbage humidifiers, I made my own. It cost a tiny fraction of the high end models, has huge reservoir, easy to clean, easy to modify and repair. It's a food grade 5 gallon bucket ($3) with a bathroom vent fan ($15) mounted to the lid with a pvc pipe section ($2 maybe) for adapting the fan the wick, a flour sack cloth towel (pack of 10 for $5). A couple of holes in the lid, some creative testing for ho…

I use a "swamp cooler" as a whole house humidifier. It's the same concept. Also my cardboard wick doesn't get mold - unlike some other paper based wick humidifiers.

I have the steam humidifiers for the small rooms. But my winter has been so much comfortable since using the swamp cooler. I just turn it on a few times a day and within minutes, the humidity jumps a few percentage.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#187

Post by fisherjeff »

andrewvc wrote: post #145
eecc wrote: post #26

What about this comically expensive https://www.venta-air.com and it’s ripoff: https://www.xiaomitoday.com/2020/06/30/get-the-xiaomi-smartm... It blows ambient air directly onto the wetted disks; it will empty a full tank in a day and haven’t cursed anymore that usual while cleaning. I did use a disinfectant additive

I have two ventas, both purchased off ebay used, and they really are the best. Simple, reliable, cleanable and no expensive wick refills. That honeywell lasted about one season. The wick refills are ridiculously expensive. It was cheaper to trash it and use anything else. I'm also upset with the wirecutter for that trash recommendation.

Do your airwashers make clicking noises? I had one that did, but was kind of old and beat up. I bought a new one and, sure enough, like 2 months later the clicking was back.

I’ve tried replacing the... little walking thing that moves the discs? (not sure what to call it) that makes the noise but it didn’t help.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#188

Post by gnicholas »

gnicholas wrote: post #80

A company accused Wirecutter of being pay-for-play, based on how how heavily affiliate revenue (allegedly) factors into Wirecutter reviews. [1] The Wirecutter responded here. [2] I wonder if this was part of the reason that the Honeywell unit was recommended. 1: https://www.xdesk.com/wirecutter-standing-desk-review-pay-to... 2: https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/our-response-to-nextdesk/

Previously discussed on HN:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22141719

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16729408

I still use The Wirecutter, but in combination with other sources. I try to ask myself the question: do there appear to be competing products that wouldn't provide the affiliate revenue and therefore potentially be left out of the recommendations?

If I'm just deciding between a bunch of stuff on Amazon, then I assume there's no thumb on the scale.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#189

Post by outworlder »

Interesting. So one personal observation on Wirecutter (which caused me to stop trusting it).

It does reviews of portable air conditioners. A couple of years ago, it went into painstaking detail on how single hose AC is bad. They linked articles from the Department of Energy and so on. Their message was that single hose were easy to install but were absolutely not worth it. And recommended a dual hose system

I happen to agree with that. Portable AC units are already incredibly inefficient, so you don't want to make it any more inefficient than it has to be. I bought their recommendation, it was actually a decent one.

Next year, the completely backtracked. Not because new research came to light that contradicts the previous one. Not because new models came out that massively improved the losses (not even sure that's possible). No. Now they say that the difference is "minimal". It is not minimal, and their previous argument is that it wasn't minimal and they should only be used when there was no other option. They did not provide updated efficiency figures.

Here's the new text:

> While dual-hose models have been shown to outperform some single-hose units in extremely hot or muggy weather, the difference is usually minimal, and we don’t think it outweighs the convenience of a single hose.

Sure, one can reverse their position and that can be a healthy thing to do. But to take major pains in arguing one position one year, just to reverse the position and provide no new data, it's very fishy.

And, of course, the recommended models tend to be pricey too.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#190

Post by boomboomsubban »

superbatfish wrote: post #152

I own this model, and use it to humidify a small room. I sympathize with the author's complaints with respect to the difficulty of cleaning it, though mine just doesn't need cleaning very often. And the wick DOES get moldy if you let it sit in wet water for weeks on end. But her other complaints puzzle me: I don't find it to be messy to refill. What is she doing wrong? It's even more baffling that she thinks it "does…

>though mine just doesn't need cleaning very often.

Do you have carpet where you use it and do you have pets?

From fairly limited observation on computer fans, those two factors make a huge difference in how messy fans will get. Apartment with hardwood floors, air duster once a year is fine. Apartment with carpet, monthly minimum still leaves the fans gunked up.

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