What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier • Hacker News Board

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#211

Post by cshepher » Tue, Feb 02, 2021, 6:08 AM UTC

mudkip wrote: post #82

cshepher wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have had a Venta LW15 for a long time, and like it. I have gone through many humidifiers, and the LW15 is the only one that has lasted more than five years and does not require filters. It is expensive, even with cleaning> It does require regular cleaning, though -- that can be a pain. It pulled minimal power, too. I have switched to a whole house humidifier this year and I really like not having to change water ev…

I don't know if the LW15 has a different mechanism than the LW45, but it shouldn't be difficult to clean. The entire machine literally comes apart ( https://youtu.be/-f2FAI70BSk?t=154 ), leaving only plastic pieces that can be hosed down.

It is probably the same mechanism. The only thing that took time was wiping down both sides of than fan blades.

I would still be using the venta if I didn't have a new geothermal system installed. The ultrasonic humidifiers I had before the venta didn't last more than two years.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#212

Post by Dylan16807 » Tue, Feb 02, 2021, 6:09 AM UTC

outworlder wrote: post #189

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…

How big is the difference then? I see EER ratings in a huge range, and if I trust those then getting the right model matters much much more than single vs. dual hose. Are those numbers not to be trusted?

Edit: I found some numbers, but they seem to support the 'minimal' theory. This page[1] says that SAAC ratings take the air infiltration into account, and that SAAC for a single hose model is 55-58% of a simpler rating, while a dual hose model is 63-70%. That's only about a 15% loss in efficiency. But the difference between a good model and a bad model with the same number of hoses can supposedly exceed 50%!

[1] https://www.pickhvac.com/portable-air-conditioner/best-dual-...

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#213

Post by ashtonkem » Tue, Feb 02, 2021, 6:10 AM UTC

tdeck wrote: post #206

I recommend getting an ultrasonic humidifier. The Miro appears to be a $120 version of the same thing you can get at Walgreens for thirty bucks: https://www.walgreens.com/store/c/walgreens-humidifier/ID=30... There's no wick to clean and they're nearly silent.

They’ll also leave calcium dust all over the place if you put hard water into it, since everything in the water gets sent into the air.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#214

Post by switchbak » Tue, Feb 02, 2021, 6:26 AM UTC

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 have a similar setup but use these cheap fog makers to atomize the water that I push around with a fan.

It's cheap, and very effective even for a larger space. I also have the humidifier the article mentions, and found it to be useless for a large area.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#215

Post by pishpash » Tue, Feb 02, 2021, 6:42 AM UTC

falcolas wrote: post #172

pishpash wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So when the water evaporates you get salt precipitates all over the wick, and more and more over time?

Wicks are a consumable item, whether in swamp coolers, humidifiers, candles or lamps.

The problem isn't so much the wick itself but the concentration increase of salts over time as water-soluble chemicals are introduced at seemingly small levels each time. I suppose with proper monitoring it can be managed, but doesn't seem like the ticket in a non-flushing system.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#216

Post by aww_dang » Tue, Feb 02, 2021, 6:45 AM UTC

I always preferred steam radiators. With the perfect adjustment you have humidity and white noise.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#217

Post by 8ytecoder » Tue, Feb 02, 2021, 6:49 AM UTC

gnicholas wrote: post #188

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 Ama…

I’m assuming you have tried consumer report? They don’t accept any incentives from the manufacturers. They even buy all their test products.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#218

Post by zkms » Tue, Feb 02, 2021, 6:50 AM UTC

luisfmh wrote: post #182

Danieru wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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?

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

yeah, i'm curious as well.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#219

Post by computator » Tue, Feb 02, 2021, 6:56 AM UTC

To give another data point, this exact model--the Honeywell HCM-350--was reviewed by Consumer Reports[1] who rated it the 4th best model of 13 models in their large-room category for humidifiers. (The top three were Boneco 7135, Crane Germ Defense EE-8065, and Honeywell HWM-340.) This is what they said about the Honeywell HCM-350:

"With Excellent ratings for moisture output, convenience, and energy efficiency, this humidifier gets the job done. Excessive noise, often a problem with evaporative models because they use fans to moisten the air, shouldn’t be a major problem. One caution: Its performance using hard water is just average, so anyone with mineral-rich water can do better elsewhere. Plus, this model won’t shut off automatically when the tank is empty. Output 5/5, Convenience 5/5, Noise 4/5, Efficiency 5/5, and Hard water 3/5."

So it seems like a good model among those available. But having used multiple different humidifiers over the years, I hated all of them for one reason or another, and returned or threw them out within days or weeks of purchase. I think that a good humidifier is an unsolved problem. It's probably the same for the author of the article.

[1] Consumer Reports is a decades-old non-profit organization which puts out a magazine (and website) which does unbiased product testing, has zero advertising, pays for all the products they test, never takes sample products, buys all their products anonymously (so they can't be given better samples for testing purposes), and has extensive laboratories, procedures, scientist/technicians for testing (a private track for testing cars, for example). I never heard of anyone claiming that Consumer Reports was fraudulent or pay-for-play.

Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier

#220

Post by Dylan16807 » Tue, Feb 02, 2021, 7:03 AM UTC

DoreenMichele wrote: post #160

kortilla wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The world can decide it values good writing and that writers deserve a decent income It has decided. The sad truth is just that “good writing” just isn’t that valuable (as can be seen in how much people pay) if you don’t have some killer content to back it up. Good writing is requisite but not sufficient. Just because something is a sustaining profession for a few people doesn’t mean it should be for everyone who d…

Nobody is forcing you to write. I write because it's something I can do. I'm seriously handicapped and there are a lot of things I simply cannot do. That's a lousy argument. I use myself as an example for various reasons, but the reality is this a widespread problem and the state of journalism is a real problem, as I noted above. I'm well aware of why people don't like hearing they basically want slave labor. I've li…

> And that's why I say it boils down to an expectation of slave labor because, yeah, people basically get mad at being told "this is why this goes on" rather than going "oh, I had not thought to connect those dots. I shall have to keep that in mind going forward."

Someone getting mad doesn't mean they disagree with you in that specific worst-case way.

> These so-called "ethics" seem to boil down to "we expect writers to write for free and find some other means to support themselves while producing quality content as...a hobby, I guess" -- aka slave labor. And then folks get upset if you frame it that way.

If you give no money and demand they keep doing it, that's slave labor.

If you give no money and suggest that if they're unhappy they should stop doing it, it's not slave labor.

You're talking about the former, but I'm pretty sure people are actually saying the latter.

> If you give writers and other creatives no means to earn an adequate income trying to meet your prissy high standards for so-called ethics [1], then don't be all shocked that they will do whatever happens to actually work to line their pockets, though it involves lying, writing reviews for pay without actually ever touching the product, etc.

> People need to eat. Not everyone can be a programmer.

The problem with this reasoning is that you could replace "writer" with almost anything and make the same analogy. Even something like "hitman"! Having ethics doesn't mean you starve. It doesn't even significantly reduce the number of jobs you could take. Someone asking for ethics isn't asking for free labor.