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29 of 34 people found the following review helpful.
Honeywell vs Whynter
By Patrick Oden
We moved into an older home that has no air conditioning, high ceilings, no insulation, and louvered windows. This is in the eastern edges of LA county, in a valley, where it gets pretty hot during the summer and occasionally other times of the year (it was 103 yesterday, for instance, a record high).When we moved here I got a Whynter 14,000 BTU Dual Hose Portable Air Conditioner with Heater (ARC-14SH) for my office, which is at one end of this ranch style home.I'm a big fan of the Whynter. It worked fine in the heat, never quite cooling the whole room, but certainly giving a blast of cold air where I needed it. The room was at fault, so I don't blame the unit. In fact, later in the summer we moved it in the bedroom to supplement a far too small window unit. The room got downright chilly. It started cooling down and I moved the unit into our babies room, with the heater function keeping the room at a steady temperature throughout the relatively cool winter months. Now that its getting hot again, I was torn about moving the unit out of her room. She needs it cool in hot weather for the sake of all our sanity.So, I was looking for an addition. The goofiness of our windows and lack of ability to do home repair projects tends to cancel out window units. This one looked like a good choice so I went for it.Which do I recommend, this Honeywell or the Whynter? Well, both have 14000 BTU cooling, with equivalent cooling power, I look at other issues. And there's no clear stand out. The Honeywell is a bit smaller, and I the vent is more variable. Though, you can't quite enjoy the full force of it hitting you. Both units prefer to vent upwards. The vent on the Whynter just closes off, never getting a horizontal direction worth noting. The Honeywell does allow for more horizontal flow, but when you close the vent to focus it horizontal, it opens a gap in the back of the vent, with about half the power or more still directed upwards.The big difference is in the air flow in and out. Both units have a standard sized intake and exhaust, but the Honeywell, for some reason, only comes with one hose and a window adapter with one slot. This creates a possible vacuum situation, where air is being sucked in from inside the room and sent outside, which means that air has to come in from somewhere else, a crack in the window or something like that. My office is old enough this isn't an issue, but it might create a problem for other situations, and some people highly recommend always using a dual hose setup. The Honeywell, again, allows for this, but doesn't come with the attachments for it. And the attachments are surprisingly expensive unless you're able and willing to patch together your own. The Whynter comes with two hoses and a window adapter with two slots, and caps in case you're not using one, leaving a one or two hose situation optional.The window attachment on the Honeywall is fairly shorter. I only have to take off one of my louvered window panels, while the Whynter requires me taking off two. However, the Honeywell adapter uses pegs and slots to tighten in length. Unfortunately for those with nonstandard windows, like me, the pegs don't match up, and I have to jerry rig a way to keep the adapter secure in the window.The remote works fine, and the display and buttons on the unit are pretty much the same for both units.Which would I recommend. Well, again, the Honeywell is a bit smaller and that might be an issue. It also seems to handle water a bit better. The Whynter has a water tray and plug that's terribly inconvenient. Too low to put a bowl by, too high to really drain the inside pan. Have to tip it and finagle it. Fortunately, we live in a generally low humidity environment, but on those rainy days in winter I was having to empty the Whynter every couple of days, taking and lifting it into the shower.But the Whynter does have that heater. So, there's a bit more bang for the price.I like both and am happy I don't have to pick between them for my own use.ADDED: Got pretty hot here the other day, had the air conditioner on. Was quite dismayed to see a trail of water coming from this Honeywell unit, leaving a puddle on my hard floor. Have no idea what was happening, as it wasn't leaking from any of the plugs, just coming from the bottom of the unit itself. I live in SoCal, so humidity isn't an issue, and if it's leaking because of that here, then I have to worry about how it will leak in higher humidity areas.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful.
Loud and not powerful
By Empyreal
Unit appears well-made compared to the other junk out there. Interface is slick, and remote is somewhat useful. Three problems:Unit is LOUD, even on lowest fan setting. It is a bit louder than most window-mounted units, and is about the same volume as those fan coil units installed in cheap motels. I have to use earplugs, and others have refused to sleep in the room with it on.Unit works, but no way it is 14k BTUs! Cools more like a 6-8k unit. I have a 480sf bedroom and on a hot day (80's) it takes hours to cool down the room. Granted I have high ceilings though.Remote control works to turn unit on & off, and to set timer (a neat feature although very coarsely-implemented). I have yet to reliably use it for anything else. Basically in middle of ight when you can't take the noise anymore you can shut it off without getting out of bed.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful.
Did not work as expected
By Edward Wojtasiewicz
Did not cool the room well. Poor air flow. My old air conditioner worked much better. Big and clumsy. It took up a lot of space.
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