Whynter ARC-131GD 13,000 BTU (6,345 BTU SACC) Dual Hose Cooling Portable Air Conditioner, Dehumidifier, and Fan plus Storage bag for, up to 420 sq ft in Grey

After years of sweating I finally purchased this for my 450 sq ft living room which has huge picture windows that don’t open so window AC wasn’t an option .. it’s seperate from the the rest of the house so all the fans in the world only lowered it a degree or two. I’m in love. I ended up getting a scratch and dent one from amazon for $229 (I’m cheap) I vent it out my screen door. It has a crack in the plastic on the side. Oh well... sooooooo much quieter than the window units. It also keeps the room at a consistent temperature unlike my window units in other rooms. Where it goes way up and then freezing.. then sweating, then freezing ... Checking my thermostat on the wall it’s generally super close to if not at the same temp I have the ac at really far away from it .. again unlike the window units I have to set wayyyyy below what I actually want my room at. It’s big... don’t care. It was super easy to install. It’s actually not that ugly.Far superior to my window units I don’t know why I didn’t do this a million years ago. I will be replacing all my window units with these. I have the room curtained off but no doubt it’s powerful enough to cool a lot more Space if I wanted to. Also my breakers are known to trip .. hasn’t once so it can’t be pulling as much power as the window units that trip it all the time.I’ve had this unit for several years now. Still works great. I got my money’s worth when it finally dies and I have to replace it. My energy bills have been very reasonable.

I bought 3 from Amazon and all 3 have gone back. I didn't even open one of them as I was so frustrated with the other 2. I bought the units for my 3 bedrooms, two of which are about 150sq ft, the last which is about 250 sq ft. All 3 rooms are well under the size of what the units are rated for. I bought the larger size unit with the expectation that I could move them to other rooms if need be to keep them cool.Setup: The setup of the units was not a problem. Even though the shipping weight is 86 pounds, I found them to be relatively easy to move. As another reviewer commented, they are very easy to unbox by just cutting the 4 straps and lifting the box up. Once out of the box and in the rooms that I was putting them in, I had an extra setup step due to my windows being casement/crank-outs. To get the unit to work I have to put a piece of plywood or plexiglass in each window and cut the holes for the exhaust pipes. I've done this with other portable units that I have used in the past so I find it easiest to cut the plywood to the size of the screen for the window. Once the unit was all setup, I was ready to go!Cooling: I am well aware of the limitations of portable air conditioners. If you do not have to install a portable unit (you have regular double or single hung windows) buy a standard air conditioner. They work incredibly well. Portable units are not the answer unless you absolutely have to use them. With that being said, I have an old unit (Icy Breeze or Arctic Breeze or something along those lines) that works perfectly in the large master bedroom. Regardless of what the temperature is outside, it will do a good job of keeping the temperature consistently cooler. That is a single hose unit and is at least 10-15 years old. These new units would not keep the rooms cool at all. I tried using these units in both hot and moderate weather. There were days when it was 90-94 and there were days where it was 75-85. I have a thermostat in the master bedroom to control one of the zones for my boiler and even with this Whynter unit running for 10-12 hours, the coldest the room ever got on a hot day was 80. Even on the moderate days, it would not drop the temperature below 72. What is the point in an air conditioner that doesn't work when it is hot out?Draining: On the days where it was hot 90-94, I had to drain the units about 4 times during the night. It probably got down to about 74 or 75 at night and still I would drain the unit at 6pm, 12am, 4am, 6am. It was unbearable. For whatever reason, as it got cooler out at night and into the morning, the unit would actually build up more condensation. Draining wasn't too difficult, I used a plastic ziplock bag that I put underneath the lower drain and let it fill up. The upper drain I used the ziplock bag as well. But this unit needs a larger tank to be able to not have to be drained 4 times during the night. Mind you that each time that you drain the unit, the unit has shut off so it takes another 10 minutes for the compressor to kick on.Due to the simple fact that these units could not cool a room that was well within the specs of what they should be able to handle, I returned them. Next year, I will just put in new windows and use regular window air conditioners as they always work as expected.

I have been using this for about 2 weeks. I bought this for my master bedroom which is about 23x16 (368 square feet) and has vaulted ceilings. It was to replace a Whynter ARC-12SD which was working great but was going to be moved to my wife's office. Not to make this a review about the ARC-12SD but comparing it to the ARC-131GD reveals the latter's pros and cons. The ARC-12SD has been in use for about 1.5 years and has performed great. It had two downsides. Its first downside may not be a downside depending on the room you place it in. It has a bright blue led display and several other led indicators that could not be turned off. At night, in a bedroom, the led's are quite bright. We taped a credit card over the main display. The card blocked most of the light at night and we could flip it up if we wanted to see it if we wanted. The ARC-131GD has a remote control that contains the display rather than having it on the air conditioner itself. My wife and I both like that. There is a spot on the unit to store the remote but my wife keeps it on the nightstand. The ARC-131GD does have a blue led on the front of the unit but you can turn it off. Again, depending on the room you are putting this in, either may work for you. We only realized the ARC-12SD's second downside when we started to use the ARC-131GD, The ARC-131GD is quieter than the ARC-12SD. The compressor seems to quietly engage in the ARC131GD whereas the compressor on the ARC-12SD seems to be more abrupt and noisier. Although I do remember hearing the ARC-12SD cycling at times (I guess it woke me up), I have not noticed the ARC-131GD cycling at night (I guess it does not wake me up). On paper, the ARC-131GD is ever so slightly better suited for a larger room. The ARC-12SD is rated for 400 square feet while the ARC-131GD is rated for 420 square feet. After reading a few reviews it seemed like the ARC-131GD was slightly more efficient than the ARC-12SD. Believing that the ARC-131GD was more powerful and more efficient lead me to consider the ARC-131GD rather than just getting another ARC-12SD. Price wise, it seems that the ARC131-DG is generally available at a lower price than the ARC-12SD. When the ARC-131GD dropped to a particularly low price, I jumped on it. The first night with the ARC-131GD revealed just how quite it is. Of course you can hear the fan, similar to, but slightly quieter than the ARC-12SD's fan. From a cooling perspective, the ARC-12SD cooled the room faster. Not sure why this is but...every night the ARC-131GD is slower to cool then the ARC-12SD. Both were set to maximum fan speed. During the night, both cooled the room fine. Neither my wife nor I have been uncomfortable. We both notice the room cooling slower with the ARC-131GD as compared to the ARC-12SD. The ARC-12SD does have adjustable vents while the ARC-131GD does not. We used to point the vents on the ARC-12SD as high as they would go, almost vertical. Since hot air rises, it seemed like a good idea to push the cold air towards the ceiling. The ARC-131GD pushes the air out at a more horizontal angle. Maybe if it could push the cold air towards the ceiling, it would do an better job at cooling the overall room faster. This may only be an issue with a room with a vaulted ceiling. Would I buy another ARC-131GD? Based on the price I got it for (much less than the ARC-12SD) I would say yes. How much am I saving in electricity using the ARC-131GD in comparison to the ARC-12SD? If your requirements are for the room to be cooled a bit more quickly than the ARC-12SD may be better choice. If you have to run the ARC-131GD 20 minutes longer a day to get the room to a specific temperature, does its slightly better efficiency pay off? If the ARC-131GD is priced the same as the ARC-12SD, I would get the ARC-12SD. If the ARC-131GD is at an all time low price-wise, I would get the ARC-131GD again. It has its pluses and minus's (both of which depend on where it will be located and your personal preferences).A couple of additional points. The ARC-12SD has an intake and exhaust hose. Both are the same diameter. The ARC-131GD intake hose is the standard size. The exhaust hose is smaller. The connectors are standard as far as connecting to the air conditioner or window vent but the tube connections are different sizes to match the hoses. The tube lengths on the ARC-131GD are about 8 inches shorter than the ARC-12SD. Whereas I could maneuver the ARC-12SD away from the window and point it an any direction I wanted, the limited hose length on the ARC-131SD did not allow for this. I had to place the air conditioner as close to the wall as I could. Although I had standard replacement hoses which were longer, I could not utilize them because of the non-standard exhaust hose connector of the ARC-131GD. My solution, buy 2 more standard connectors.I live in FL. My back yard, which is where the air conditioner cooling intake pulls air in from, is basically a jungle. The air being pulled in is extremely humid. When I hooked up the new air conditioner, I replaced both the intake and exhaust tubes. The intake hose I was replacing was full of a very light coating of mildew. Yuck! Even given those conditions, I never had a problem with the ARC-12SD filling up with water. I have read other reviews of the ARC-131GD and some have reported problems with the unit filling with water. So far (2 weeks) I have not had a problem with the unit filling with water even with the very high humidity.