Air Filters

My husband and I had been talking about getting an air filter for a while and a couple months ago we finally decided to just do it.  Living in LA, we get really bad air quality.  I think I read somewhere before that LA has the worst air quality in the entire country!  It makes sense, from all the smog out there.  Many times when I think it's kind of cloudy or foggy, it's actually the smog!  It's really quite gross.  So we actually bought 2 air filters, both from Walgreens.  One is the Winix WAC5300 PlasmaWave True HEPA Air Filter.  It's $199, and I believe it's like mid price range as far as air filters go.  I see some for close to $1000!

This thing is actually about 2 feet high and 1 foot wide.  So it's not small.  But it looks pretty slick, you can put it in a corner of the room and it doesn't look too bad.  When I first received it, I was really impressed by how quiet it is.  It's actually got 5 different speeds, from "sleep", to "turbo".  But both the sleep mode and mode 1, which is the one above sleep mode, are so quiet that you can't hear it at all.  It only gets a bit loud if you put it on turbo mode.  It's supposed to work well for rooms up to 350 sq ft.  

We put it in the bedroom, and so far I really have noticed a difference (we've been using it for about 2 months).  Everywhere I've lived in LA, basically you must dust every 3 days or so, otherwise you see a layer of dust on top of all the furniture surface.  But with this air filter, I've noticed that we can go for weeks without seeing any dust!  Of course, the furniture closest to the air filter collects the least amount of dust.  

It also traps pet hair, now that we have a dog here, I have noticed that there's less dog hair in the bedroom than the other rooms.  The air always feels crisper and cleaner in the bedroom too.  So I believe it does work!  We usually just leave it on speed 1 and let it run 24/7.  It is energy efficient, so we haven't noticed any increase in electric bills.  It also has an air quality indicator so when it indicates "poor", we put it on turbo mode.  It's really quite nice.  The filter needs to be changed from time to time and there is an indicator for that as well.  So far running it 24/7 for 2 months, we haven't had to change the filter yet!

The other air filter we got is a little one, it's a portable Clean AirBall HEPA filter.  This one is only $39, and it's supposed to filter air within about a 45 sq ft room.  

It's actually pretty cute looking in person.  It's about the size of a medicine ball.  This one is super easy, you just plug it in and push the "on" button.  There's no other settings.  When it's turned on, it emits this blue light, it looks kind of futuristic.  This one we put in the living room, which is obviously way bigger than the 45 sq ft space.  I think immediately around it, there is slightly less dust.  But otherwise I haven't noticed that big of a difference.  I might bring it to work and put it on my desk or something.  That way I can have better air in my immediate surrounding area by where I sit.

I really want to buy another big air filter for the living room / kitchen area as well, so we can clean up some dog hair and odor from cooking!  Speaking of the dog, he got neutered today and he is now spending the night by his lonesome at the vet.  He will be a sad puppy the next few days!  I miss his cute face.