Re: Germ Guardian Hygia 6 AC-6000 vs Sharp FP-P40CX

A Reader writes:

Hi Ed,

I found your website quite informative on air purifiers.

Thank you for the great work.

I recently bought a Sharp FPP40CX purifier at a sale price and liked it.

However, I just can't accept the fact that the filter price is even more expensive than the machine itself ($150 vs $180). It not only feels like ripoff, but rather not environmental friendly. People would just dump themachine with expired filter and purchase a new one.

In the mean time I also found some less-known-brand purifiers with more features, such as the following two:

Germ Guardian Hygia 6 AC-6000,

and Surroundair Intellipro.

They both have PCO filter and UV light, which are not available in the Sharp model, and also have a much more reasonable price for replacement filters.

I'd like your advice on those multi-feature purifiers compared to the Sharp.

You can either post it on your website or reply to my email.

Thanks again for your great work and please keep it going :)

Regards,

Ed's Reply

Hey Reader;

Your new Sharp was a good deal.

Sharp is shifting its marketing emphasis to the humidifier-purifier models, and has dropped several of the older "dry" Plasmaclusters from its line.

This has sent users scrambling to find interchangeable filters - as evidenced by several user posts here - and dealers have begun scalping on remaining inventories.

But when comparing filter costs and product life expectancies, Plasmaclusters rank among the best.

I bought a Sharp FP-N60cx in 2005, and have run it 24/7 for almost five years with the original HEPA. I recently refilled the carbon bag with new activated carbon.

My maintenance cost for 5 years operation is the $15.00 I spent for carbon.

I do not plan to replace the HEPA soon, it is discolored but not clogged.

Some have experienced problems with the carbon bag getting saturated frequently, but assuming a 3 year filter life, your cost averages only $60 per year.

Few machines match the air cleaned per dollar of a Plasmacluster.

I own 3: KC-C150U, FP-P40CX, and FP-N60CX.

It is extremely common for air cleaners, especially "department store" brands, to be discarded when the user discovers a filter replacement rip-off. Look on Craigslist.com, you'll find lots of Hunter and Holmes models along with the many Ionic Breeze and Ecoquest sales.

These models often have annual filter costs higher than the initial cost.

I stand by my endorsement of the Sharps as the best in class in their respective price ranges.

For the Mitsubishi designed and very low powered IntelliPro, see IntelliPro Review.

Germ Guardian Hygia 6 AC-6000

Hygia 6 AC-6000 by Germ Guardian is a modern but low powered air cleaner.

Hygia 6, though a low volume product, has been picked up by some quality web vendors, including allergybuyersclub.com, and sylvane.com.

I am not enthusiastic about the AC-6000, and the "more stages are better" marketing model.

The 6 has six "levels;" a washable prefilter, charcoal, HEPA, PCO (photocatalytic oxidation), UV light, and negative ionizer.

Right at the outset, we find dubious marketing.

The "HEPA" is said to capture "99.97% of dust mites, mold spores, pollen and pet dander."

Is this even a true-HEPA filter?

Real HEPAs capture 99.97% of .3 micron sized particles. That's 3 tenths of one micron.

Dust mites measure 400 microns and are not airborne. It is the mites fecal droppings that are allergenic.

Mold spores go from 1 to 100 microns.

Pollen size is generally above 2 microns - many cheap NOT-HEPA air cleaners are designed just to catch seasonal pollen.

Pet dander, which can be smaller than 1 micron, but generally is skin flakes large enough to see, is not the source of most pet allergy. It is proteins in pet's saliva, transferred by licking and petting, which are to blame.

When looking at filter costs, be sure you are comparing apples to apples - one big profit center in the air cleaner business is substituting inferior filters for sale to the naive at inflated prices.

These exaggerated claims are common in the industry, but are associated with low quality products.

The multi-stage model is often used to obscure non-existent or weak carbon weight, which is not specified in Hygia's literature.

Here is another profit maker - cheap poly mesh impregnated with carbon powder sold repeatedly as odor filters. This is another rip-off tactic, targeted at the inexperienced air purifier user.

Additional spurious marketing claims - "kills 99.99% of airborne influenza" - are nonsense.

The low powered machine kills only those viruses which pass through the UV-photocat system, which is far from powerful enough to sterilize even small rooms.

And flu is transmitted primarily by direct coughing and touching. The great fear among epidemiologists is that flu will eventually mutate into an airborne, and therefore highly infectious, strain.

Hygia is stylish and automated: a dust sensor automatically bumps through four fan speeds and a pollutant indicator gives user feedback on air quality.

The one positive user review on the web states that sensor sensitivity is good.

Clean Air Delivery Rates (CADR) are quoted in the user manual as smoke 95, dust 107, and pollen 129.

CADR is an official certification, but no Germ Guardian product is currently AHAM certified. I do not remember ever seeing this company on AHAM's site. The AHAM seal, which is expensive, is not displayed.

Another question mark for the Hygia 6.

But even if legitimately certified, these are very weak CADRs for a $200-plus machine. The low smoke-to-pollen CADR ratio suggests poor retention of sub-micron particles, consistent with the idea that we are not looking at a real HEPA air purifier.

Rating this air cleaner for a mere 144 sq. ft., a small bedroom, is a stretch. All 100 CADR air cleaners are too weak to clean real rooms.

Using 100 Watts on high, Hygia is no Energy Star.

PCO installations are only as strong as the UV lamp, have partial oxidation byproduct safety issues beyond those posed by plasma-ion machines, and require advanced metals added to the Titanium catalyst for maximum effectiveness.

UV installations have frequent maintenance and serious safety issues, and are an environmental hazard (mercury vapor lamp).

The Hygia manual warns that the UV lamp should not be looked at, is extremely fragile (releases mercury vapor if broken), and should only be replaced by a qualified technician.

UV bulbs MUST be replaced annually to remain effective, even when they still emit light.

But to make matters worse, there is no replacement bulb offered anywhere.

A review at Amazon.com reports the company is slow in the customer service area and that, per Germ Guardian, bulb failure within 2 years of purchase is considered a warranty issue.

Amazon Hyglia 6 remarks.

That means retain proof of purchase, ship it to them, they replace cheap bulb, ship back.

If the bulb "fails" after two years, you pay for everything, maybe $100.

Everything about this scenario should strike you as completely unacceptable.

Now I am pretty sure this is a very standard UV bulb, probably 5 to 6 watts, and could be replaced by many do-it-yourselfers for $15. But the average user will just naively assume the PCO is working when it is not.

Here your environmental concerns are compounded - this machine is going to the landfill, probably with the mercury bulb still installed - far sooner than any Sharp.

Another negative review at Amazon mentions burnt odors from motor out-gassing and issues with the company and a vendor.

Germ Guardian's FLT6000 Filter Replacement Pack, $50 - $80, contains the HEPA filter and a charcoal filter, with 6 to 12 month replacement intervals. This results in very high annual costs for a filter set not comparable to the Sharp offering.

The Germ Guardian EV9102 Air Sanitizer, a companion product, and its marketing claims, are reviewed here;

Germ Guardian EV9102 UV-C Air Sanitizer Review.

In my opinion, at $199.99 to $265.99, with significant cost, safety, marketing, and maintenance issues, Germ Guardian Hygia 6 is not in the same league with Sharp FP-P40CX.

True-cost-to-own is very high, performance questionable, and support weak.

You have made a good choice, just keep coarse dust out of the Sharp HEPA by frequent room vacuuming and avoid exposing the carbon filter to heavy chemical loads, especially formaldehyde and ozone.

The Plasmaclusters have been downgraded from the originals, but are still a leading product.

Properly installed and maintained, your Sharp will last longer, at a lower overall cost, than any mass market air cleaner in its price class.

Best wishes,

Ed