Honeywell HWM450 Quick Steam Warm Moisture Humidifier
by Honeywell
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Tools and Hardware Reviews of Honeywell HWM450 Quick Steam Warm Moisture Humidifier
Customer Review: Best made Humidifier on the market
Summary: 5 Stars
I am a skilled Commercial/Industrial Equipment Repair Technician and I can tell you this is a well built unit. I have answers to all the questions in this message area and to all the issues some people are having with simple user problems.
The Warm mist is the best to buy for the winter, it puts out the most humidity and helps to warm the house. It doesn't have bacteria like cold water units which need filters and are best used during summer months to help COOL the room.
Like all equipment there is maintenance, and some required maintenance is well worth the comfort and relief you get from the dry air in the room during the winter months when the humidity levels drop down into the teens!!
Whenever water is boiled any calcium, iron, and air you have in your water will separate from it. Same here, if you have hard water calcium will collect in the bottom of the water reservoir. Honeywell knows this and has made this unit capable of being used in such situation. If you have very hard water you can use the mineral pads, some supplied, to help absorb the minerals.
Water softeners help to remove most of the calcium and iron that makes your water hard. You do not need to use the mineral pad, the unit will operate better without it!! Use it in situations if you have very hard water only. Most of the extra noise is when air gets trapped below the pad because the air holes are blocked during use, and it builds up pressure and pops.
Do not clean the pad and reuse, it shreds and blows up blocking the air holes in the 2 layer pad. The holes must line up and not get crossed like closing a valve trapping more air in the bottom of the tank.
As the Humidity in your home drops the moisture in everything in your home dries up, the wood, furniture, walls, and floor, so it will take some time (about 1 to 2 weeks) until you get all the moisture back into everthing. Water levels below 40% are considered to be dry, and 30% and below are very dry. You can get nose bleed and headaches below 35%!!Ideal levels are 45 to 50 percent. In the winter it is harder to get levels up because you have constant drying from the weather and your heating system. Dry mouth and sinus relief can be noticed above 40%. I recommend a unit for each floor. You may need to fill it once a day on low, and twice a day on high, hence the different output levels. Whatever it takes to achieve your desired humidity level.
So the water, type of heating, weather, and construction of your home are factors effecting the overall performance you will get in aquiring your desired humidity level. This unit puts out up to 4 gal a day, that is awsome!! The more it is used the more you will have to clean it depending on how hard your water is. Remember a water softener will help most situations.
All in all this unit will handle the job, it's stainless steel heating plate is easy to clean, just pop the unit apart, brush and rinse the parts off, it all washes well in the wash room. Only the calcium thing is a problem for those who have very hard water, but in most cases a water softener is used and should take care of the problem.
Use the mineral pads only if you have a hard water problem, turn the output level to the low setting after the humidity level is achieved. Check the mineral level in the reservoir when you fill the tank, you can see the water when you lift the tank off, if the water is dirty, it needs to be cleaned soon (every 1-2 weeks, takes 5-10 minutes). The unit will shutdown if the water is too dirty, cool heh!!
I recommend this unit over any other brand out there, don't mess with the ultrasonic nightmare units, I hear they are a real headache and spit dirt all over the place, the maintenance it high too, plus the filters are expensive!!
Customer Review: Good - not the best
Summary: 3 Stars
Honeywell Quick Steam - This unit quickly and noticeably humidifies a room. Since it's the hot steam type you can actually see the steam and you feel it in the air. It has a built-in hygrometer, so you can see the humidity level and select the level you want. It has a smaller tank - needs refilled more often than others. Also has a filter, but only for the water, so it never has a bad smell. It gurgles and my wife can't sleep in a room with it. The sound from the other units is limited to the sound of the fan, which on low is fairly quiet and on high is like white noise.
Other options I have owned:
Honeywell QuietCare - This unit will also definitely humidify a room. It has a built in hygrometer. So you can set it to get to a certain level and stop. The two big tanks make the job of filling it less frequent, and the two-tank design is a good idea since it would be hard for most people to handle a single tank with 11 gallons of water. On the downside, it's a bit loud on high and you need it on high when it's cold outside and the humidity inside is low. The tanks often don't work, as they have to be positioned just right and I've never mastered getting them on 100% right 100% of the time. It has a filter, so it's cleaning the air - but the instructions tell you to remove the (rather large) filter and re-wet it every time you fill it. That's such a pain I doubt anyone would do it. Another reviewer suggested just flipping it over each time - good idea! After a while it begins to smell a bit moldy, so you have to clean it and change the filter.
The Venta LW 44 is my favorite unit. It has no filter at all. It cleans the air using the water. It's easy to fill, and requires less attention in terms of filling and cleaning. Overall it's a simpler design. Visually it's the least obtrusive unit - the only one my daughter would allow in her room. It's also the quietest. It also cleans the air so it eliminates an air cleaning device. In some reviews it is criticized for not humidifying. Unlike the others it doesn't have a built-in hygrometer. The moisture it puts into the air is not as noticeable as the others. However, I got a separate hygrometer and it works as well as the others. The humidity can be the same level in a room, and it will feel more humid with one unit than another. The steam units make you feel the moisture the most. The feeling of moisture - by-the-way - is not good. The less it feels moist the better. Venta allows you to use scented oils, if you like that option. Others do not. Amazon has several hygrometers. I got the Honeywell TM005X Wireless Thermo-Hygrometer.
Central Unit - The central unit will not do the job alone. We have a two-story house and it really has no impact on the upper level, where the bedrooms are and where you most need it.
Air-O-Swiss U7142 Ultrasonic humidifier. I saw it at a Bed, Bath and Beyond while shopping and it looked so slick I got it. It's not obvious until you get it home, but the instructions require you to place it up 3 feet off the ground, even though it looks like a floor unit. This is going to be a problem in most rooms because it limits where you can put it and it becomes the visual focus of the room. It worked for one day, though it produced a lot of white powder that covered the unit itself and would have become a problem for every object in the room. It only got the room to 29% humidity. On the second day the red light was on, so I refilled it and could never get it to work again. After hours of effort and troubleshooting with the customer support line, I could never make it work. The good news is that Bed, Bath and Beyond was super easy to deal with on the return and had the Venta model I discovered when troubleshooting the Air-O-Swiss.
Customer Review: excellent warm mist humidifier -- you will not be sorry!
Summary: 5 Stars
I am extremely pleased with this humidifier. I much prefer warm mist models to cool mist models due to the quiet operation and soothing mist. I recently had to replace my veteran warm mist model that has since been discontinued and in my two year search I purchased (and returned!) nine (yes, nine) different warm and cool mist models from various manufacturers before I found this one. I was absolutely disgusted with what is on the market, even at four times the price. Cool mist ones that promise to be "ultra quiet" sound like jet engines; ultrasonic models produce unbelievable amounts of fine white dust even with new water treatment technologies that claim to reduce mineral output. Warm mist models are especially hard to find (forget it if you want digital controls) and tend to have very low output.
I am very pleased to say that the HWM450 lives up to my very high standards and I'm quite surprised to see some of the poor reviews here. I've had mine for about 3 months. I knew this was the one when I first unpacked it. I was so accustomed to the poor design and flimsy construction of the other models I've owned that I was literally taken aback when I disassembled it. The technical design of this humidifer is absolutely beautiful. The heating plate is stainless steel and has a large surface area. A heavy plastic baffle/deflector sits inside the unit over the heating plate in an upside-down cone fashion to create an enclosed steam chamber which enables it to operate quietly and have surprisingly high output on its highest setting. Unlike other models, the steam chamber design is brilliant because it clearly traps as much heat as possible near the heating plate in an effort to keep energy use reasonable. It has the additional benefit of helping to muffle the sound of the boiling water.
The mineral absorption pads do a reasonably good job of controlling mineral buildup. I live in a city with relatively hard water and I find I need to clean the unit and change the pad once a week. Get some cleaning solution designed for humidifiers (or white vinegar works, too) and cover the heating plate with it. It helps to slightly elevate the opposite end of the unit to encourage more of the cleaning solution to stay on the plate instead of draining into the rest of the tray. Let it soak for 30-60 mins and then use an old toothbrush to brush off the softened minerals. If it doesn't get clean on the first soak, repeat. You should be able to get it spotlessly clean without scrubbing.
Pros:
- Quiet, like you'd expect from a warm mist model
- Produces more humidity than any other model I've tried
- Three levels of humidity output
- Digital controls
- Hygrometer (humidity meter) that ACTUALLY WORKS ACCURATELY and is not tricked by the humidity generated by the unit
- Timer feature could be useful if you're not using it in the winter
- Doesn't produce any white dust like ultrasonic models do
- Sturdy construction; obviously well-designed
Cons:
- Mineral absorption pad needs to be replaced regularly (I've found weekly) for optimal operation
- Needs more cleaning than cool mist or ulatrasonic models (cleaning is relatively painless, though -- see comments above)
- Water tank could be larger, although you'll get 20-24 hours out of it on the normal output setting once you're maintaining the desired humidity
Again, I can't recommend this model enough.
Customer Review: Very good vaporizer-type humidifier
Summary: 5 Stars
Overall, this is a good humidifier. We have one of these humidifiers, a Honeywell "cool mist" humidifier, and an Air-O-Swiss ultrasonic humidifer to humidify our 2,400 sq ft home in Phoenix, which has very low humidity especially in the winter time. This is the third season we've used this unit.
Mode of operation: This humidifier works by boiling water. The boiled water creates steam. The steam is slightly cooled as it passes upwards, to release warm, bordering on hot, invisible steam from the unit.
Ability to humidify: Of all three of our humidifiers, this is in the middle in its ability to humidify. It does a great job raising the humidity in our bedroom while we sleep, but doesn't affect the humidity in the rest of the house that much.
Noise: The boiling process creates a rather nice white noise of gurgling sounds. You will hear bubbling sounds on occasion as the water from the tank is let into the unit. If you hear pops or clicks -- which can sound quite violent -- then this means that the humidifier needs cleaning.
Hygrometer accuracy: The digital hygrometer is pretty accurate, being a couple of points greater than what our stand-alone hygrometers read.
Type of water that has to be used: You can use any type of water, but the type of water you use dictates how hard it will be to clean the unit. Reverse osmosis or distilled water will basically leave the unit inside spotless. We use softened water, and salt deposits form inside the unit as a result of the boiling process, but these deposits just flake right off. If you use hard water, the hard water deposits (calcium, magnesium) will be much more difficult to clean.
Ease of cleaning: As noted above, it really depends on the type of water you use. I pour vinegar into the base every week to clean off the softened water salt deposits. Once a month I use Air-O-Swiss's "EZ Cal" (or "EZCal") humidifier cleaner/descaler, which is a little more aggressive than vinegar, and renders the stainless steel boiling plate nearly as clean when we took the humidifier out of the box for the firs ttime. It may be worthwhile to use this type of cleaner every week if you have hard water deposits, as it removes them more easily than vinegar. Every week, I also wash the tank and the base in the dishwasher (on "gentle"). Cleaning weekly is a must unless you use distilled or reverse osmosis water, to remove the deposits that can affect the efficiency of the unit, and that can cause popping noises.
Consumables: There is just one consumable: a very inexpensive filter pad that soaks up some of the minerals. These are very inexpensive, and sold in packs of 12 I believe. A pad lasts about two weeks, although if you have hard water, it may only last one week.
Other thoughts: This type of humidifier uses the most energy, and is the worst to use around kids (because if they topple the unit, they can be exposed to boiling water) -- but at the same time, is the safest to use in terms of the cleanliness of the steam it puts out. Germs, bacteria, mold, algae, etc., are all burned off or killed in the boiling process. You will never have white dust (i.e., minerals) in the steam leaving the unit, because the boiling process causes all minerals to lodge themselves in the base of the humidifier. If you are concerned about bad things coming with the steam leaving a humidifier, this is the humidifier for you.
Customer Review: If only it can boost a higher humidity level ...
Summary: 3 Stars
I bought this humidifier from Amazon after a really extensive research exercise. I can't remember how many websites/forums I've visited ... I've looked at brands like Air-O-Swiss, Bionaire, Vicks & obviously Honeywell; what I'm looking for is a unit that doesn't require filter change, quiet operation, good enough for a bachelor (<600 sq-ft)and hopefully last reasonably long. I've been through 3 humidifiers already in the past 3 years: an ultrasonic one (can't remember the brand name, not 1 of those 4 aforementioned) that ceased to work after just over a year with white deposit gumming up the vibrating plate, a Vicks boiler type that ceased to work after a few months when it started to output no mist but burnt smell, & a Honeywell fan-blowing cool-mist HCM-890 which is louder than an industrial blower. I'm sick & tired of constantly needing to find a better humidifier so you won't believe how much I struggled before I committed on this HWM450 of Honeywell.
So I've been using it for a couple of months now. The 1 thing that I can say about the unit is ... an ok product. The general user comments on Amazon about this product are by-and-large accurate - quiet machine, above average water capacity storage, lots of maintenance work required, not really powerful moisture output etc. Even though it's a boiler, it's somewhat quieter than my previous Vicks, but with 3 gallons there're not too many other options that can rival its tank capacity. But tank capacity is 1 thing, humidity level achievable is another - isn't that what humidifier is for afterall? According to the build-in display, the unit can raise the humidity of my bachelor to 40% only, regardless of whether I set the target to 40% or higher, & changing the 3 power levels won't matter at all. In fact only the middle level can constantly reach 40% whereas the lower & high are touch-&-go. For comparison, my noisy HCM890 can easily push the humidity to beyond 55%. I live in Toronto, & being in a condo with forced air humidity is constantly below 20%, so I guess 40% is better than 20%! It also takes a long time to go up to 40% as well - I'd say > 2 hrs than plateau & couldn't go any higher until emptying the tank. & to be fair a full tank will keep the humidity at 40% or just below throughout the entire night & beyond, even at the high power level. We have hard water from our taps, so deposit appears on the heating plate even after the 1st time I used it. But thanks to the other users' suggestion on this forum, white vinegar cleans up the deposit very easily, & I found that cleaning every week after daily usage is more than enough. 1 more bone to pick maybe is the tank cap, not sure why but I have trouble lining up the threads everytime I try to tightly it up, & whatever I do still feels like the cap is kinked, but everytime the tank fits properly back to the base & doesn't seem to leak, so I guess it's just a poor molding of the threads on my unit.
I paid $65 including everything for this, can't really say it's a great deal but it's the best deal I could find by the time. Certainly I was expecting a not-so-cheap humidifier to lift humidity level higher than it does, but I'm not aware of any alternative that has all its pros without its cons. So I can't say I regret buying it - especially if it lasts longer than any of my previous ones. But it's certainly a case of can be better.