Vornado 184 Whole Room Air Circulator Tower Fan, 41", 184-41", Black

UPDATE July 2015:2 years of nearly daily use here in The Hot Southwest. Working as GREAT as the day we bought it. Ironically, ALL of our Vornado fans are still like new. NO complaints-period.------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Below is a copy of my review of the model 154 I also bought. I want to ad that measuring sound, this largest model 184 is by FAR more quiet and blows a LOT more useable air at the same time than my model 154. It has taken me some time living with all these fans to be sure of their differences. If I could choose all over again, I would simply have bought 2 of these 184 models and called it a day. Of course this is too tall to not block the view of our TV so I suppose I really just had no choice. For the record, EVERY room in our house has ceiling fans and forced a/c. But I find that using fans down lower to the ground, do a better job cooling than do ceiling fans, blowing all that hot air gathering up high.In the past month I have now purchased from Amazon a collection of fans. I bought the:Honeywell Fresh Breeze Tower Fan with Remote Control, HY-048BPand Vornado 184 Whole Room Tower Circulator, 41"and:Lasko 4000 Air Stik Ultra-Slim Oscillating Fanas well as this fan the Vornado 154 Whole Room Tower FanI have found this to be the perfect compromise in cooling, noise, price, RELIABLE features. I love the look of the Honeywell but I am disabled and the remote simply SUCKS. In fact, if flat out does NOT work....My disabilities are now so severe that the most important feature of all in the end has become a remote as there are times I literally can NOT even get up to make changes. Ordinarily I would think any remote for a fan was simply stupid. But then I never expected to be a basket case either. I have discovered that in a heartbeat, your world can change....The results I walk away with in the end (as far as comparisons go is that to ME the largest Vornado 184 is the most quiet on the 2 lowest settings (it has 4 speeds instead of just 3) and yet moves FAR more air than the Honeywell. My only problem is it is to tall and blocks the view of our big screen TV. This 154 is the perfect and EXACT size of the Honeywell without the base extension so sits perfectly below the screen and still has the 4 speeds, not just 3. The lowest setting actually seems a bit less quiet than even on the Vornado 184. Not sure why, I had assumed the internals would probably be the same as on the 184. I may have been wrong. Reason I suspect this is that it also seems LOUDER on the highest setting than on the 184 model. All I know for sure is in a side by side test, this Vornado blows quite a lot more air on high than does my 3 speed Honeywell. And the Honeywell is LOUD on all 3 settings by comparison than either the Vornado 154 or 184. In my bedroom, I place this on the floor (carpet) and on the lowest setting of #4, I have it 8 feet away from me and it is almost too strong of a breeze, strong enough to dry out my throat in about an hour. I actually now turn it more away from me so instead it will just circulate the are AROUND the room instead of directly on me. I tried setting it on a 30 inch high wood table but the normally almost silent/lowest setting now resonated a pretty loud hum so back to the carpet it went. Make no mistake, the lowest setting WILL move plenty of air but you need to give it a few minutes to get the job of circulation to take effect.I like the look of the Honeywell far better than any fan I ever owned. But then I am getting used to the look of these Vornado fans as well and the real important difference is that they move the air in a far wider arc than any other brand. The Honeywell and others simply do no more (to ME) than any simple conventional fan does, yet they make far more noise than any conventional fan. NOT something I like. We also have 3 15 year old school pedestal/conventional stand fans I got on sale for 20 bucks each at k mart for $19.99. All are 14 inch and can be made to oscillate or not etc. These were the very first thing I ever bought made in China. I KNEW they would fail in a month but for 20 bucks I thought, "why not". And here I am, they all work as good as the day I bought them! Go figure. But again, becoming unexpectedly disabled, my fan search began so I could control them from bed or my recliner when unable to move on my own.I read prior reviews about this having a strong odor. Mine has had NO odor of any kind so guess I got lucky for once. Even though at the lowest setting it seems a tad more noisy that the larger 184 series, it is still perfectly fine for my bedroom to sleep without being disturbed. I am considering returning the Honeywell and buying another 184 Vornado since it is a far more simple design without all the features that FAIL. Like:Honeywell problems:1-The remote that NEVER works correctly.2-The so called ionizer that fails almost ALWAYS within warranty period and always at some point thereafter.3-The oscillation feature which get noisy and ALWAYS fails and is simply not needed with this style Vornado.Bottom line for me is the Vornado's of this style move far more air in a very WIDE swath with NO need to oscillate so less to go wrong. It is just a far more simple design. I can best describe it this way. I sit on one side of our living room 14 feet away from the fan & TV. My wife sits at the same distance away on the couch on the other side of that living room 6 feet to my right side. ANY other tower fan has to oscillate to hit us both at the same time, just giving one of us at a time, a BRIEF blast of air, then nothing. This Vornado as well as model 184 hits us BOTH at the same time continuously, with no need to oscillate. It also cools down the entire room much faster and at a much lower (quieter with less electricity) setting.No fake ionizer to fail & take out the entire fan as well as complicated/faulty remote. The remote control works 100% FLAWLESSLY so if lazy or disabled as I am, it becomes your best friend if bedridden. This once thought trivial feature has become the difference between being trapped in bed all day miserable or being comfortable and that difference is just something I can't stress enough. In the end, my overall opinion is that the best 2 single fans for me are this Vornado 154 and the Vornado 184. Between these 2 fans alone, there is simply NO cooling need that is not met. They cost more. But they DO more with less to go wrong. They also have a 5 year warranty. Ordinarily I never ever give any product 5 stars unless it has stood the test of time. But this journey into the world of tower fans has been such a pain and so full of real surprises, as well as expense, I find this brand to be head & shoulders above the rest. What I need may not be what YOU need etc.....But I have found the performance differences to be so profound in price, performance, noise, convenience (remote control effectiveness) an the like that this simply HAS to get 5 stars from me. If & when it changes, I will adjust this rating down if needed or reiterate how well it has earned it as time goes by. This style and brand has flat out earned it's 5 stars from me, and become a new best friend.

The 42 inch Vornado Tower Fan does a great job of moving air and is a very good fan. As an air mover circulator that actually doesn't move the fan does a great job of moving air, unlike an oscillating fan nothing pivots or rotates the ingenious curved vent naturally and efficiently puts the air in motion without actually moving resulting in a gentle breeze to circulate and balance the temperature of a room. It will not cool the air but somehow manages to blend the air so that warm spots become cooler. The reality is this is not an AC unit so the change in temp is a result of the blending of the zones of air naturally balancing out the hot spots, as well as the gentle movement of the air so that you can feel cooler. If you are one that needs a rush of air of any type to manage your body temp then this is not that type of fan and you would be better of with a blower that bursts air out of it. This fan is when on high is not silent but, thankfully it is not any louder than our other stand Vornado when set on high. On low and medium it is a ninja, our cats and the wife and I have had no problems sleeping to this fan. The large tower is indeed tall for this type of unit. Sturdy and since there really aren't any moving parts is a well built solid design. The only thing you need to do is attach the base of the unit, pop in the batteries of the remote and prepare to enjoy the breeze. Highly recommended! (P.S. We do not use this for the kitchen...at least not yet.)

I'm now set up to work from home in my basement. Typically, you wouldn't really need to worry about COOLING a basement, but I have about 3000 watts of waste heat pouring out of equipment around me. Until I can get a split AC system set up in the basement, my comfort is largely dependent on moving the heat around. A large Utilitech 24" fan right behind me worked well enough, but it is way too loud to have on during audio or video calls. That's where the Vornado 184 Whole Room Air Circulator Tower Fan, 41", 184-41" (Black) comes in...My previous experience with the Vornado brand consists of a Vornado 660 fan, which I'd been pretty happy with. As a result, I decided to look at the brand's tower fan offerings, when I started my research. Sure enough, the Vornado 184 isn't the cheapest option, but I thought it may be worth it if it worked well enough. The 184 arrived in a comically large box. Inside? Another large box. I suppose it worked well, though, as the item was intact and undamaged. Assembly consists of sliding the two base halves together, and then attaching the base to the fan unit with 4 self-tapping screws - it takes about two minutes. The fan is pretty distinctive looking, with it's large, curved vertical vanes. It's not ugly, but the piano black gloss of the base and the very top of the unit make it look a little more downmarket.I selected the 184, over the 154, because it's only a little shorter than me, when I'm sitting in my desk chair. I do have some notes on the functionality of the fan. In operation, the 184 has four fan speeds. The lowest fan speed is nearly silent, but moves very little air. The second fastest mode works well, but is pretty acoustically conspicuous. The fastest mode circulates air extremely well, but is too loud for videoconferencing. I would have preferred changing the speeds from 1 - 2 - 3 - 4, to 1.5 - 2.5 - 3 - 4. The base seems stable, even when on carpet. The controls, and remote, operate logically. Two minor gripes... 1.) the fan indicator is not really visible from a seated position - doming the top cap a bit would have made this possible, and 2.) it's fine that the fan is not a "smart" IoT device, but it's a little more difficult to automate with an external IR device due to the iterative nature of the fan speed selection.All in all the Vornado 184 is a good fan. While I don't really know that much differentiates it mechanically from other tower fans, I will say that it works well. It's also good to know that they have (and honor) the 5-year warranty on these items, as they tend to have a high duty cycle. Recommended