Sharp CVP10MX 9,500 BTU Portable Air Conditioner with Full Function Remote Control, Large Capacity Dehumidification & Bucketless Design  Product Reviews

"I won't repeat the comments in the other reviews, which are generally accurate. If you want a portable air conditioner, well, you must make some compromises. I first used portable air conditioners professionally about twenty years ago, so I was aware that they had ducting requirements. If those are a problem for you, look for another solution. As background, our 16-year-old central air conditioner had a relay fail, and my wife was ill, so I needed to provide some heat relief fast. We live in a condominium and a window unit - the cheapest solution - was not allowed. I installed this in a couple of hours at night and it has been a blessed relief. I found that there are a couple of installation tips which may make your life easier. Every situation is different, these worked for me, but you should assess whether these will be useful in your particular circumstances. 1. Duct tape is your friend. Don't scoff - the purpose of duct tape is to seal air conditioning ducts, and guess what, that's what we are doing here. Rather than drill into your window frame to mount the duct opening and cover, duct tape will hold it and seal. Since ours is a temporary installation, this is fine. You may find it useful to fasten the window duct apparatus with duct tape for a week or two, until you decide exactly where you want the product permanently, then go through the drilling later when you are sure of the location. 2. Our window was an aluminum-framed horizontal slider. The instructions call for a security mount by screwing an L-shaped bracket to the sash and window frame. This is a BAD IDEA, since this makes it impossible to use the window for a fire exit. A 1x2 cut to the right length will secure the window, and can be removed easily in an emergency. Use our friend Mr. Duct Tape to secure the duct cover to the sliding window. Leave a utility knife handy to cut the duct tape just in case. In any event, for a high-crime area, consider the security impact of a partially-open window. 3. The plastic window opening cover/duct outlet comprises five pieces: two flat plates, a sliding connector to hold them together, a snap-in duct mount/insect guard, and an internal sliding piece to cover the duct opening when the duct mount is removed. For horizontal sliding windows, lose the internal sliding piece, which is always sliding down during the installation. This will make sense when you actually see the unit. 4. As designed, the snap-in duct mount was too long to fit inside our existing screen. I didn't want to remove the screen, which helped to conceal the duct, so I didn't use that, instead relying on our friend Mr. Duct Tape once more. 5. For horizontal sliding windows, this unit will work best with vertical blinds. 6. Make certain nothing leans on or obstructs the hose between the air conditioner itself and the window. Items leaning on the hose may destroy all your painstaking duct tape handiwork. The unit draws in air from the room being cooled. Some of this is chilled and returned to the room, and some is used in the heat exchanger portion of the air conditioner and exhausted outside. You will need to draw air into the room being cooled. This was not an issue for us. We are pleased with the unit, and found it more than ample for a roughly 250 square foot room. Highly recommended, just be aware that the exhaust installation is a bit fiddly. Don't forget the duct tape!"

"Living in a condo and presently not having the funds to install central, a portable was my only option and with 100 degree heat daily this summer I finally broke and bought one. Like the last reviewer, I also researched thoroughly before purchasing. However, I disagree with many of the reviewer's complaints. 1) The exhaust hose is a breeze to install and probably took me no more than a couple of minutes. I even had to cut mine down to size and it was not an issue. 2) I have honeycomb blinds on the window and the unit does not interfere in the least, so I am not sure why his are "rendered useless" by the a.c. unit. 3) Perhaps he is a very light sleeper, because I have mine running right this very minute on the highest mode and it is still "library quiet" in my opinion. My window fan makes at least 10x more noise than this machine. 4) Nearly all operational displays are on the remote, but the unit also comes with a remote holder on the back for easy storage. If you put it in it's place, you won't lose it. I love the sleekness of this product and am happy that it does not have a bunch of number and digital displays on the front. They designed this unit to blend in as seamlessly as possible with the indoor environment, and I appreciate that. I paid full price for my unit and would do it again in a heartbeat. I have the 10,000 BTU unit and am using it to cool off a fairly large area which includes a kitchen, living room, and dinette area...probably some 450 to 500 square feet. It cools like a champ! This a.c. was worth every penny and I am a very satisfied customer. "

"I just purchased this Sharp CV-P10MX from Bed Bath and Beyond for [...]- 20% coupon + 8.25% tax - 5% bonus CASHBACK rebate for using my Discover card. Total net purchase price for me was about [...]. That's the best deal I could find and I didn't have to wait for shipping. I got the A/C unit today. The unit is big. Look at the measurements carefully before purchasing. You need enough space right next to your window for this unit. Even though this is a portable unit with casters to move it around, the exhaust hose setup is more or less semi-permanent. Once installed it's not meant to be taken off very easily. So keep that in mind. Once you've installed it, you essentially can't use your window again to bring in fresh air--not without taking down the exhaust hose installation. Don't get me wrong. I LIKE this portable unit quite a bit. I do solidly recommend purchasing this unit if you need a portable AC. For what it does, it does it well. The cooling performance is SOLID! Don't listen to other users with similar NON-Sharp units complaining about it not working or not bringing the temp down enough. They either have faulty units or didn't install the exhaust hose properly. These kind of AC units WORK and they work quite well for what they are designed to do. BUT there are shortcomings with these designs. For one, we have blinds AND curtains installed on our windows. With this portable AC installed on this set of windows, our blinds and curtains become essentially useless. Please keep that in mind. Also, it's a real pain to install the exhaust hosing contraption properly into your window frame and to make sure the insulation is properly insulated. It's not impossible but a real pain. Another bad design about this particular SHARP unit is that there's no display on the AC unit itself. ONLY the remote has all the info/stats. So you can't tell what's going on with the unit just by looking at it. For example, you can't tell the current temp--or at least what the AC unit thinks is the current temp. You can only set the desired temp. on the remote unit. Additionally, you can't tell what setting the fan is currently running at just by looking at the unit. You have to go check your remote, and even then, you don't really know what the real fan speed is currently running at, only that you've set your remote to a certain setting. If you don't point the remote directly at the unit, it may show that you're running at high speed but really you're running at low or medium speed. It's a bad design pure and simple. The AC unit itself should have a display with all pertinent info AND it should have buttons to allow you to change the settings of the AC unit. As it stands, you can ONLY turn the unit on and off on the unit itself. Everything else is controlled by the remote. Make damn sure you don't lose your remote or else it essentially becomes useless to customization. Another bad design is that the louvers ONLY automatically adjust UP and DOWN. For side to side adjustment, you have to MANUALLY adjust it by going to the unit itself and using your hands to adjust it. What this means is that you get auto action of up and down but not side to side. If your room is very small, it may suffice for just this up/down action, but if you have a bigger room, you're going to get frustrated with the lack of automatic side to side movement of the louvers. Again, bad design. One of the biggest reason for getting the SHARP units is how quiet they are suppose to be in the lowest setting--supposedly 36 db--however that is just the sound of the fan operating by itself--meaning when the compressor isn't working to produce the actual COLD air. When the AC unit has kicked in with the compressor, the sound, even at the lowest setting, is not very quiet. It's definitely not something you can fall asleep to unless you get adjusted to the sound. Having said that, the Sharp will be the quietest of all the portable AC units out there. I've done ample research before purchasing this unit and this is by far the most quiet unit on the market today. So if you want the quietest machine, this is the unit to purchase but don't be fooled into thinking that it's truly quiet. It's NOT. It'll take some getting use to before one can go to sleep without ear plugs with this unit on. (I've been using ear plugs since my college dorm days to fall asleep so it doesn't bother me one bit but it will bother others initially I'm certain.) All in all, I solidly like this unit and I believe it's one of the best out there. I am quite satisfied with this purchase. It will absolutely cool your room. If it doesn't, you've either installed it incorrectly or you have a faulty unit. If installed properly, it WILL work very well. But there are shortcomings--described above--to these portable AC units, by nature of their design, not isolated to SHARP units only. Realize these shortcomings before purchasing these kind of portable AC machines and you won't be very disappointed once you get it home and installed. I know when the next heat wave comes this way, I'll be sitting happily in my bedroom surfing the net with a very "cool" smile and appreciating my Sharp CV-P10MX very much. :) (I would give this machine 5 stars if they improved upon the user design. Otherwise very happy with the cooling performance of this Sharp CV-P10MX!)"