MideaDuo 14,000 BTU (12,000 BTU SACC) High Efficiency Inverter Ultra Quiet Portable Air Conditioner, with Heat up to 550 Sq. Ft., Works with Alexa/Google Assistant, with Remote Control & Window Kit

Update - 4 months in--------------Decided to do a follow up since it's getting into the summer time now and I've had this now for the past 4 months.For context I live in the inland empire with dry desert California climate. As we speak right now It's 97 degrees in my room of around 350-400 ft. I bought this to circumvent issues I was having with my central AC that my landlord is being extremely stingy about getting properly fixed that froze on me last summer, and even froze on me this week when I turned it on again for this extremely hot weather.Ive primarily have used it before in hot weather so I knew it would work but I was worried that I was crossing the threshold of efficiency where it would be better to simply use my AC instead of doing my hacky solution. Except for trying to get the ac fixed and this past week I have not turned on my AC a single time during this summer or this week with over 90 degree weather.And this has been not only working, but still working more efficiently than my AC for my space. It's really good at being able to regulate itself at a decent level when your room is at the temperature that you set. For my case however I do run this at 78, which is fine for me. The degrees it shows will be about 2-3 degrees cooler in your room to whatever you set it too, but I know that a lot of people like it way colder than I do in my room. The colder you run this unit, the less efficient it'll be, especially when your trying to work with extreme temperatures.I do suggest getting the warranty when you get this unit as the actual pipe you get with the unit is extremely flimsy and super expensive (around 60-100 dollars last time I looked). I had some damage on mine from setting it up, but found a workaround with drilling in screws instead to keep it in place, but I still got a replacement sitting in my room after sending them pictures from that.There are automations that come with the app that would help to make it more efficient I haven't played around with, but I suggest you do so as the only issue I've had running this consistently is it running when it's cooler outside, but my room retaining a lot of heat naturally due to how it was built. If you do this, I suggest getting an indoor thermostat so you can control when you turn it on conditionally by both your indoor temperatures and the outdoor temperaturees, as I've found in my case especially after dark it'll be cool outside but super hot in the house because of the heat cooling off from the walls.--------------------------------------------------------------------Im basing this on my first couple of days using this unit from a unusual heat wave for the past few days in cali, and not off any long term use from using the productI primarily was looking for a portable unit with the purpose of saving money in my small rental apartment. My AC over time has massively gone up over time and very likely needs to get an inspection but even with it working as intended, it's generally a very costly piece of equipment especially during the summer. I have an all electric unit - so the expense is already going to be higher than if I had gas, but the unit also being broken and older has also increased that cost over time.The unit itself is around 70ish pounds, so if you're looking to move this around upstairs, then I wouldn't get this unit. It is movable but you really want to utilize the wheels whenever possible. In my apartment, the 2 ideal locations that I would place this unit would either be my bedroom or my living room, which can both be accessed easily by wheeling it to where it needs to go.The installation of the unit is fairly straight forward. I actually have not done any permanent fixtures with the foam as I'm trying to avoid doing that as possible, but I haven't had any issues with the unit being semi fixed. The noise from outside seeps a bit more like this, but this also isn't a unit that I need to use all the time - as I really only need it when the weather gets hot.One primary concern that I have so far operating the unit is the hum of the refrigerant as it's going in the unit itself. The first couple of days it was making a very annoying audible sound that was mostly machine like, but it seems to have gone away after operating for the last few days. If you hear this noise, give it a few days to see if it goes away on its own.The other issue with this unit is the flimsiness of the installation itself. It's very easy to break the clips for your mounts, and the replacement cost for those pieces is around $79 dollars on midea's site. You have a limited warranty of 1 year on the unit itself, but I can see this breaking very easily after some time, especially if you move it around a lot.The unit has 4 modes, for mine it has a fan, cooling, and a dehumidifer mode. From using the auto mode it seems to do a fairly good job once the room is set to a certain temperature. Generally speaking though, with any AC, you should turn them on first thing in the morning when it's cool, so it doens't need to work as hard cooling your house. It's easier for it to maintain a cool temperature, then it is to bring down the temperature of your whole house.I've also seen people say "it doesn't carry air that well, but also try to use it in a 1000 ft garage, or some other weird area. This unit is specified to work for around 450-550 feet. My room is around 200-250, with my living room being around 500 ft with obstruction that makes it difficult to carry air if my doors are all open. If you need to carry air, grab a fan that can carry air in your room like a dreo or a vornado, or any kind of fan that can tilt or has the ability to swivel. My room says relatively cool, but my living room right now is at a different temperature without my engaging ingenuity around it, but I am able to circulate air into my living room by setting up my fans properly. It's just a hassle to do that constantly.Otherwise, for energy savings from my wattage hours it's operating at a much lower cost than it would to use my AC. Even if I needed to get more involved with adding more fans to circulate air in my house, that hack is significantly less than the amount of electricity im using right now. I haven't gotten a kill a wat to watch the unit, but from my bills alone, the total operation on a fairly hot day seems to be around 4 watts, vs my AC which would easily take 10 watts minimum even on an average day.

I have now purchased two Midea Duo 14,000BTU units. They both had mechanical issues on first use which I had to investigate and resolve. After that they have both been phenomenal. I would not buy any other unit, because I have bought other brands and theirs cannot hold a candle to Midea. See below for Midea issues as well as praise. Note: these Midea units have a large rotary fan which is held by a massive rubber… grommet? rubber… bearing? at only one end of the rotary fan. The fans also have a unique structure cast inside of the rotary fan (presumably to help draw air from one chamber to another within the ac unit). This unique fan structure and unique mounting of the fan requires Midea to counterweight the fans with metal weights at the factory. This style of fan has also lead to vibration and potential self destruction in these units. But when it works it works well.Praise: The unit itself is phenomenally well made, incredibly well thought out. Every detail has been planned for and the instructions are clear. The build quality is very good, form factor is excellent too. The Midea app is great and integration with the new device was seamless. The install video is great too.The ac works wonderfully well. Heat mode works phenomenally well and is super quiet. Heat mode does not require reconfiguration or any particular preparation other than hooking up the drain line. I used the included drain adaptor to run a 1/4” black silicon line to a glass gallon jug for heat condensate drainage. The Midea Duo 14,000 BTU unit (with heat) has an internal pump that pumps out condensate from heat mode. This is very helpful.Issues; Within a minute of turning on my first unit, it made a HORRIBLE persistent rattling sound. The compressor/cooling lines were rattling against each other. I was able to get in where these lines were and slide the vibration-dampening sleeve that was already on one pipe, further down the pipe, so it would actually keep the pipes from rattling against one another.My second unit (after sitting for 16-24 hours as it should) made a high pitched metal-on-metal squeaking sound emanating from the compressor when I turned on the ac. I immediately turned the unit off, pondered for a bit, then ran the unit in heat mode, this immediately resolved the metal-on-metal squeaking issue. It now runs perfectly in heat or cooling mode.P.S. These units do make a high pitched whine sometimes, but most people will learn to tune it out.Do not attempt to repair these without some knowledge and caution of these sorts of things.P.P.S. This unit replaced a Whynter ARC-14S that was much bigger, louder, had no heat, and finally, it did not work well. So Whynter went back!Edit Jan 2023:This unit is 8 months old and now periodically emits a loud buzz and does not work. I believe the compressor is freezing up. The issue occurs a few times a day, sometimes once a week. Midea Customer Service asks silly questions and marked my ticket as "Solved" when I failed to reply within 5 days (including weekends). Not impressed. I am now seeking a replacement or refund if possible.Edit Jan (late) 2023: Midea customer service refunded me for the malfunctioning unit. I am a little concerned that it was not worth repairing a $700 unit, and now I must pay a $60 disposal fee for freon containing devices in CA, but overall I appreciate Midea’s customer service.