Good for allergies

I have very bad allergies. In fact, I currently take five medications daily to try and combat them, and my life is still a living hell of congestion, watery eyes, runny nose...you name it. Now the smart person would get rid of their cats, but I kind of like the little critters, and they're really not ready to live on their own yet -- they don't even have jobs!

So like any person with severe allergies, I do the ritual cleanings of my house that involve special anti-allergy products, hepa filters on the vacuum cleaner, and nagging of the husband to do the dusting, since I can't do it without practically dying (well, that's an exaggeration, but he doesn't need to know that). All of this helps, but I wanted to be more proactive in addressing allergens in my house by trying to purify the air. I do have an old Hunter air purifier that runs in the bedroom, but it's getting harder and harder to find the filters for it, and they're really expensive.

I was intrigued by the Sharper Image ionic air purifiers, but there's no way I'm going to pay $300 for something like this. For that kind of money, it had better not only purify my air, but get down on its hands and knees and scrub my kitchen floor. So the hunt was on to find a cheaper alternative...which I did find here on Epinions: the Ionic Pro. Oddly, all the reviews for the product appear to have disappeared, but you can still find them if you do a search on google for "ionic pro" -- hopefully the reviews from the old listing will get moved over to this listing eventually.

Basics

The Ionic Pro costs about $150, which I found much more acceptable than $300. I bought mine at Best Buy, but there are several places online that you can order it as well for about the same price.

It's about 2 and a half feet tall and maybe 8-12 inches round, and I believe it only comes in black. There's a button on top that allows you to cycle from low-medium-high as well as turn it off. There's also a light that will light up if the Ionic Pro thinks it needs to be cleaned. Maybe it's not as snazzy looking as the Sharper Image version, but if you're buying your air purifiers based on looks, then you've got other issues to deal with.

It only comes with a one-year warranty, which didn't really matter to me. I don't think I've ever used a warranty on any product I've ever bought.

I can not comment on the noise it makes as we run a fan continuously in the bedroom where I'm using the Ionic Pro, because my husband needs some sort of noise to be able to sleep, and it covers up most of the noise the Ionic Pro makes. I do occasionally hear it make a zapping sound if I'm standing right next to it, like a bug zapper, but I don't find it very noticeable.

There is a very slight ozone smell that it exudes. I really don't notice it, and when I do, it smells like outdoors to me, so I don't mind it. Compared to the smoggy stench of outdoor Los Angeles, it's really not that bad.

One thing that I really don't like about it, though, is that it has this horrendously bright blue light at the top next to the button, to show which mode it is in. We use the Ionic Pro in our bedroom, and I'm way past the age of needing a night light. We solved the problem easily by cutting out a small piece of cardboard, and taping it over the light.

Care

Care of the product is pretty simple. Once a week, my husband turns off the Ionic Pro, and pulls out the collection blades. He then takes a very slightly damp paper towel, and wipes the blades clean (there's always a nice collection of gray yucky looking fuzz and dust). He does this in the evening, and it's dry by the time we go to bed.

One tip: squeeze the heck out of the paper towel that you're using to wipe the blades, until it's only slightly moist. You should not put the collection blades back in the machine until they're fully dry -- you can assure that they go back in quickly if you're careful about how much moisture you get on the blades while cleaning. The manual does state that if you use soap and water, then you need to wait 24 hours before re-inserting, but using a slightly damp cloth should only require a 2-3 hour wait.

To reinsert the blades, you must lay the unit on its side, as my husband found to his chagrin. I highly recommend that you read the instructions first :)

The manual recommends that you clean the ionizing wires every 8-10 days. This is very simple, and requires that you just pull a little mechanism attached to the Ionic Pro up and down a few times.

Finally, the manual recommends that you do a deep cleaning if you start hearing a lot of noise from the Ionic Pro. This requires using soap and water, and letting it dry for 24 hours. We haven't had to do this yet.

Does it work?

I've noticed a substantial improvement in my allergy symptoms while sleeping (we use the Ionic Pro in our bedroom). Normally, I'm very congested at night, and wake up in the morning with a sinus headache, but that has lessened quite a bit since I've started using it.

I really like that I don't have to buy expensive filters, and that it only requires cleaning once a week (which I can nag my husband into doing). I intend to buy at least one more of these, possibly two, for other rooms of the house that I frequent regularly.