The Austin Air HealthMate is a great air purifier for home or business use. This air purifier is a serious machine and should garner the attention of anybody that is in the market for an air purifier.

The Austin Air will remove from the air a variety of contaminants including dust, pollen, dander, odors and chemical vapors. This air purifier is rated by Austin Air to be effective in areas up to 1500 square feet. That is a good chunk of space for sure.

The Austin Air Healthmate is a good option for both allergy sufferers and asthma sufferers.

Straightforward Air Purification

Compared to other air purifiers in it’s price range (around $400-$500) it pretty basic in functionality, meaning it doesn’t have a lot of “extra” features, but it packs a punch in the filtration department.

Other air purifiers in this price range have features such as timer controls, filter replacement indicator lights or a remote control. This might deter some people, but the filtration capabilities and low maintenance that the Austin Air HealthMate offers more than make up for the lack of extra features.

Low Maintenance

The Austin Air HealthMate air purifiers are known for their low maintenace cycles and costs. This is the kind of air purifier that you can pretty much turn on and just let it do it’s thing. The most maintenance you might need to do on a regular basis is vacuum the outside pre-filter and that’s about it.

Austin Air claims that the air filters in the HealthMate will last 5 years before before needing to be replaced under normal air purification conditions. That is much longer than the typical 6 months to 1 year that you will get out of the filters on many other air purifiers.

Four Stages of Air Filtration Media

The Austin Air HealthMate air purifiers use a 4 stage filtration process.

The first stage is the large particle pre-filter that encases the rest of the filtration media. The large particle pre-filter removes large, visible particles from the air.

The second stage is the medium particle pre-filter. This filter will knock out many of the other small to medium size particles that make it through the large particle pre-filter.

The third stage is 15 pounds of activated carbon and zeolite. Yep, 15 pounds! The carbon and zeolite will remove chemical, odors and gases from the air with ease.

The fourth stage is 60 feet of true HEPA filter media to polish out the air that is passing through the Austin Air HealthMate.

5 Year Filter and Mechanical Warranty

The AustinAir HealthMate air purifiers come with a 5 year mechanical warranty and a 5 year filter warranty. It should be noted that these warranties cover normal “residential” air purification conditions.

If you are going to be using the unit in extreme circumstances you might have a hard time getting your unit replaced under the warranty. You also need to return the warranty card to Austin Air to be able to take advantage of the warranty.

Excellent Air Purification

On the Austin Air web site they claim that the HealthMate will filter 250 cubic feet of air every minute. Considering that much air is being pulled through that much filter media and carbon/zeolite, this is quite a beast of an air purifier. This air purifier will work well in any size room in your home, provided you don’t live in a vaulted ceiling castle of a house!

Even then, the HealthMate will perform better than most other cost-comparable air purifiers in medium to large size rooms.

The Alen Paralda was released only recently by Alen Corporation. This is an air purifier that is touted to use less energy than a light bulb. I guess that is green!

From a recent press release:

“Paralda is unlike any air purifier previously available to U.S. consumers to date – it creates an entirely new category,” said Peter Mann, CEO of Alen Corporation. “The powerful yet extremely energy efficient four-speed Paralda couples stylish design with the most advanced HEPA filtration cleaning system available, a UV lamp to kill bacteria in the air – that is set to last 3 to 5 years, ionizer, the industry’s best lifetime warranty, and an easy-to-use 24-hour programmable timer. For holiday shoppers looking for the safest and most efficient air purifier on the market this Christmas or Hanukkah – Paralda is the only green, portable air purification appliance available,” concluded Mann.

So… the unit uses less energy. The first thing that one might wonder is whether or not it’s powerful enough to cycle decent amounts of air through it.

Air Cleaning Capability

The Alen Paralda is rated to clean a 400 square foot room, which isn’t bad. It contains a HEPA filter that cleans the air with 99.97% efficiency. In addition to the HEPA filter there is also a UV lamp to aid in air purification.

A review at achooallergy.com states that the unit might best be used in a smaller room such as an office or bedroom. This might hint at the fact that it might not be as powerful as some other air purifiers.

Power Consumption

The Alen Paralda uses the following amounts of power for each of it’s four fan speeds:

• Fan Speed 1: 19W
• Fan Speed 2: 29W
• Fan Speed 3: 41W
• Fan Speed 4: 55W

In addition to the multiple fan speeds, the Paralda 24-hour programmable. The combination of both of those features will allow you to get the most efficient combination of power consumption and air purification for your indoor environment.

What Makes It Green?

There are four key guidelines that this unit follows to allow Alen to tout this air purifier as a green air purifier:

• 100% lead-free components
• RoHS compliance
• Ozone safe
• Energy Star qualified

The RoHS (or Reduction of Hazardous Substances) compliance basically means that none of the substances lead, mercury, cadmium, PBB’s and PBDE’s are found in the Paralda.

The UV lamp also lasts 3-5 years. This means less replacements and less waste materials.

Other Features

The rest of the features that round out the appeal of the Alen Paralda include:

• A filter replacement indicator light
• An ionizer
• A cable management system
• And a light touch activated display and controls

The Alen Paralda is selling for around $499 right now as a new unit. This cost is higher than other air purifiers that can clean the air just as well as the Paralda. But, there is going to be extra cost for an air purifier that is this energy efficient, at least for now.