EDIT: several commenters seem to think that I’m claiming this air conditioner does not work at all, so I want to clarify that it will still cool down a room on net. The point is not that it doesn’t work at all. The point is that it’s stupidly inefficient in a way which I do not think consumers would plausibly choose over the relatively-low cost of a second hose if they recognized the problems.
I do believe the analysis in the post is in fact correct, and the success of this air conditioner is primarily due to consumers not recognizing the problem. Would you have spent an extra, say, $30 on a two-hose air conditioner if you had noticed the issue in advance?
(BTW, I also bought a one-hose air conditioner off amazon a few years back, which is where this example came from. When I realized there was only one hose, I was absolutely flabbergasted that anyone would even bother to build such an obviously stupid thing. And it indeed did a pretty shitty job cooling my apartment!)
Looks like you did the usual iterative approach: bought an AC, saw that it doesn’t work as expected, did the analysis, figured out what is wrong, and corrected your model of what works in your situation, then bought a better AC.
bought an AC, saw that it doesn’t work as expected, did the analysis
I read John as saying steps two and three here were reversed. He bought an AC, realized before trying it that it wouldn’t work, then tested and saw that (as expected) it didn’t work.
That’s true! When I opened the box, I first dug around looking for the second hose. Then I thought they must have made a mistake and not sent the second hose. Then eventually I noticed that the AC only had one hose-slot, and the pictures only had one hose, and I was just very confused as to why on earth someone would build a portable air conditioner with only one hose.
Just added a clarification to the post:
I do believe the analysis in the post is in fact correct, and the success of this air conditioner is primarily due to consumers not recognizing the problem. Would you have spent an extra, say, $30 on a two-hose air conditioner if you had noticed the issue in advance?
(BTW, I also bought a one-hose air conditioner off amazon a few years back, which is where this example came from. When I realized there was only one hose, I was absolutely flabbergasted that anyone would even bother to build such an obviously stupid thing. And it indeed did a pretty shitty job cooling my apartment!)
Looks like you did the usual iterative approach: bought an AC, saw that it doesn’t work as expected, did the analysis, figured out what is wrong, and corrected your model of what works in your situation, then bought a better AC.
I read John as saying steps two and three here were reversed. He bought an AC, realized before trying it that it wouldn’t work, then tested and saw that (as expected) it didn’t work.
That’s true! When I opened the box, I first dug around looking for the second hose. Then I thought they must have made a mistake and not sent the second hose. Then eventually I noticed that the AC only had one hose-slot, and the pictures only had one hose, and I was just very confused as to why on earth someone would build a portable air conditioner with only one hose.