When I drafted my post on alternatives
to masks for infectious aerosols I initially based the air
purifier section on the
AP-1512. This is a
common air purifier that I bought several of on the
Wirecutter’s
recommendation, and I haven’t had any trouble with it. When
reviewing my post, however, Vivian pointed out that the
Airfanta
3Pro was 20% cheaper and produced 72% more clean air. Sounds
pretty good!
The design is a lot like a smaller version of a Corsi-Rosenthal
Box, with four 6″ computer fans instead of a box fan. It was a
bit annoying to assemble, but went together well.
A big question with any sort of purifier is noise, and I had a go at a
comparison. In each test I used my MacBook Pro with its internal
microphone, set to 100%, about five feet from the purifier. I
compared:
(CADRs for 4⁄6 and 2⁄6 estimated from the numbers in this review.)
For a sense of how loud these are in absolute terms, the AP-1512 is
rated 53dB.
Here’s the frequency comparison:
You can see that on full power the AP-1512 and the 3Pro make similar
amounts of noise, though (a) 3Pro is cleaning a lot more air and (b)
the 3Pro has a worse tone per my taste. A better
comparison is the 3Pro on 4⁄6, where it still cleans more air but is
both substantially more quiet and reasonably pleasant sounding. And
on 2⁄6 it’s essentially indistinguishable from the background while
still cleaning a useful amount of air.
The main downside of the 3Pro relative to the AP-1512 is that it can’t
change it’s fan speed based on the level of particles in the air,
which is valuable in a cooking (or fire) context. So I’ll be keeping
my AP-1512s in the kitchen and using 3Pros in the living room and
other places where I’m most concerned about infection.
(What I really want is one that combines particle measurement with
CO2, as a proxy for aerosol infection risk, and ramps up and down
appropriately.)
Comparing the AirFanta 3Pro to the Coway AP-1512
Link post
When I drafted my post on alternatives to masks for infectious aerosols I initially based the air purifier section on the AP-1512. This is a common air purifier that I bought several of on the Wirecutter’s recommendation, and I haven’t had any trouble with it. When reviewing my post, however, Vivian pointed out that the Airfanta 3Pro was 20% cheaper and produced 72% more clean air. Sounds pretty good!
The design is a lot like a smaller version of a Corsi-Rosenthal Box, with four 6″ computer fans instead of a box fan. It was a bit annoying to assemble, but went together well.
A big question with any sort of purifier is noise, and I had a go at a comparison. In each test I used my MacBook Pro with its internal microphone, set to 100%, about five feet from the purifier. I compared:
AP-1512 on High (~240 CADR):
(mp3).
3Pro on 6⁄6 (~413 CADR):
(mp3).
3Pro on 4⁄6 (~270 CADR):
(mp3).
3Pro on 2⁄4 (~130 CADR):
(mp3).
Everything off (0 CADR):
(mp3).
(CADRs for 4⁄6 and 2⁄6 estimated from the numbers in this review.)
For a sense of how loud these are in absolute terms, the AP-1512 is rated 53dB.
Here’s the frequency comparison:
You can see that on full power the AP-1512 and the 3Pro make similar amounts of noise, though (a) 3Pro is cleaning a lot more air and (b) the 3Pro has a worse tone per my taste. A better comparison is the 3Pro on 4⁄6, where it still cleans more air but is both substantially more quiet and reasonably pleasant sounding. And on 2⁄6 it’s essentially indistinguishable from the background while still cleaning a useful amount of air.
The main downside of the 3Pro relative to the AP-1512 is that it can’t change it’s fan speed based on the level of particles in the air, which is valuable in a cooking (or fire) context. So I’ll be keeping my AP-1512s in the kitchen and using 3Pros in the living room and other places where I’m most concerned about infection.
(What I really want is one that combines particle measurement with CO2, as a proxy for aerosol infection risk, and ramps up and down appropriately.)
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