Smart Air SA600 Review - Is It Worth It?

[@CallMeFil]

Dang that clear air kit is a beast

[@HouseFresh]

Yeah the guys at CleanAirKits made a silent beast! Just a shame we can’t get HVAC filters easily here in Europe 🥲

[@itgoofy]

I have almost every high end air purifier on the market and this is actually one of my favorite units. I use it in my RV and it works great. I immediately removed the carbon filters since they are insignificant and only will restrict air flow. Also had 0 off gassing unlike a lot of the plastic units from other brands. I love it.

[@HouseFresh]

@@itgoofy that is great to hear , been a big fan of ours the more I used it. Plastic also feels higher quality just from touch. I want to try and wall mount ours soon as that should be possible.

[@RRR20238]

Hey Danny! How safe is the SA600 for kids, especially if they try to put their fingers into the round inlets near the fan (2:24)? Are there any protective measures to prevent accidents?

[@HouseFresh]

Just had a look and it’s got a hard plastic grill so no way of putting any fingers into this area. Will show more details when we post the web review version. A very useful thing to check for so will make sure we check for this in all future reviews. Thanks!

[@RRR20238]

Similar question about the Blast Mini MKII: Is it safe to leave around kids unsupervised? Does the fan automatically stop if the lid is opened or the pre-filter is removed, or is there a way to securely lock them in place? Also, how big are the holes behind the pre-filter? Is there a risk that kids could puncture the pre-filter and reach the fan with their fingers?

[@milenakoodziejczyk8664]

😍

[@HouseFresh]

Glad you liked Milena!

[@Holy_Hobo]

Seems like speed 5 is not worth it. Not a significant difference from speed 4 with 4x the energy usage. Speed 1&4 probably the best 2 settings. Speed 4 with 12 month replacements and maybe third party options would probably smoke the competitors price wise.

[@HouseFresh]

Depends on use case but like that speed 3 is close to the 40dBA limit for quiet classroom and offices. Considering it’s not much extra cost I don’t see a reason why not.

[@Holy_Hobo]

@ side question, it's hard to tell from the videos and pictures but it seems like this unit's carbon filter is very "light" on carbon-like everything I've seen shows a ring of pellets around each circle but almost nothing filling the rest of the circles. Compared to other similar carbon pellet filters it seems quite lackluster. Can you confirm this visually/weight wise or with a comparison on VOC reduction?

[@RRR20238]

@@Holy_Hobo it's 140g each side, 280g(±10%) total, which is indeed lackluster. Especially for their price

[@HouseFresh]

@@Holy_Hoboit is fairly light in the carbon and around half the width of the Winix 5500-2 filter but then you also get one on each side. Likely enough for minor odors but like many standard air purifiers would get quickly used up with serious issues.

[@RRR20238]

One Winix 5500-2 filter reportedly contains about 1 lb of carbon, which is more than two SA600 filters combined. A pack of 2 SA600 carbon filters costs $48.99 on Amazon, while a complete set of Winix 5500-2 filters (carbon + HEPA) is $40.91. Similarly, in the UK, the Xiaomi Smart Air Purifier 4 Pro combined (carbon + particle) filter costs £57.54 and contains 650 grams of carbon, which is more than double the carbon in a pack of 2 SA600 filters. For the SA600, a set of 2 HEPA filters (£36.00) and 2 carbon filters (£33.00) costs £69 (nice) total. Besides odors, activated carbon can adsorb harmful gases like NO2, a common air pollutant in areas with high traffic or industrial emissions. In my city, NO2 levels right now exceed the WHO's annual limit by more than 10 times. So, if this is a concern, it wouldn't hurt to have more carbon. In any case, if one needs a lot of carbon, it might be worth buying activated carbon by weight and refilling the filter frames or making a DIY custom frame for it. That said, I don't know how much carbon is realistically needed, or how to tell for sure when it’s time to change it without buying NO2 sensors, which might cost thousands of dollars. Although, I think, the AirGradient monitor might suffice with the right approach.