Rated

Some home air purifiers merely clean the air. Some rejuvenate it, creating a healthier environment that you actually feel better about living in. The Rabbit Air BioGS SPA-582a is definitely in the latter category. I was more than impressed; I was jazzed. I think you will be, too.

Appearance

I confess I like having a nice looking piece of equipment around (provided it does the job well, of course). It’s subjective, of course, but I really like the chrome coating on the high-tech case, the elegant controls, and the space-ship indicator lights on the display panel.

Other colors are available too: pearl white, metallic blue, and lime green. Naturally, you want something more than just eye candy in a home air purifier. Not to worry. This model delivers well in every category.

Set Up & Preparation

Getting the Rabbit Air BioGS SPA-582a up and running will be effortless. The filters are pre-installed, but wrapped in plastic. All you have to do is remove them, pull off the wrappers, and put them back in again.

That’s good practice anyway, because you’ll do that for maintenance and it’s better to learn how when they’re still clean.

Operation – Remote Control or Main Control Button

The front controls are ergonomically designed, which is a fancy way of saying anyone can operate them without fumbling.

The colorful display shows you everything you might need or want to know. The different colored-lights make knowing the status of your air purifier easy from across the room.

At only 18 inches wide x 22 inches high x 9 inches deep it fits in any nook. And at just 17 pounds, you won’t have any trouble moving it from one to another if you don’t like the first location you selected.

I’m especially fond of the remote so I can adjust the unit from across the room without getting up from the desk rather than using the main control button on the unit. Like you, my days are busy and I like to save every second possible but it’s also great for individuals who have trouble getting around, like elderly people.

Noise Level – Ultra Quiet!

Like the old saying about children, your home air purifier should be seen and not heard. The super quiet Rabbit Air 582a succeeds on that score, thanks to quality workmanship second to none.

If that isn’t persuasive enough, here’s some hard data on the Rabbit Air BioGS SPA-582a, across its five different fan speeds:

• Speed 1 = 19.1 dB
• Speed 2 = 30.6 dB
• Speed 3 = 39.7 dB
• Speed 4 = 44.8 dB
• Speed 5 = 49.1 dB

By the way, there’s an Auto setting that will adjust the speed based on what a sensor detects in terms of air quality.

Performance – 4 Stage Purification – Energy Efficient

Of course, the most important thing is: does this Rabbit Air air purifier do the job and do it well, does it clean the air?

The short answer is: YES!

Mitsubishi – the huge Japanese electronics manufacturer – helped by putting their many years of experience and expertise together with Rabbit Air’s.

The SPA-582a uses both passive filtration and active negative ionization. The second aspect charges particles that the first method then picks up. It’s designed to clear up to 780 square feet with two air changes per hour.

A nano-silver pre-filter eliminates larger particles (big dust particles, animal dander,…). Then a HEPA filter removes at minimum 99.97% of particles down to 0.3 microns, including many bacteria and other nasty things that would otherwise slip through the cracks.

Then things really get interesting.

A third step uses a washable honeycomb activated charcoal filter to scrub air of odors, many of which are caused by VOCs (Volatile Organic Compounds). You may think the latter are only from household cleaning products and the like but even pine trees give off VOCs. Nature isn’t always as benign as some like to think!

Then step four generates negative ions. That electrification pushes particles around so they wind up inside the BioGS SPA-582a’s filtration system, where they’re removed from the air.

A whole series of well-designed sensors keep things operating at peak efficiency. It operates on 67 watts at Turbo Speed and only seven watts during normal silent operation. At average electric utility rates, that will add about 100 a year to your electric bill. At less than 10 per month it’s a pretty good deal for clean air all year ’round!

Maintenance

That quality design and implementation extends to an area not enough people think about when selecting a home air purifier: maintenance. Some units are a true pain to clean, and they need it often. You get so much gunk in your lungs from cleaning one, it undoes much of the good from having a purifier.

Not so here.

The Rabbit Air 582a has a HEPA filter that needs to be replaced only once a year (less if you have a fairly clean environment to begin with).

The carbon filter is washable and requires an easy clean up only once every 2-3 years. The pre-filter needs it more often – about once a month – but that’s super easy to do, like maintaining the others.

Cleaning the particle sensor from time to time is no effort. A simple wipe with a clean cloth of the air intake and outlet can be done when a visual inspection shows the need, which is not often, only about every 3-6 months. You won’t need more than 15 minutes or so to do everything.

Does it include a Warranty?

A 5-year warranty on workmanship and materials gives you good reason to relax. If RabbitAir sold many lemons, they couldn’t afford such a generous policy.

Conclusion

The Rabbit Air BioGS SPA-582a air purifier is a high-quality air purifier that definitely creates a cleaner environment. Ideal for home or small office use, it’s silent, low-maintenance, and as easy on the eyes as your new air will be on you.

The Surround Air XJ-3800 Intelli-Pro, once popular for its effectiveness in purifying indoor air, is no longer in production.
I recommend considering the LEVOIT Air Purifier Air Purifier as a good replacement.
It has gained a reputation for exceptional performance and advanced features.

Yes, the Surround Air XJ-3800 Intelli-Pro is quite a name for an air purifier. It’s well deserved, though. Its space-age appearance gives it a slightly retro Jetsons look, but the design and performance are completely up to date. Superb sensors, outstanding indicators and an amazing filter system make this model one heckuva cleaner, especially considering the modest price.

Truly High-Tech, Multi-Stage Filtration System

The XJ-3800 may sound like a 1950s rocket ship design, and there’s probably a good reason for that. It’s definitely space-age technology, only 21st century.

Stage 1. It all starts with the air entering the unit through multiple air inlets enabling maximum air flow through the unit. The air first enters a washable pre-filter, capturing the largest particles.

Stage 2. An electrostatically-charged dust collection grid attracts charged particles & pollutants like a magnet. That component is found in a great many home air purifiers today, and for good reasons. The technology is straightforward, reliable, and low-maintenance… and it really works.

Stage 3. The high-tech continues with an activated carbon filter that performs both a mechanical and a chemical function. Mechanically, charcoal filters act like sieves to continue the particle-removal function for yet smaller pieces.

It adds a chemical action, thanks to carbon’s high propensity for forming loose bonds with so many different molecules. That chemical action brings even more value when the combinations are with gases and odors that occupy many homes. Paint fumes, household cleaning products, cat litter and more are present in many if not most homes. The XJ-3800 Intelli-Pro’s carbon filter gets them all.

Stage 4. Of course, there’s a HEPA filter that captures not only more dust but a wide array of potential allergens, such as most bacteria and some viruses. The Surround Air XJ-3800 then goes beyond those fairly common abilities to add several more layers of home air purifying technology.

Stage 5. In this stage a process called Photocatalytic Oxidation is taking place. A TiO2-coated filter (TiO2 = Titanium Oxide) in combination with UV rays – coming from the nearby UV lamp – generates ions to produce hydroxyl radicals (=highly reactive electrons) in the air.

These aggressively combine with harmful indoor pollutants such as formaldehyde (a common outgassing of new carpeting), ammonia, and many others. Once bound together, a chemical reaction takes place effectively “oxidizing” (or burning) the pollutant. This breaks the pollutant down into harmless molecules.

Stage 6. A germicidal UV lamp irradiates the air passing nearby. The UV light possesses just the right amount of energy to break organic molecular bonds. Any microorganisms left intact get killed. That germicidal action requires no chemicals to worry those who might be sensitive but still want a hospital-clean environment.

Stage 7. In the final stage the XJ-3800 Intelli-Pro pumps out negative ions that circulate throughout the room. Those ions (charged particles) produce small electrostatic fields in the air similar to the one inside the case.

That increases the size of the particles in the air, which might sound like a bad thing. But that larger size makes them easier to trap. It also makes them heavier, so they tend to float more readily to the floor or carpet, where they can be vacuumed up. They also attach more readily to positively charged surfaces where they stick, harmlessly waiting to be wiped off.

The net result is air cleared of dust, smoke, mold, bacteria and other microorganisms, odors, chemicals… in short, anything and everything airborne that can harm your eyes, nasal passages, and lungs. Even shorter: clean air.

Let me summarize this 7 stage purification process…

• Stage 1: Pre-filter gets largest particles
• Stage 2: Electrostatic precipitator traps more particles
• Stage 3: Carbon filtration removes odors and chemicals
• Stage 4: True HEPA filter traps microorganisms
• Stage 5: Photocatalytic Oxidation further reduces chemicals, bacteria and odors
• Stage 6: Germicidal UV lamp destroys more micro-organisms
• Stage 7: Ionizer produces helpful negative ions

Sensors and Indicators

Purifying all that air is great. It’s the main reason you buy a quality home air purifier. But it’s also really helpful for that process to happen automatically and to be able to see how the unit functions. For that purpose, the Surround Air XJ-3800 Intelli-Pro incorporates a number of sensors and indicators. The sensors detect what is going on in your air, the indicators tell you what the purifier is doing about it.

The XJ-3800 Intelli-Pro has a number of components that can sense the quality of air. Of course, ‘quality’ is a qualitative term. What’s really going on? Well, the answer lies in one of the more interesting facets of chemistry.

Chemical compounds in the air – everything is ultimately a chemical: dust, pollen, smoke, animal dander, as well as what we refer to as chemicals (like cleaning products) – carry electrical and physical ‘signatures’.

If they’re charged, the unit can sense that electrically. But different compounds also react with sensors in other ways, triggering a response. Cat litter odor, for example, has such a signature. The XJ-3800 can sense that. Pollen has another and there’s a sensor for that.

When it senses a quick rise in either of those (or many other possibilities), the unit can increase its air cleansing by speeding up the fan. You’ll hear that as a rise in the white-noise sound as air flows into and out of the unit through its intake and exhaust ducts. The fan components themselves make very little noise.

Open a window on a pollen-laden day and your XJ-3800 may well automatically turn itself on high until the air is cleared. Light up a cigarette and the unit can go into overdrive.

Apart from the sounds you hear, there are a series of indicator lights to show you what is happening. There are ones that tell you when to change any of the filters. There’s an indicator to guide you when to clean the dust collector grid. The UV and Ionizer lights show these components at work.

Noise Level

The downside of that increased operation is, of course, some extra noise. In the XJ-3800 that noise is moderate, but some people are more sensitive to background noises than others.

On low (35dB) or even medium (45dB), almost everyone will be able to sleep soundly without disruption. On high (52dB) there is some noticeable ‘white noise’, with the intensity varying according to distance, room layout, and your furnishings. You would have little trouble hearing the TV, for example, even on high.

Hardwood floors obviously reflect more sound, while carpets absorb them. More closed drapes means less reflected sound off glass. More soft chairs, pillows, and so forth will create a quieter environment.

Maintenance + Costs

Cleaning and maintenance every 2 to 3 months is recommended. The washable pre-filter does not require replacement. You can clean it under flowing water. To remove all the dust from the dust collection grid you can use a dry cloth, warm water and a mild detergent. If the dust is hard to remove, pre-soak it in diluted detergent and then use a toothbrush to clean. Dust can be removed from the Carbon/HEPA filter with a vacuum cleaner. To clean the TiO2 filter use a dry cloth or air to blow away the dust.

When the change filter indicator is glowing it’s time to replace filters. Expect to change filters once a year.

The lifespan of the UV lamp is about 10,000 hrs. When no blue light is observed it’s time to replace the UV lamp.

What will this unit add to your electric bill? I know I know… electric rates vary so much, as does the amount of daily usage due to variations in fan speeds. But let me try to give you a rough idea… The specs show that this unit operates on 80 watts on the highest fan speed setting.

Let’s assume the worst case scenario… If the XJ-3800 runs continuously at the highest setting for an entire month (31 days) your consumption would be 59.52 kWh. At average electric utility rates (let’s take 12 cents/kWh) you’ll add about 7 a month to your electric bill – once again that is if the unit would run continuously on the highest fan speed. Even in this worst case scenario that’s pretty good for clean air all year ’round!

Does it include a Warranty?

The XJ-3800 Intelli-Pro comes with a 30-day risk-free guarantee. If you’re not completely satisfied with the purifier, you may return it for a full refund – that is within 30 days of purchase. After that the unit is backed by a 3-year warranty on materials and workmanship.

Conclusion

The quiet, yet powerful Surround Air XJ-3800 Intelli-Pro is an amazingly effective air purifier, incorporating an unusually large number of in-depth filtration methods. It offers superb sensing and several helpful indicators. It really works for rooms up to 650 ft². At such a modest price, there may be no better value on the market today. It also looks pretty cool. Just keep in mind that if you’re looking for an air cleaner for a bedroom and hoping to sleep with the unit on the XJ-3800 emits a bright blue UV light which may or may not be what you want.

The Winix PlasmaWave 5300 home air purifier can’t improve your health. Your body does that. It won’t cure your allergies. Allergies are largely genetic. But it can generate air that’s much better to breathe, giving your body its best shot at optimizing your health.

Winix took some cues from Sharp and adapted elements of that better-known company’s PlasmaCluster model.

They included 3-stage filtering, as well as microbial destruction, and then lowered the price from their Winix 5000 series. Not bad for what some people might (mistakenly) consider a knockoff!

Performance – For Rooms up to 350 Square Feet

The Winix Plasmawave 5300 air cleaner may be similar to the PlasmaCluster but it has even better performance numbers.

The CADR (Clean Air Delivery Rate) numbers are 235 for smoke, 248 for dust and 251 for pollen. The unit will handle a room size of 350 square feet (assuming an average height ceiling).

Its four separate fan speeds allow this model to let you balance noise, electricity consumption, and air-cleansing rate with a tap. Yet, even at high settings you can live quite comfortably with this PlasmaWave model.

Sitting in a home office, you’ll barely notice it above your computer’s fan even at the purifier’s top speed. The only time the fan noise becomes truly noticeable is in the normally short-lived Turbo mode. That’s initiated automatically when the unit senses ‘bad’ air, unless you turn it on manually.

Being energy star approved you may be confident too this unit works efficiently.

Construction – Attractive, Sturdy, Compact, and Lightweight!

The Plasmawave 5300 is an attractive, well-built unit. The case is sturdy, compact, and lightweight. (22″ high x 16″ wide x 9″ deep, 15 lbs.) The seals are high-quality, which helps maintain high efficiency since it eliminates the problem of air (and, therefore, particle) bypass.

Made of high-quality plastic, the case is odor free, a nice benefit for those who are sensitive to outgassing compounds that flow from some cheaply made units. Those molecules, typically VOCs (Volatile Organic Compounds), are one of the things good home air purifiers are intended to remove, so it’s great that the Winix 5300 doesn’t add any of its own.

3 Stage Purification System

Like most home air purifiers, the PlasmaWave 5300 sports a True HEPA filter, which captures at minimum 99.97% of pollutant particles down to 0.3 microns. That’s good enough to filter out all but some viruses. Many of those are 0.020-0.250 micron.

Pretty good for the most common, and in a way least important, component in an overall filtration system. Least important, because if your vacuum cleaner has a good HEPA filter you get a lot of that value already. The filter needs to be replaced about once a year.

There is, in addition, a carbon mesh filter made of activated charcoal. That not only filters out additional particulates by a mechanical sieve action but – because carbon so readily combines with many molecules – provides a safe chemical cleansing of room air.

In this case, though, that component does much more than simply the normal carbon-filter duty. It’s suffused with anti-microbial compounds that can help combat flu viruses and other nasty bugs in the air that would slip by the HEPA filter. Keen.

That carbon filter needs to be replaced about once every three months for the average home and the manufacturer thoughtfully included three spares in the box, for a year’s supply total. When it comes to replacement, the Winix filter kit #115115 includes a True HEPA filter and 4 disposable activated carbon pre-filters.

There’s another important aspect to the filtration system that deserves a section all its own: the PlasmaWave 5300′s ionizer.

PlasmaWave Ionizer Technology

In the final stages of cleaning, filtered air passes through a type of electric pulse generating negatively and positively charged ions that combine with naturally occurring water vapor (H2O) to form Hydroxyl radicals (OH). The amount of Hydrogen (H) gas produced is too small a concentration to be any kind of danger.

Those Hydroxyls act as forceful oxidizers to destroy microorganisms – bacteria, viruses, mold spores, and the like – in the vicinity. But they also combine readily with many VOCs (compounds in paint fumes, for example).

That allows the ionizer to do double duty, destroying potentially harmful bugs in the air and removing some of the organic chemicals that can irritate lungs, eyes, and nasal passages. After pollutants have been destroyed the Hydroxyls reform into water vapor (H2O) or other harmless air molecules.

This method is more effective and safer than older-style ozone generators. Those work by creating ozone (O3), an oxygen molecule with three oxygen atoms rather than the usual two. That extra atom attached provides additional energetic electrons that ‘stick out’ and zap nearby organisms. But they can also irritate lungs and sting the eyes when the concentration is high enough to do good by purifying the air.

The ionizer is controllable, too. You may notice a slight clicking noise from time to time when the ion generator is pumping out those electrically-charged, air-cleansing molecules. So, it’s helpful that you can turn it off or on as you please. If the noise is irritating, it’s a simple matter to turn on that mechanism just before you leave the room, and turn it off when you re-enter.

Does it include a Warranty?

Yes, the Winix PlasmaWave 5300 includes a 1 year warranty.

Conclusion

The Winix 5300 air cleaner operates at low-noise levels while clearing a substantial volume of air quickly. It offers reliable operation and virtually eliminates smoke, dander, and health-injuring microorganisms. I’d say that merits the phrase “healthy air in a box”.