Affordable upright freezers - any experience or advice (esp with Haier)?

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jonathan18

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# 140795 20-Feb-2014 14:08

Hey there

I've been hunting for a new upright frost-free mid-sized freezer and found that the model that appears to offer about the best value for money is a Haier; does anyone have (direct or indirect) experience with Haier freezers (or fridge for fridge/freezers)? EDIT - or have any other of the more affordable brands/models of upright freezers they can recommend?

Given their price point, I know they're not going to be the Rolls Royce of applicances, but still am interested given the cost for other brands is considerably more. Being at the cheap end of the market, I'm aware they may be noiser but I don't think that'll be to big an issue as it'll be located in the laundry.

The model I was looking at specifically was the HVF-260SS, which Harvey Norman had down last weekend to $1124 (the white version is just a few bucks cheaper). Interestingly, I noticed the energy efficency of this particular model appears to be significantly higher than others, so apparently it will be cheaper to run than even some larger models (the following are just some examples for comparison, though I note every other freezer in that shop wasn't as efficient):

Haier HVF-260 / 256 litres / 3 stars / 320kWh/yr
F&P E210L / 213 litres / 1 star / 481 kWh/yr
F&P E308 / 304 litres / 1 star / 559 kWh/yr

I did notice that many of the cheaper freezers including the Haier I'm looking at above have that grill thing (showing my technical knowledge here!) exposed on the back - apart from it therefore needing to sit slightly further out from the wall, are there any issues with this design?
Thanks for any advice!

[EDIT MOD:RC - Use of correct company name.]

mattwnz

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# 991129 20-Feb-2014 14:14

It now owns F&P. But it has always been a cheaper brand historically. I have got one of the samsung upright freezers which was about $1200, and is silver in colour. I think samsung these days is seen as one of the top brands. Had for about 3 years and they do still sell the model. Looks identical to the photo in your link. I think they retail or about $1600, but saw it recently in HN for about $1200 so depends on how good your negotiating skills are. This is the model. http://www.harveynorman.co.nz/whiteware/kitchen/freezers/samsung-286l-vertical-freezer.html

jonathan18

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# 991144 20-Feb-2014 14:24

mattwnz: It now owns F&P. But it has always been a cheaper brand historically. I have got one of the samsung upright freezers which was about $1200, and is silver in colour. I think samsung these days is seen as one of the top brands. Had for about 3 years and they do still sell the model. Looks identical to the photo in your link. I think they retail or about $1600, but saw it recently in HN for about $1200 so depends on how good your negotiating skills are. This is the model. http://www.harveynorman.co.nz/whiteware/kitchen/freezers/samsung-286l-vertical-freezer.html

Thanks for that - I did indeed see that model at HN, for the same price as on their website ($1301 - though in-store they claimed this was with a 10% reduction), so if I can negotiate it down to around $1200 it's getting close enough to the Haier to consider it.

How have you found it - would you recommend it? No particular quirks?

mattwnz

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# 991157 20-Feb-2014 14:50

jonathan18:
mattwnz: It now owns F&P. But it has always been a cheaper brand historically. I have got one of the samsung upright freezers which was about $1200, and is silver in colour. I think samsung these days is seen as one of the top brands. Had for about 3 years and they do still sell the model. Looks identical to the photo in your link. I think they retail or about $1600, but saw it recently in HN for about $1200 so depends on how good your negotiating skills are. This is the model. http://www.harveynorman.co.nz/whiteware/kitchen/freezers/samsung-286l-vertical-freezer.html

Thanks for that - I did indeed see that model at HN, for the same price as on their website ($1301 - though in-store they claimed this was with a 10% reduction), so if I can negotiate it down to around $1200 it's getting close enough to the Haier to consider it.

How have you found it - would you recommend it? No particular quirks?

It has been good to date. Can't think of any negatives with it. You can also get a matching fridge for it, or have two freezers side by side, and the door can be changed to the other side. I got mine from smiths city, and they threw in delivery so HN may not be the cheapest place to buy it.

scuwp

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# 991182 20-Feb-2014 15:34

have a look at the inside and we found many cheaper brands has some really silly internal designs. Just make sure it fits what you want. For a standard fringe hard to past the good ol'e F&P as value for money IMO.

Always be yourself, unless you can be Batman, then always be the Batman

mattwnz

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# 991185 20-Feb-2014 15:45

scuwp: have a look at the inside and we found many cheaper brands has some really silly internal designs. Just make sure it fits what you want. For a standard fringe hard to past the good ol'e F&P as value for money IMO.

I agree. The samsung has modules you can remove, such as an icemaker. Some of the plastics can also be quite cheap on some of them. I used to have a freezer where the drawers stuck, which I don't get with the samsung. Perhpas the only downside with vertical freezers , is you can't put a big turkey in them, without removing a couple of drawers.

jonathan18

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# 991194 20-Feb-2014 15:59

mattwnz:
scuwp: have a look at the inside and we found many cheaper brands has some really silly internal designs. Just make sure it fits what you want. For a standard fringe hard to past the good ol'e F&P as value for money IMO.

I agree. The samsung has modules you can remove, such as an icemaker. Some of the plastics can also be quite cheap on some of them. I used to have a freezer where the drawers stuck, which I don't get with the samsung. Perhpas the only downside with vertical freezers , is you can't put a big turkey in them, without removing a couple of drawers.

Unless it's a turkey made out of tofu I think I'll be ok! (I'm vegetarian so won't be needing to put such large items in it).

That said, a vertical freezer takes up so much less floor space than a chest freezer - and all but the cheap ones are frost-free - two really signficant advantages. But I'll certainly check out the insides for useability.

The Samsung has an RRP of $1699 so will need to be patient and/or negotitate hard to get it down to the price you got it for; no harm in trying though! Can get the Haier model for $1099 in white from 100 percent; also from 100 percent is a brand I'd never heard of - Beko: similar size freezer for $1249. The salesman said the brand had been around the UK for about 20 years, and Aus for about 5; only been in NZ a couple of years. Anyone bought/heard much about this brand?

bazzer

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# 991246 20-Feb-2014 17:36

Every time you open the door, your feet get covered in cold air. I think that makes a chesty more efficient. That's why I prefer chest freezers, but each to their own.

mattwnz

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# 991268 20-Feb-2014 17:52

bazzer: Every time you open the door, your feet get covered in cold air. I think that makes a chesty more efficient. That's why I prefer chest freezers, but each to their own.

New ones should have secondary doors or drawers which retain the cold air in them, so you only lose the cold air once you open that secondard compartment door. I actually think more cold air is lost by the chest ones when you open them, as many of those are just open, when you open them up. I remember my old chest one and it was always a nice cool experience to open it in the summer.

Niel

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# 991283 20-Feb-2014 18:17

Samsung for sure. Noel Leeming has specials that cycle evry couple of months, different things on special as different times. We waited for the 8kg top loader washing machine special to come around, the nice model with glass door. Really happy with it. Looked at fridge freezers as well, some other nice ones around but every time we end up looking at Samsung for practicality. And you should see their dish washers. We have an almost 20 year old Samsung compact vacuum which my mum says sucks stronger than her brand new large one, and our was the cheapest we could afford as newly weds! And someone recently posted here about the Samsung vacuum robot which blows away Roomba.

You can never have enough Volvos!

bazzer

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# 991549 21-Feb-2014 08:32

mattwnz:
bazzer: Every time you open the door, your feet get covered in cold air. I think that makes a chesty more efficient. That's why I prefer chest freezers, but each to their own.

New ones should have secondary doors or drawers which retain the cold air in them, so you only lose the cold air once you open that secondard compartment door. I actually think more cold air is lost by the chest ones when you open them, as many of those are just open, when you open them up. I remember my old chest one and it was always a nice cool experience to open it in the summer.

But cold air sinks doesn't it? I thought the cheaper uprights I'd seen still have mesh baskets, but maybe not.

jonathan18

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# 991606 21-Feb-2014 09:03

bazzer:
mattwnz:
bazzer: Every time you open the door, your feet get covered in cold air. I think that makes a chesty more efficient. That's why I prefer chest freezers, but each to their own.

New ones should have secondary doors or drawers which retain the cold air in them, so you only lose the cold air once you open that secondard compartment door. I actually think more cold air is lost by the chest ones when you open them, as many of those are just open, when you open them up. I remember my old chest one and it was always a nice cool experience to open it in the summer.

But cold air sinks doesn't it? I thought the cheaper uprights I'd seen still have mesh baskets, but maybe not.

The real cheap "bar freezer" types do still use mesh baskets, such as the one we bought from Countdown. Apart from the "leaking cold" problem, they're a real pain in the @rse as - inevitably- being cheap such freezers are not frost-free so the baskets get 'iced in' (one of the reasons we need to get a new one).

However, even the cheap frost-free models comes wih proper drawers, such as the Haier I was looking at.

Any advice re the merits of the claimed efficiency of the Haier? (see the first post of the thread) No other similar sized freezer that I've looked at comes close, which makes me suspicious of the Haier's figures.

pctek

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# 992967 23-Feb-2014 18:45

Bad idea.
Go look at Consumer, they have reviews on whiteware.

Cheap is not always economically viable. Take into account lastability...not much point in cheap if it lasts 5 minutes (comparatively speaking).

My Frigidaire is going strong after 10 years of use - and I bought it second hand.

jonathan18

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# 992985 23-Feb-2014 19:20

pctek: Bad idea.
Go look at Consumer, they have reviews on whiteware.

Cheap is not always economically viable. Take into account lastability...not much point in cheap if it lasts 5 minutes (comparatively speaking).

My Frigidaire is going strong after 10 years of use - and I bought it second hand.

Consumer - already did that prior to my original post. Like many of its reviews, the selection of models is slight and tends to be dominated by F and P; it was really of little use to me, given the much wider choice out there. I guess it's a sign of the size of the NZ market that the reviews in Consumer are far from all-encompassing.

And sticking to well-known brands isn't always fail-safe - both my parents and in-laws have F&P upright freezers and both have had fairly significant problems with them recently; also we bought a fairly new but s-h F&P fridge/freezer only for it to start having problems a year or so later. At least with new but "lesser" brands I will have the safety of the CGA.