Stadler FormO-025 OSKAR BIG Humidifier, Black

Living on Colorado's Front Range, humidifiers are a fact of life year round. I had tried/used just about every humidifer on the market over the years, so I consider myself a fairly good judge. I was looking for an evaporative humidifier to replace the ultrasonic used in the 25 by 15 foot attic / bedroom, mostly because the constant white dust and refills had gotten to be too much. While evaporative humidifiers are more effective at humidifying the air, MUCH more energy efficient, and generally more sanitary in that only water, and not mold / bacteria can evaporate, they are also (typically) far too loud for a bedroom. Not so for the Stadler Form OSKAR Big. On it's lowest setting, the unit is not only quiet, it's virtually silent. You can be sitting directly next to it and not hear a thing. On it's highest setting, it is about as loud as the quietest possible setting for other evaporative units (VERY quiet).The design is impressively solid for a concept that is, at it's base, so simple. Air is drawn up from the floor, passed through wicks which run the length of the unit on both sides, and blown out the top of the unit. Humidification is impressively high as there is really no way for the air to 'bleed' around the wicks, with this unit actually doing a better job than my much larger console humidifier in the main living room. Water is refilled by a spout which pushes open and closed. A clear level on the same side, illuminated by LED, allows you to see exactly how much water is currently in the unit. The fan has four speed options indicated by blue LEDs recessed into the top of the unit, as well as several preset humidity settings. These LEDs can be dimmed, or switched off entirely, which is great for a unit being used in a bedroom.All in all we are thrilled with this purchase. While the unit certainly isn't cheap, it's one of the very few humidifers that actually looks GOOD in visible location. The design is superb, addressing most of the issues I've had with other humidifiers over the years. It gets a ton of humidity into the air near silently, without any of the white dust issues cause by ultrasonic units. While we've only had this a few days now, I can't imagine going back. If you live in a climate that calls for humidifiers for large portions of the year, give this one a serious look. While it's a significant investment for a humidifier, you won't regret having one that silently 'just works'.

We have a big Oskar at work that I got a year ago for a big (approx 1000 sq ft) room. After a few weeks of constant use, there was no discernable difference in the humiditiy level, as measured by the hygrometer that we got at the same time. Oskar raised the humidity in there by 1 or 2 percentage points. We moved Oskar to a smaller room, and got a big ugly loud humidifier for the 1000 sq ft room, and things improved. Oskar worked really well in the small room. The big loud humidifier was big and loud, but it was better able to handle the big room.The great things about Oskar: He's not ugly (in my opinion, anyway). He's small, and has a clean simple design. I love that the lights can be completely dimmed to nothing - I hate seeing a light shining on something out of the corner of my eye, even a faint one. Oskar's lights can be dimmed slightly, or dimmed to nothing. If he runs out of water and you have his lights turned off, a faint red light will appear. If I don't feel like refilling him, I just turn him off, and the red light disappears. (Side note about the lights: With the office Oskar I got a year ago, if the lights are dimmed to nothing, and then I turn it off, and then back on, it comes back on with the lights on bright. The new Oskars I got this week will turn off and back on and the lights stay dimmed. The new ones "remember" they're supposed to be dimmed. I had one of them dimmed and didn't realize it, and kept plugging it into different things, turning it off and on, and it's so quiet, I didn't realize it was on, so I thought it was broken because the lights weren't turning on. I finally happened to see the blades turning as I unplugged it, and realized what was happening.) Oskar is quiet. Even at full blast, he's pretty quiet. If you're in a quiet, silent room, you'll hear Oskar when he's running, but he's so quiet, I rarely notice him. I don't have to turn my TV up louder because of Oskar. The only time I really notice him is when he reaches his target humidity level - he does a thing where he turns off and on every few minutes, trying to maintain the target humidity, which is annoying. I just turn him off, or set him for a higher or lower humidity at this point. (I don't know if the new ones do this yet, because they haven't yet reached their target humidity level.) Oskar doesn't spray that white powder around that some humidifiers do. The one at our office has always been filled with distilled water, so I don't know if that's a factor. The floor and other stuff around him never feels damp.I liked my office Oskar enough that I just got two more Oskars for home, despite his exorbitant cost, so that tells you how much I like him. I just think their claim that one Big Oskar is capable of humidifying an 1100 sq ft space is ridiculous. I've now got one Big Oskar in a 16ft x 14ft room, and another in a 15ft x 11ft room. I've got hygrometers in both rooms, and have had the Oskars going full blast for 2 days. The humidity has gone up 10% in each room. The two "big" rooms are actually connected by a short hallway, so the two new Big Oskars I just got are basically working on the same space - the entirety of which is well below 1100sq ft - and they're struggling to get the humidity up above 30%. The space Oskar was moved to at my office is about 11ft x 14ft, and has low ceilings (pitched roof, no higher than 10ft at the peak). All of the places I've seen him struggle with have high ceilings (12ft to 15ft), so the manufacturer's claims may be based on a standard 10ft ceiling, and he might easily humidify an 1100sq ft space that has low ceilings. I think the two Big Oskars I got for home will eventually get the humidity up to the target level and will keep it there.Tl;dr: Big Oskar looks nice, is quiet, doesn't leave white powder, doesn't get your stuff or floor damp, but is too expensive, and doesn't humidify an 1100 sq ft space, as they claim.