It's a dust-eating monster!

Author's Rating:

Pros: True HEPA; Cleans the air QUICKLY, and completely.

Cons: Relatively loud on "high", and blue 'run' light can be bothersome.

The Bottom Line: 
Amazing air purifier that makes the itty bitty weak "silent" air purifiers look useless, which most are.

Author's Review
First, this is a true HEPA purifier:  Regardless of which purifier you ultimately buy, don't waste your money on a "HEPA-ish" or "HEPA-like" purifier.   You want a HEPA purifier.  Period.

Second, this thing is a magnificent, powerful, no frills air purifier.  It can indeed be rather loud, because it has a fan that can move -- and clean -- a whole bunch of air!  I put mine on high, for only about 5 minutes, which is all it seems to need to clean the air in the room; then I switch it to low.  It also has a 'medium' setting, but I've never used it!  But even on low, it's pretty powerful;  so I would NOT recommend it for a bedroom, unless you like white noise.   Also, it has a bright blue "run" light that could keep you awake unless you happen to like blue nightlights.    I don't, so I put a bit of opaque duct-tape on the LED.  Problem solved.

But to me, it's that (loud!) 'high' setting that rocks; and separates this air purifier from wimpy units.   I love to switch it to 'high', in the late afternoon as the setting sun lights up all the dust floating around in the air.  It takes just a few moments (like 30 seconds or so) for the show to start:  Distant particles seem to hesitate for a moment, do a u-turn, and then make a beeline for the purifier.  Really cool watching it work.  In fact, I'll admit to shaking out a kleenex, just to get some more dust particles to watch, once I'm all out of real dust.  So much fun, I don't need cable TV anymore.  ;-)  

Third, it's very cheap compared to the boutique fancy frilly air purifiers out there.  But it does the job, very well.  This HEPA purifier has a CADR (Clean Air Delivery Rate) of 250; which is very good.  In fact, it's my unqualified guess that it has a higher CADR per dollar ratio, than any other air purifier.  The HEPA filter is big, so it will last a long, long time.  I didn't (and don't) believe Honeywell's assertion that it's a "permanent" HEPA filter; so I bought a replacement HEPA (for around $60) at the same time I bought this.  But four years later, I've yet to need it.  And because it's a sieve filter, not an electrostatic filter (that can fail without you knowing),  when this filter fails, you'll know it because the air flow will drop off.  You get to decide when it's time to replace it; NOT some marketing department!

It also uses a carbon pre-filter, which Honeywell suggests you replace every three months.   But it can be washed many times (if you wish).  However, it will eventually fall apart and need to be replaced.   Since they're only about $8 each, I just replace them when they get too dirty.   Now, supposedly there's activated charcoal embedded in the pre-filter that can remove odors.  But there's so little carbon in there, I don't believe it really does much more than filter out the bigger particles.   In my opinion, you shouldn't depend on the 50250 to remove much in the way of  VOCs (Volatile Organic Compounds) or odors.  It will remove some, for sure, but this unit is primarily a great HEPA filter that will remove nearly all the invisible (and visible) chunks of crud floating in the air.

Finally, I want to emphasize that this does NOT have an "ionizer".  That is actually a GOOD thing, since many (most?) ionizers create ozone, which is basically SMOG.  Cough, cough...