Tjernlund AS1 AireShare Room-to-Room Fan Ventilator, Hardwired

MY NEEDI have a closet I use for all my electronics. There are two servers, a DirecTV box, a receiver, a XBOX One and all of my networking equipment. In all, they give out enough heat to raise the temperature of the closet by about 30 degrees with the doors shut. We had too find a solution other than leaving the door open all the time.INSTALLATIONInstallation is very easy. The kit comes with a cutting diagram to make the proper cuts on both sides of the wall. You will need to find the studs, because the fan needs most of the space between the studs. Also, you will need to offset the supply and return sides vertically. The fan blows air into the dead space between the studs, the supply then catches this positive pressure and exits the air from the dead space through a very small plenum. It works very well.I also installed a thermostat (see below). This was very simple. I got a thermostat that was rated for inline usage. You won't be able to use a thermostat like the one in your house, you'll need one rated for at least 110v and 15amps. Anyway, I installed this inline and the fan is working great. I just put it between the power supply and the fan.Everything you need, other than the thermostat, came in the box. Screws, plates and mounting instructions. I would suggest getting a multitool to cut the wall, it makes installation much easier. Once installed, the entire thing looks great.GENERAL REVIEWSo far, this is exactly what we were looking for. The fan is very quiet, barely noticeable at all. The supply plenum is very small, about 3 inches by 16 inches. In our installation, we put it just below the ceiling. You can feel the air if you put your hand beside it, but otherwise the hot air is dispersed very well. Because of the quiet sound and the direction of the plenum, most people don't even notice it all.As for the fan's ability to exhaust the air from the server closet, it works very well. It creates enough negative air pressure to pull the air from under the door, but still keep enough air moving to cool the room. If your room is sealed tight, you will need to figure out a way to get air into this room through another opening, but for us, the space between the door and the floor has been enough.THERMOSTATIn case you would like a thermostat, this one works:http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000E7BTFO/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o09_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1The manufacturer has a wireless thermostat is likes to sell, but it is unnecessary if you want to do the wiring yourself (and it costs over 100 bucks). Since the thermostat above is a lot cheaper, I chose it. I installed it so the fan would cutoff when the closet is below the temperature I feel is safe. Although the thermostat feels a little redundant now because the servers put out more sound than this fan does. It really is very quiet. I wouldn't mind just leaving it on all the time, but I went ahead and installed the thermostat.

Install was easy. The white grill covers blends into the white walls and is hardly noticeable. Installed the fan unit (intake) high on a wall inside a server closet - approx. 15 sq. ft. Installed the diffuser (exhaust) on the opposite side of the wall down low. Controlling the fan with a Z-wave switch controlled by Veralite. I also installed a Z-wave temperature sensor inside the server closet. Setup two scenes in Veralite - turn on the fan at 85 degrees and turn off the fan at 82 degrees. The fan does a great job of exhausting the hot air and drawing in air conditioned air. The reason I knocked off a star is the sound level. The fan isn't as quite as I'd like. Fortunately, most of the noise is contained within the closet. But you can definitely here a motor hum when it's running.The fan is running about 8 hours a day. On for an hour, Off for two hours. At this rate, I calculated it's going to use about $7/year in electricity to keep my server closet cool.

Thus far I am glad that I spent the little extra to get the model with multiple speeds. Even on low it provides a good amount of air and is very quiet. At medium and high the amount of air is increased and so is the noise, but not to any unacceptable level. Installation turned out to be much easier than I thought, but if you are not familiar with doing your own electrical wiring, definitely hire an electrician to assist with that part, and if you're not comfortable with making sure there is adequate space between the studs and up the wall, definitely hire someone with adequate experience. The air vent does stick our 2 1/2 inches from the wall and is pyramid shaped, which isn't a problem in my application, but could be for some, so pay attention to that. For what it is worth, I am using a 3-way remote switch instead of a switch on the wall, and that is working well thus far. Also, I have two of these and the diffuser in the first was bent a bit an the seller promptly refunded the full purchase price after UPS picked it up and I was able to then use my refund to purchase another.