I would recommend going throught the attic as a last resort. Ours vents on our steep roof and maintainence is a nightmare!!!! We have to call someone to come out to clean our vent line since the roof is such a steep pitch. We've had trouble with the flaps sticking up and birds getting in the vent line = ewww! = maintenaince call. Put chicken wire over vent to prevent birds = clogged vent = wet clothes = another maintenaince call. This is our current status. This has just been our experience. I'm sure (I hope) there are others that have sucessfully vented through roof. The fans you mention I believe are for those that have a longer vent run and need the extra push to get the air out. Depending on your attic height you may or may not need one. We didn't. Another option is what davey3000 has, a condensing dryer. They do not vent outside and the moisture from cloths collects in a pan or can set up to drain into a floor drain. These appear to be a bit less efficent energy wise but are gentler on clothing. Bosch makes a nice condensing dryer. Good luck in the final stage of your house!! Anyway my 2cents worth.

gordonr, If there's nothing else I've learned during the course of my renovations, I've learned that everything ends up being more complicated than you expect. Once you open up the ceiling or the wall, there always seems to be something in the way of what you want to do. A floor joist where the tub drain needed to be, pipes where I wanted recessed lights to go, and now the recessed light over the tub is where it would make sense to run the duct. I can hardly wait to get to the kitchen renovation! I spoke with a rep in Miele's technical service group yesterday. Initially he was telling me he thought what I wanted to do entailed too long a stretch of duct - that it would reduce the performance of the dryer. I told him I expected that it would not be optimal performance, but what I was trying to determine was whether it would reduce it to the extent that a condenser dryer would have the same performance. He didn't seem to understand what I was getting at, so I gave an example: If the vented model has 15% better performance than the condenser model and the venting I'm doing reduces performance by 15%, then the condenser model would be generally equivalent, but if the vented dryer's performance is 50% greater, the same 15% reduction in performance would still mean the vented dryer was a better choice. I asked if he could give me any information about how much better the vented dryer's performance was than the condenser model and how much the venting I was considering would reduce the vented dryer's performance. At that point, he said he wanted to talk with one of the senior technical reps and put me on hold. When he came back, he told me that the dryer was rated for up to 60 feet (which I already knew) and that I should be fine with what I was planning on doing. He also told me that the sr. rep had indicated that having a condenser dryer in a closet could be problematic because it puts off a lot more heat than a vented dryer - you'd need a lot more air circulation into the closet with a condenser dryer. The closet I'll be putting the w/d into is 68" wide by 29" deep, so the extra heat and air circulation need may not have been as much of an issue for me as it might be for others with a more confined space. One learning that I took away from this: if you start to get the sense that the technical or customer service person you're talking to may not be as knowledgeable as you'd like, ask to talk with a senior rep. Like anywhere else, initial phone calls will be answered by more junior staff who will route the more complicated issues to more experienced staff. I've decided to go with a vented dryer, and now just need to decide between the Miele and the Asko. I'll let everyone know which one I end up with. Jan

While I'm not familiar with LG appliances, I am familiar with condenser dryers. I have a Miele condenser dryer in a second home (a condo where venting wasn't possible). I've been very satisfied. The performance has been just as good as the vented Miele dryer in my primary home. Except that the condenser model requires periodic cleaning of the condenser unit (a job that takes about ten minutes) there is no difference in drying time or performance between the vented and condenser models. The European manufacturers (Miele, Bosch, Asko) have been making condenser dryers for years. The technology is reliable and time-tested. I'm going to guess that LG's system would be similar, and your experience with LG would likewise be similar. Bear in mind that I'm referring to stand-alone condenser dryers. I don't recommend the combi washer-dryer machines, which rely on a completely different drying technology. The combi machines don't even come close to the drying performance of a vented dryer (they can take hours to dry a single load). I'm guessing that LG has made the assumption that the only buyers for these smaller footprint machines must live in apartments or condos where venting isn't possible, hence the lack of any vented dryers in their small machine line-up.

I have a free-standing (i.e. non-combo) Asko condensation dryer. I've had it about 15 years and it is my only dryer. However, I do not dry my laundry in a dryer, I hang it out, so my dryer gets very little use compared to what most people would need. I mostly use the dryer for an initial 5-15 min tumble prior to hanging out and and on rare occasions when weather foils my need to get a particular load dry. This is more frequently in the summer, oddly enough, even though I live in a very cold northern area. Condensation dryers do work as claimed, but I would never choose one if direct venting was possible because I think they are less efficient than conventional models. Since you can't direct vent, that's a moot point. When I use the machine in the winter time (in a generally cooler than normal, woodheated - and therefore very dry farmhouse in northern NY) I don't see much degradation of efficiency because the ambient air is dry and cool, which improves the effectiveness of the condensation function. My machine also raises (by a modest, but measurable amount) the indoor relative humidity, and to some degree the indoor air temp during operation. But that's just fine in the winter, and I really appreciate not blowing my heated air out of the house as I would with a conventional dryer. However, that's not germane to your situation, of course. In the summer when I use the dryer (and that's usually on hot, rainy days when something I need to wear won't dry outdoors), the dryer is more problematical. Condenser dryers work by having double air paths. They have a "normal one" that enters the machine, is heated and then passes through the drum with the clothes, collecting moisture and carrying it off, just like a standard dryer. When that air is drawn out of the chamber, however, it passes across the plates of the condenser where the moist, heated air is cooled and relieved of most (but obviously not all to a perfect scientific degree) of the moisture it's carrying as it condenses on the metal plates in the condenser. The air then is discharged into the room and the resulting condensed water is pumped to a reservoir. The condenser itself has room air drawn through it in a sealed, separate, path which keeps the condenser surfaces cooler so that when the warm, moist air passes over it the water vapor it is carrying is released. (Think of how your glass of ice-cold soda -the condensation plane- gathers so much moisture on a hot day.) That's the theory, anyway. Where I can get into problems is when the ambient room temperature rises high enough, say 80+F, (whether due just a hot day, or continual drying if I accidentally leave the door to the laundry room closed) so that the temperature differential between the heated air path through the drum and the natural air temp through the condenser gets too close. Then little condensation occurs, even though the machine is running correctly. Also in a closed space such as closet, you might run into problems if the machine caused a small but steady rise in humidity. You would in effect be constantly re-condensing the same moisture out. I think the ideal situation for a condenser dryer would be in cool, and very dry climate. Then they would work like demons. If you air condition your home (and remove humidity that way) you will have less functional problems with a condenser dryer than I do on a hot, humid, but un-air conditioned day in Aug. in NY. However, you will put a small, but probably measurable increased load on your A/C to remove the fugitive humidity from the machine and any increase in room temp. The only other thing to report is that you must periodically remove and clean off the condenser unit to remove any fugitive lint or pet fur that has evaded the lint filters. My machine's manual says once every six months, but I've found that it's more like once every 10 loads, alas. This is by far the nastiest, slimy, gross job in my household and I simply hate it! However, other users of condenser machines on this forum report much less cleaning is needed and when necessary it's nowhere near as onerous. So, this may be a peculiarity of my particular machine, or model, or even my usage patterns. I hope I haven't discouraged you, too much. In a situation like yours you may have no choice if you can't dry clothes any other way. And a condenser dryer is definitely much better than collecting the moisture in a free-standing bucket. It will have drawer in the front which will make removing the condensate very easy. (Some con. dryers will also allow direct draining through the washing machine stand pipe. Don't know about that for Axxis.) Axxis machines are very nice, but IIRC they need 220V power. That's not a bad thing in my mind, as that gives them really good cleaning power from powerful internal heaters. My own washing machines are all 220V models and I would never have anything less. I would ask the dealer if he can give you the names of other users in your area that you could call and ask about how the machines work in your climate. I would be glad to come on an all-expenses paid trip to assess the location for you. How does January sound; it's really grim here in January and Mauai would be much better! Heck, I'd even ship my own machine out with me for a few tests runs. (LOL - I always get a little panic-y the first morning I wake up and see frost outside like this morning; I grew up in South America and Asia.) I hope this helps you make your decision. I suppose there's no way you can line dry? I found one of the best things about living in the tropics was great drying weather year-round except, of course, in the rainy season! No place is perfect, I guess. Molly~ PS: In evaluating condenser dryers keep in mind that "combo units" i.e. ones with a single drum where both washing, and then, drying takes place are very different things from free-standing (or stackable) units. Having a single drum makes things very complicated, and usually you can wash twice much as you can dry in a combo unit making for some awkwardness in load planning. A free-standing/stackable set like the Axxis will wash and dry the same sized loads, and work simultaneously, so your second load is in the wash while the first is drying. PS 2: You also might want to look at Asko brand machines if they are available to you, though the Bosch machines are nice, too.