In the future, if you encounter similar problems, you could consider buying things from the UK (or for that matter, from most other countries in Europe). I have had good luck ordering from country-specific Amazon stores. Shipping is not negligible, but I find it is frequently surprisingly little compared to what I would have expected. A quick glance at the amazon.co.uk suggests that shipping an undercounter wine cooler to the US would set you back somewhere on the order of $85. Amazon usually is good about shipping internationally for items that they sell themselves, but several third-party vendors on Amazon don't do so by default. I have sometimes contacted them directly, and discovered that in about 50% of cases, they are willing to negotiate special terms to ship to the US. Also, they should technically refund value-added-tax, when they do this. That's about a 20% discount, which can often make the extra cost of shipping more palatable. The downside is that you won't have easy warranty service, and you also will have to deal with country-specific model differences. Dimensions could be a little different, but a quick check suggests that UK appliances are compatible in height with US models. And of course, voltage is different. The UK uses 240V/50Hz, whereas the US uses 120V/60Hz. The difference in voltage is easy to fix. You simply ask your electrician to run a 240V circuit to the kitchen. That's possible in most households, although it might be difficult to do in some apartment buildings that get three-phase service. The difference in frequency is usually not a problem. Modern electronics never care; resistive loads (i.e. heating elements) don't care; inductive loads (i.e. motors and transformers) might care. That's a chance you have to take. Or you could ask the manufacturer. Realistically, it is extremely unlikely that operating at 60Hz instead of 50Hz is going to cause problems. The reverse is more likely to be a problem. This only leaves you with potential questions about building codes. There is nothing inherently wrong with European appliances. After all, hundreds of millions of people use them daily. But they might not have been tested by American test labs. And they probably won't even show up in American building codes, as they simply aren't a major consideration. This could be a problem when you get the kitchen inspected -- or it could be a non-issue. Depends on your local building department.

I'm thinkin that all you have to do is choose between a sweet wine and a dry wine. Then let price be your guide. Granted, there are $5 a bottle wines that are better than $50 a bottle wines, so just go for the most expensive, (I'm sure, if your neighbor is an a-fish-ionato, then they will know how much you spent on them). But you need to know if your neighbor likes sweet or dry. I'm not a wine 'conna-sewer', but I like something in between sweet and dry. And then there's your choice of red or white. Lord, now I know why I don't drink wine. Whisky is no problemo, either bourbon, or rye, TOP SHELF. Easy Peasy.

My Kitchenaid beverage center is very quiet, I never even notice it. I just walked over and put my head down next to the glass door and I could hear it running, but once I walked away a few steps I couldn't hear it anymore. Right now the beverage section is at 37 degrees. DH keeps his cranberry juice in there for cosmos and I keep my acai berry juice in it ... always ice cold. I believe I paid just over $1000 for the panel ready version.

viburnumvalley gave you some interesting choices. Remember that a wine is sweet if some residual sugar (RS) is left in the wine after fermentation. If it is fermented until there is no RS, the wine will be called "dry". Germany has very exact rules, but to Americans they are not necessarily clear. The grapes can be picked at various sugar levels - the sugar increases as the grapes get riper and riper. Then those wines can be fermented until they are dry, called "trocken", or halb trocken. So you can get a spatlese, which will have a lot of sugar at harvest, but if the winemaker wants to, he can ferment it all the way to dry and that wine will not taste sweet. But Eiswein is not the next level up from Trockenbeerenauslese (TBA) The TBA is made by a fungus that attacks the grapes. It is a kind of botrytis, or mold, called "noble rot". It dries the grapes and makes them taste very much like raisins, and it also adds its own flavors. The German levels of sweetness refer to how dry the berries get. Eiswein is made by leaving berries on the vine until they freeze and pressing the frozen juice. Dissolved sugar keeps some from being completely iced and this is what comes out - much more concentrated than if the rest of the water had not formed ice. Those berries don't need to have any botrytis. In both cases - botrytis and ice, the amount of juice is reduced and the wine is thus more expensive. Vouvray comes from the Loire valley. Generally very dry, almost lemony wines. But the Loire also gets botrytis - you need a river or water source. And those very tart grapes, when attacked by botrytis, make very sweet wine. So you can get some very good sweets from the Loire. Sauternes/Barsac are regions in Bordeaux. They typically grow white grapes - semillion and sauvignon blanc. The river allows the botrytis to form and the clusters become moldy then are pressed. These can be super expensive - the 2005 Chateau d'Yquem is available as a future for $500 / bottle. Tokaj is the name of the town, the wine named there is Tokaji. The famous wine is Tokaji-aszu. Also made w botrytized grapes but in this case they also make a dry white. They pick the INDIVIDUAL berries and store them until ready. Then they mash these up and soak that paste in the dry wine. These wines are measured by the amount of sugar. The pails are called puttony, so you can get 3,4,5, 6 puttonyos wine. THat used to mean that they took 3,4,5,6 pails of mashed raisins and soaked them in a barrel of wine. Now it is based on sugar. But at the upper levels, you can have wine that has as much sugar as honey! These are truly great - I expect to be back there in about 2 weeks to get some more. Most Australian rieslings are very dry unless otherwise indicated. May Americna rieslings have enough residual sugar to taste a bit sweet. Port is made by adding alcohol into partly fermented grape juice. Remember, fermenting is the process of converting the sugar to alcohol, so if it is stopped, the juice remains sweet. In Italy they make the vin santos - the grapes are air dried to concentrate the flavors, unlike the botrytis method in Austria, Hungary, France and Germany. Spain has some of the PX sherries made in a similar way, but also fortified. All of the above are for very sweet wines. You can also get late harvest wines - left on the vine until the grapes are really ripe, they produce sweeter wine. And you can find the undrinkable non-wines that they sell in supermarkets - usually have a lot of sugar and flavors added. Not really wine. But don't forget that fruitiness is often perceived as sweet. So a dry wine that has lots of fruit, is often considered sweet. Around $100 you can find Gemstone Facets, Pax syrahs, or other big California wines - some people consider them sweet and soft. They are actually dry wines made from super ripe fruit. At a much lower level, look for Bodegas Arrocal or something similar from Spain - about $10, no oak, and very ripe. Muscat as a grape smells like flowers. Beautiful. But it is not always made sweet. It is often a very dry wine that smells floral. Ditto viognier. Muscat is sometimes used in Tokaji-aszu, and those have fantastic aromatics. Chardonnay, and any wine for that matter, can be made in a number of ways and can be fermented and/or stored in oak barrels. The stereotype California chardonnay is buttery and tastes like vanilla. That vanilla comes from oak. The butter can come from oak, but also malolactic fermentation makes the wine much softer and gives some of that quality. Remember, malolactic fermentation is the conversion of malic to lactic acid and "lactic" means milk. So you get a buttery quality. The oak usually does not impart much tannin to chardonnay. Try Martin Ray from Russian River in Sonoma - about $15. In Burgundy, the French typcially do not use much or any oak for their chardonnay and the result is a much more tart and dry wine. Many California wineries are making unoaked chardonnay as well. Morgan for example. You can try one of these against say, Chateau St Michelle from Washington. Both good, both under $20 or even $15, and one w/out and one w oak. Oak itself is too big a deal to get into here, but people discuss the differences between French and American oak, and in some cases Hungarian and Slovenian. Suffice it to say, whatever anyone tells you, most of it is nonsense. Especially coming from "experts". People in the oak business will explain that the best palates cannot really discern differences. Most of what we consider differences have to do with cooperage and the trees that were used. But it is not true that American oak is vanilla and French oak is spicy. Get good oak and have the same cooper make the barrels and no sommellier will ever be able to tell you which is which based on country. I've tried and was humbled. Anyway, move beyond sweet wines and you will be surprised. A very nice dry shiraz, for example, can taste very fruity and full of blueberries and black cherries if you eat it with a piece of sharp aged white cheddar for example. Cheers!