This issue is clouded by the fact that all vacuums tend to now be throw-aways that compete on price. Once it was clear who was the winner in each category. If you can get a good upright it will have a powerful brush rubbing and vibrating the fibers of a carpet while a good (not great) vacuum sucks up the dirt that is loosened. Canisters had very powerful vacuum power to collect as much dust as ome could loosen with the equipped attachments. Simple as that. Now Consumer Reports is contending with both the inherent properties of various models and the junk that is out there. Wwe have a whole house of carpets to contend with. So my wife has a Kirby that does the job. Not junk and very expensibe. It will never make a Consumer Reports best buy category, but it works like all good vacuums did in the old days. I have a small plug in hand held vac. that Consumer Reports said was very good and I use it for all small jubs around the house and cars. Hope you find what you are looking for.

Posted by mike9 : " How large of a cooler do you recommend? " How big a cooler will depend on how much food you try to sous vide. Since the components of my system are portable, I have several container sizes, from a small one to cook a few eggs to a good size cooler for large roasts. "How much power do i need? " The pump is less than 10 watts, the rest depends on the electric heater. Remember the heater use not much power to keep the water at the set temperature. "If i had to raise that the temperature of the cooler 30-40 degrees above hot tap water then its going to take a long time with 300w. I'd have to pull out the pans boil water on the stove etc. Could say a 1500w heater be too much and have problems with overshooting? I plan on using a PID and solid state relay. " I always use boiling water to get the water bath temperature high enough. 1,500 W heater will not overshoot if you have a good enough circulator. PID controller with a solid state relay, I believe, but not sure, throttles the heater from low to high. PID will, using self-tuning, self-adjusting to compensate overall equipment overshooting. "How much power does it take to sustain the equilibrium temp after everything has been cooking for many hours? " Depends on the insulating property of your container and the size of the container. "How much power does it take to maintain the set water temperature after a bunch of frozen food has been dropped into the bath? That could be important if i have an item already cooking and then later throw something frozen in there, if the temp of the water dropped for a long time it could mess up the cooking time of the first item. " Just keep an eye on the temperature reading, add more boiling water if needed. "I was looking at these heaters. http://www.amazon.com/NORPRO-559-Immersion-Warming-Liquids/dp/B000I8VE68/ http://www.amazon.com/Bush-CH-101-Energy-Saving-Immersion-Heater/dp/B003DLB5KW/ http://www.amazon.com/Reliance-9000129-045-Electric-Heater-Element/dp/B000H5W1TQ/ " The first two not too good: 1. they are not long lasting. 2. They are not completely submersible. The third one is very long lasting, but requires you to build something around the exposed terminals to waterproof and shock-proof. ------------------------------------------- I would like to say this to those of you who may be reading this thread, do not worry about any of these tech stuff. They are not what sous vide cooking is all about. A ready-made sous vide cooker is not that expensive anymore, plug it in, set the temperature and enjoy the superior food. That is all. All these annoying tech stuff are for crazy folks like me, who hasn�t quite outgrown his toy playing delinquencies yet. dcarch

kcboom wrote: >>Most of the US electricity is generated by Coal fired boilers. A coal fired boiler has max efficiency rating of 80%. A large majority of US boilers are using lower BTU coal then what they were built for, decreasing the efficiency even more.The efficiency of coal->electricity conversion is around 40% absolute maximum, usually a bit less than this thanks to Mr Carnot and his laws of heat engines. If you want to compare CO2 emissions for a given amount of heat delivered of say gas and a heatpump you have to know what your electrical generation mix is in the first place and how many kg of CO2 are emitted for each kWh of power delivered to your home and then factor in the COP of the heatpump. If you're interested in the cost of each kWh of heat delivered, you can do a similar calculation, but you only need to know the cost of each kWh delivered (and then, again, factor in the COP of your heatpump versus your furnace after accounting for the output efficiency). Electric resistance heat is indeed 100% efficient, but that same electricity could give you 3x the delivered heat or more if it is used to power a heatpump - this is why heatpumps are touted as being "efficient". Really, all you need to know is the $ cost for each kWh of heat that makes it into your home - that's probably the most important metric for comparing systems in an apples-to-apples way (assuming you're not concerned with CO2 or anything else). Paul.

I was thinking about my former garage (now my den). My DH was a GC. He'd clean out his truck by putting everything into Hefty bags and first, putting them in the garage. Right in front of the door. So, the garage was kind of empty, but you couldn't get in. Then he just left them in driveway. Thank goodness our home is in the country and no one could see. I hated it, but didn't know what the stuff was to clear it out or save. For 3 years I lived in a home damaged by fire and subsequent rebuilding plans. No electricity, plumbing, windows, heat, kitchen, 1 toilet (I begged to have hooked up), and finally a shower. I lived in 1 room with 7 cats and 4 dogs, waiting for him to get thru depression, work exhaustion, God knows what. Turns out "what" was an affair and the rebuilding he was doing on the house and come to a grinding halt because he was "busy". Not working for a year, but during patience and understanding, I didn't know that. We split up and those bags became a blessing. Lots was rusted or ruined, but I was able to exchange anything with a bar code to Lowe's and HD. Probably well over $4500's worth of stuff I exchanged for electrical wire, plumbing stuff, additional drywall materials, roof tar paper, flashing, (stop me) if you can think of something you'd use to build a house, insert it here. Because I had materials in those bags, I was able to get electricity in all but 2 rooms, a donated vanity sink installed, drywall materials (still LOTS of this to do), things built, some plumbing installed, and amazing stuff done. Without buying much at all! Some projects required NO material money whatsoever. I had 43 electrical outlet/switch boxes and the outlets and switches to go with them! When I can get the money together to hire someone, even they started to ask where I had this tool, this gadget, this plumbing part, this electrical box, that wood, this type screw, that drill and this bit, (stop me again) vs. immediately thinking they were going to get an hour break to go to Lowe's or HD. Saved me TONS and TONS in time, money, frustration, and got rid of much of the Hefty bags. Let me sing that song again: It also got rid of the bags. I decided to teach myself how to build cabinets (no kitchen) since I had all this material in the garage and barn. Well, one little class at a woodworking club showed me many of those weird tool things I had were something I could use!!! Glad I didn't clear out everything in a grief/depression/frustration-purge. Turns out when he couldn't find something, he just bought another. I actually had MORE tools than the workshop! So purging by returning. Purging by installing. Purging by building. And not purging something I didn't understand has held me in good stead! I admit to giving away an entire lathe system and an evil radial arm saw. Afraid of that baby! But I know people who take this stuff can USE it. I purge frequently and actually don't have stuff like I used to. I just have no place to put things yet (haven't built closets) so my life is in those Sterlite boxes stacked in different rooms. Slowly but surely, they're either given away or I finish a cabinet. One project at a time, even if it's winding the cord up on the vacuum cleaner.