Hi ZIns, Oberon offered professional technical details so I will chime in with homeowner experience. Yes, even with Low-E, there will be fading. Depending on the amount and intensity of exposure and the finish, it is a matter of how much and how soon. In a situation where the sun is very mild and light, by the time fading is noticeable, it may also be time to refinish the floor. My guess is the floor is not receiving year-round exposure, true? The sun is stronger and deeper during some time of the year and weaker and less intense at other times, is that so? We have seasonal sun intensity problem too and solve it with a combination of solution. We use rugs to protect several sections of our floor during mid-Spring through late Summer. The rugs are removed to prevent tripping when we have visitors. The rugs are also removed around Autumn when the sun is low and the exposure is much less intense and shortening each day. We have old furniture in one area by our French doors and my wife made knitted coverings to cover the furniture. As necessary, we remove the covering when appropriate. Outside the French doors, we installed retractable awning so that during extremely hot summer days, the awning extends to provide cover without blocking natural light. Our goal is to not use any window treatment because we enjoy natural light and the views. Hope this helps a bit.

Alexandra E., Hello! I've sold Fleetwood, Western, Jeld Wen, WeatherShield, and Awake products. Paring the list down to thermally broken aluminum products, let's focus on Fleetwood, Western, and Awake. Right now, Fleetwood is suffering from an incredibly long lead time, of between 38-52 weeks, depending on the series you order, I've been told. Western is at 6 weeks, Awake, depending on size of job, is 12-14 weeks. All 3 offer narrow site line multi slide doors, though the Fleetwood Edge series is a trainwreck. Awake has an almost full line-up of narrow siteline products, ranging from multi slide doors to swing doors to fixed multiple lite windows using their T-Bar offering. Western currently has only the 300 Series door systems that offer a narrow site line multi slide door. Of these 3 manufacturers, Awake has the thinnest profile at 3/4", Fleetwood Edge is at 1", and the 300 Series by Western comes in at 1-1/8". Cost to consumer, from lowest to highest would go; Western, Awake, Fleetwood. Heights - 132" is easily done by all 3 (Western, Awake, Fleetwood). Panel size on multi slide doors is constrained by the glass manufacturer they are supplied by. Western and Fleetwood utilize Cardinal 366 Series glass, which is held in size to a max width of 94" and a max height of 144". A general rule of thumb is standard glazing goes up to 70 square feet. Beyond that, you move into jumbo glass. Awake and Fleetwood can go up to 100 square feet in their panel size for multi slide doors. I believe Western is held at 70 square feet. For sills, all three offer a flush and thinline/t-sill, where the space between the tracks can be infilled with tile or natural stone - DO NOT BRING wood to within 24" of a thinline or t-sill as you can suffer water damage to your wood floor. Carpet is not a good idea too, as your door will never seal (had a client do this, then called me at 11pm to tell me he's suffering from a draft). Awake and Fleetwood can go up to 180", possibly even 192", depending on the width of the panel. Western is capped at 144" height. Full height or transom windows? You'll pay the same when it's all said and done. To carry transom windows over a multi slide door system, you'll need steel (to keep a narrow profile) or wood (to keep costs down) above the multi slide door system, that runs the entire length of the frame (this would include pockets). What I've done in the past for clients who wanted transoms above their multi slide door is I take a 2" x 5" tube steel, lay it on it's side, then run upllift legs that tie into the header or trusses that run above both systems, to maintain the integrity of the multi slide door frame and preventing any sagging. In one instance, I had to tie another 2"x5" run of tube steel 90° of the other to help provide the strength needed for wind deflection to a wind speed of 72 mph. *it was a 480" daylight opening, double pocket Western 600 series door, with 60" awning windows at the end, and fixed windows between, that made up the transom. Hope this information has helped you! Best of luck with your decision and build.

Hey. It’s me again! I just thought a round-up/semi-conclusion to this thread would be nice for anyone else struggling to make this same decision. Our house will be finished in another month. I went with all 366 windows. The dealer and the builder thought I was crazy for ever questioning it, FWIW. Here’s my takeaway: The visible light transmission reduction is noticeable. It’s not terrible but it is a slight bummer. The solar heat gain coefficient is no joke. I stood in front of the giant south facing window on a cold sunny day in black leggings and never warmed up. My black leggings were cool to the touch. A dog looking for a warm spot would be very disappointed with 366 windows. That said, I’m assuming it will do a good job of keeping the heat out in the summer. I just wanted to chime in and affirm that these ARE noticeable things. They are real trade offs. The jury is still out for me as to whether I made the right choice. But I’m certain my furniture and floors will be happy with the 366.

orveusz, You are welcome. I89 is an exposed surface 4 coating. What it does is reflect heat back into the room rather than having the glass absorb that heat. Reflecting back into the room does two things: 1) it makes sitting next to the window more comfortable because the air in front of the window is slightly warmer. This also results in improved U value performance (less heat loss through the glass) 2) because the glass isn't absorbing room heat, the glass is colder than it would be otherwise and this can potentially lead to increased condensation on the window glass if its really cold outside...you know like mid january in Minnesota. Some windows companies are more concerned about this potential than others, and some add disclaimers about this possibility. As I recall, testing by Cardinal has shown that I89 is going to lower edge glass temps about 4° or so, and center of glass about 9° or so versus not using the I89 coating. Is that a problem? The simple answer is...it depends. Primarily it depends on how cold it is outside and how much moisture there is inside. If someone is in a moderate climate then it simply won't be an issue. If you live in Minnesota in January then you might notice an increase in window condensation on the coldest days. Keep in mind that using a warm-edge spacer helps a lot at the edge. In fact, using a warm edge spacer with I89 results in edge temperature that is still higher than using an aluminium spacer without the I89 coating. As to center-of-glass, 9° does sound like a lot, but even with that much potential glass cooling, with a LowE coating and argon fill the center of glass temp is still higher than it would be if all you had is a plain uncoated dual pane glass package. And even in the coldest days (bathroom windows excepted), how often does anyone see condensation over an entire window - assuming that the inside of the home isn't really humid. So will I89 cause your windows to be wetter than they might be otherwise? They might where you (and I) live. But even if it does, it might not be an issue more than a few days during an entire winter. Make sense?