if you have an attic above that room get the kind that the motor is actually several feet away from the vent in the ceiling as they work great and are very quiet. I put a Solitube with a light kit and a Broan vent in one of my bathrooms with motor in attic and it is outstanding. You don't need a Solitube to use this type of vent fan. If you don't have attic space above, then I would go with the panasonic or a Nutone.

mike -- Don't know that we will need a timer. It's just DH and I -- retired -- can remember to turn it off, I think. BTW, how long should it run after a bath or shower? energy rater -- The specs say the backdraft damper is within the 8" duct connection portion of the fan, not whether it faces in or out. I need to ask that they face it away from the fan itself, right? Or are you saying the damper should be not at the fan, but at the soffit? The bath is on the NW corner of the house. Air and moisture will go UP through the bathroom ceiling into the fan, ACROSS about ten feet of attic floor, then out a West soffit. Is it at the soffit that you want metal-flex flaps? Does moisture acclumlate there? Drip outside the exterior wall? (Yeah, where DOES the water go?) I see round aluminum-looking flex-ducting in the attic. Is that what I should expect to see on this install -- not hard metal ducting like a forced air furnace? Is this capacity appropriate? I want to eliminate excess moisture, but don't want to be taking baths or showers in a wind tunnel! (It is meant to run *while* one bathes and a short while afterwards, right?) Is a sone rating of 1.7 good? Is Broan a good brand? This installer is also going to correct three other, smaller bathroom exhaust fan ducts that now empty INTO the attic instead of outdoors. Price is $900 all in for Broan unit and all work. He says it will take about four hours. We are north of Chicago in a high-*address tax*-suburb, as my DH terms it. Thanks so much for your time and trouble. Much appreciated. I'm probably overly concerned, but we keep finding faults (like these fan exhausts) in a house that passed city inspection when it was built only 10 years ago. I'm sure it was not code to vent into an attic!

It's easy to replace just the motor, but I've found that these cheap fans go hand-in-hand with cheap flexible ducting that has collapsed and/or become disconnected. I now always replace these fans with a higher quality one (I use Panasonic), and put in rigid ducting, even though it could mean doing some ceiling repair. Sometimes you get lucky, though, and only have to cut the hole a little bigger, no repair work necessary.

I’m hoping to see some cool ideas from the other Houzzers. Just as an FYI, we put in a new fan, with an automatic moisture sensor, and automatic shut off timer. And it is very sleek. Of course, it might have come from one of those big box stores that rhymes with repo. We then added a place for a new light.