Midea U Inverter 12,000 BTU Smart Window AC end of summer review
I picked up the Midea U Inverter Smart Window AC back in June or July. It’s a connected air conditioner that allows you to open and close your window without massive hassle, lets in a little more light, and it’s a pretty decent design. Here’s what my experiences have been the last 4 or 5 months.
Also in case you’re unfamiliar with my style, I will list out every annoyance pretty much at the start and then work my way into where it excels. This is a pretty positive review relatively with items that might irk you at the start.
Connectivity
The Midea U Inverter Smart Window AC sits as one of the only smart and connected devices where I regularly get Google and app errors claiming that the Midea Air service cannot be reached. As part of my job at Big Pocketables Corp, I have a lot of connected devices. When a connected device goes down I generally get that said device is down, not that the service cannot be reached. I’ve literally never heard that the Productname Service Cannot be reached.
When this happens I can pop open the app and connect. If the app says it can’t connect, I can ask Google. One of them always works and usually both of them do, but this is not something I’d expect these days. Usually also if I want to wait a minute it’s back up and running. Just not the flawless experience I get off of a $5.99 smart LED bulb or similar.
It has been extremely useful to be able to shut it down remotely and spin it up as needed. I don’t know how many times I’ve walked out of the house with an air conditioner on full blast that did not need to be.
Support
Disappointed in it thus far. I’ve had three requests I put in, each one took several days to get a response, two of three involved them asking me to call their support, one email gave me the correct answer (unplug the USB WiFi adapter,) but did not give any useful information such as where it was, what it looked like, other things that could be done.
The first support case was about an error it was throwing up in the app related to sensors that just went away. Second involved an issue in which the type of WiFi AP the unit was connected to changed from an AP to a router style and the AC would not pick up new settings. Solution ended up being unplug it, press the on button, let the capacitors drain over the course of the 3 seconds it still has power, and it should reset finally.
Getting smarter
This thing has had the dumbs in the past. From not recognizing the word “degrees” for nearly a week through Assistant/Home, being able to set a temperature in fahrenheit and it responding in Celsius, but it seems to have gotten the basic functions smoothed out with assistant integration. Other than the inability to reach the Midea Air Service somewhat regularly it’s become quite useful. Except the fan.
Fan mode
This I feel like there’s something I missed – so there may be something I have completely missed, or I might be rightly justified in my “wtf?” – so, you have a fan mode for the unit – it just recirculates air and moves it around the room. The fan speed can be set by you, or it can be set to auto. There’s also a giant temperature slider which I would assume would work in conjunction with the auto fan speed setting but no.
So, the fan is on auto mode, which appears to mean it stays at the exact same speed for all of eternity whether it’s hot, cold, or not needed. What is this auto speed set for? How is it determined? Sometimes I pop it on and it’s barely a whisper, sometimes it’s blasting full throttle. Always on auto.
It’s whisper quiet, but arthritic
I cannot stress how quiet this thing *usually* is. And it can be quiet almost all of the time if you don’t require the setting called “Horizontal S” which causes the air to be directed up and down. On lower whisper operations you can hear this, not particularly loud mind you. Not even something to be aware of until it starts getting cold.
As the until kicks into freezing mode you start hearing popping as plastic and metal shrink. This doesn’t last long, but I’ve done midnight checks as it can sound like it’s dripping or popping its knuckles.
You can get around the noise by setting the temp real low and leaving it so the unit can’t warm and cool and resize itself.
Oh yeah, PS that doesn’t need its own section, it is not quiet when you want to change a setting – it always beeps. Ask Google to set something, beep. Use the app, beep. I generally find I’m changing the temp setting around 3am and it’s loud.
How’s the U?
The ability to have more window, be able to open it for fresh air without an AC unit falling out, these seemed good selling points. However, immediately after getting the U I wondered if they could make it upside down, and some other company did (not that I can find the inverted U as of this writing.) Units that go over the lip rather than up into the window. Oh well, I live in the south where it’s either 98F, 12F, or raining. I don’t really open that window much.
Was this a good review or a bad one?
Most of what my complaints are are fixable. Midea can invest a bit more in their cloud service connectivity, they could push a firmware update where it doesn’t beep all the time, update the app a bit. Nothing’s been a deal breaker thus far.
The only quality issue I have is I wish they would use some sort of different material on the air redirector so it doesn’t pop and crack as the temp drops down when the AC kicks on. The performance has been that of a physically much larger unit. I’m impressed.
