Holmes Air Purifier
If price is one of your concerns, then one of the better lines to consider is Holmes Air Purifier, a collection of brands that range from about $50 for the HAP240 air purifier to $130 or so for the HAP675. Most other brands cost a minimum of $200 or so for a quality product, so this is a good one to take a look at. The low price also makes it easier to buy more than one, which many people end up doing (buying one for each room will get you better coverage, and avoid having "pockets" in your house where none of the air is being cleaned).
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Holmes Air Purifier
This brand has gotten generally good reviews, and the Holmes
line relies on HEPA technology, which is one of the newer methods of air
filtration. It's designed to cycle through the air in a medium sized room
every ten minutes or so, so there's a constant cleaning process going on. The
Holmes
The Good:
It's cheap, and you can probably get more coverage in your house because you can afford more than one. It doesn't make that much noise, even at the high setting, which is a big plus - a lot of brands will make conversation or watching T.V. difficult if you put them on high. On quiet, the Holmes air purifier still makes some noise, but it's probably not going to bother you even if you're trying to sleep.
The Bad:
A $30-50 air purifier just isn't going to be as effective as a $700 one. If you've got serious health problems, or you're trying to get rid of smoke from cigarettes (which is one of the hardest things for an air cleaner to tackle), then a Holmes air purifier may not be for you - it gets rid of a significant amount of the particles, but it's not one of those brands that will get rid of nearly everything.
Specific Reviews:
Holmes HAP240
I've personally purchased a Holmes HEPA air purifier for my
office. I work in New Orleans, so there is a pretty big mold problem here at
the moment. I bought the HAP240 - a cheaper model that ran about $30 (though
I've seen the price vary up to $50). This is
just to run in the office, and it's a one-room model (the specs are for 10
feet by 11 feet). Installation was extremely easy - all you had to do was pull
a plastic bag off of the filter, then reinsert it. It is pretty much
no-frills, so I doubt that I would go with this particular model at home.
There are two filtration systems: first, a HEPA-based filter. They are fairly
cheap to replace as well, I found them
online
UPDATE:
It's been about 3 months, and I've had the Holmes HAP240 on in my house continuously. It is very clear that it has picked up a lot of dust and some hair. It doesn't seem to be that great about picking up cat fur - I have a cat that sheds a lot, and there wasn't that much in there, especially compared to how much I find on the floors. However, it appears to have picked up a LOT of dust. The filter had a lot on it. The prefilter caught much of the hair - one downside was that when I pulled it out to wash it, dust went everywhere. However, I did notice that the prefilter let a lot of hair-type stuff get through on the corners. Dirt also got sucked into random nooks and crannies of the air purifier, so maybe I should have been cleaning it more often. The filter looks like it is getting near done. It is starting to get black, which is the "replacement color." However, I am in a high dust area and I have a cat, so I may be putting a lot of pressure on it.
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