I’m a bloke so when it comes to buying stuff I generally leave it to the wife. I’m happy buying music, books, computer games and technical stuff but when it comes to white goods I’m just not interested enough, as long as it does the job and doesn’t cost an arm and a leg I’m fine about it.
We just moved house and so the fridge which was perfectly good for the other house is no longer good enough for the new house, apparently. So off we went dragging very uncooperative kids through electrical stores, they are absolute swines in places like that, way too many gadgets to fiddle with, buttons to press and tall equipment to get lost in. So I chased my son through aisle after aisle of fridges, freezers and other expensive white goods trying to stop him causing as much damage as possible. My wife on the other hand casually browsed the fridges looking for just the right thing.
Our specification was it had to have good solid drawers and shelves, no flimsy wires baskets, it had to be silver and it had to have an economy rating of A, my one and only contribution to the purchase. What we found was the Samsung SR-L3626B in Comet, for about £349.00. There is currently a special offer from the electricity companies; if you purchase A rated electrical efficiency goods they will refund a set amount as a trade in for your old goods. I was half tempted to pop down to the tip and pick up something from there to trade in for £45 and sell our fridge in the local papers, but I was talked out of that.
What do you get for your money then, well we didn’t get silver, a silver fridge/freezer cost about £50 more. A fridge is a fridge, but a silver fridge is, well it’s silver isn’t it, not for £50 it isn’t! The draws in the freezer are very sturdy and there is a good division of storage space. The shelves in the fridge are well thought out too with shelves for 1.5 litre bottles and for 1 litres bottle taking up the lower half of the door, the upper part has 2 diary compartments, an egg tray and a nifty little can holder. The body of the fridge has four toughened glass shelves, one of which will splits into two narrow selves to allow the storage of bottles, plenty of room for booze then! It’s also got a couple of salad crispers at the bottom for the times my wife insists on green things to eat! The crispers have an adjustable humidity controller, which is nice.....
Specification wise the fridge uses R600a as a refrigerant which has a zero Ozone Depletion Potential (ODP) but it is flammable. In addition to the fridge having the best economy rating available there is also an economy button which sets the fridge to 6oC and the freezer to -17oC which are the units optimal settings. There is a boost setting for when you put fresh stuff into the freezer and there is a vacation setting which turns the fridge off and keeps the freezer going for when you are on holiday. The current temperature is displayed on a digital panel at the top of the unit, this is where all the other buttons are too. I’m not too sure it’s such a good idea but they also have a power switch on the panel, I my opinion it’s probably best to keep that out of reach so it can’t be knocked off accidentally. It’s also frost free which is apparently (according to the lovely Comet salesmen) very unusual for fridge/freezers in this price range. It will take 7.6 cubic feet of fresh food and 3.8 cubic feet of frozen food, that is a lot of beer and pizza. Outer dimensions are 71.5in x 23.5in x 25in so it is a bit of a monster, I’m kind of glad we didn’t get a silver one after all, a hunk of metal that big in my kitchen might have been a bit too much.
Although I find it very difficult to get worked up about these kind of things, I’d say it’s quite a nice fridge/freezer, which I suppose is a recommendation of sorts.
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Advantages: Good capacity for small family, no frost or condensation on interior walls. Disadvantages: Freezer compartments quite tight for large items like pizza's etc
Advantages: Good capacity for small family, no frost or condensation on interior walls. Disadvantages: Freezer compartments quite tight for large items like pizza's etc
Apr 19th, 2001
(Apr 2nd, 2001)
very helpful by (100%):
