Hi Everyone,
I'm in Penang area, and am looking for the following:

2.5HP Ceiling Cassette x 1: York
2.0HP Ceiling Cassette x 1: York
1.0HP Wall Mount (with ionizer, non-inverter) x 2: Panasonic / York
1.5HP Wall Mount (with ionizer, non-inverter) x 4: Panasonic / York
Please pm best price and itemize for labour charges


Would appreciate some clarification on the sound levels too:
based on the brochure it appears to me that York is quieter for the same HP based on the SPL (especially for ceiling cassette). This appears to contradict what some people are telling me. (i.e., Panasonic being the quietest)

thx

R22 Daikins inverters offer the best compromise in my opinion. It's really expensive to service R410 at the moment, and the phase out of R22 gas in my opinion, is a non-issue for the foreseeable service life of the typical modern air-conditioner. Furthermore, the environmental friendliness of R410A is debatable to me, as eventhough it does not contribute to ozone depletion, it DOES contribute to global warming as it is nearly 2000 times more effective in trapping heat as CO2. AFAIK, currently R410A servicing involves release of the gas directly to the atmosphere compared to R22 which is reclaimed during servicing.

Keep in mind that Daikin compressors are HUGE relative to York and Panasonic. Your air con guy will sure b**** about installing it.

IMHO, the reason why York and Panasonic are more popular (at least in Penang) is the name recognition and it is easier for them to install and make money maintaining them. To me those are not valid reasons to recommend them to a customer as you are the one to have to live with the airconditioning day in and day out.
Furthermore, York build quality is not as good as Daikin from what I heard, as Daikins are manufactured in Thailand and therefore considered export quality, whereas Yorks are locally assembled. Panasonics are pretty quiet, but rather underpowered

BTW, don't wait until your reno is done. Get the piping installed around the same time you are doing the wiring, and before you do the cabinet work. Otherwise there's additional hacking to do, plus Daikin wiring is different from York's so you need to tell the wireman/aircon guy upfront....

This post has been edited by oe_kintaro: Mar 11 2013, 05:23 PM

Looks to me like you need a 1HP and a 2HP unit. Right-sizing your air cond HP is the first step otherwise you will never get cold. A baseline model York should be good enough for you since you don't need any fancy features. Setting at 18oC is also a bad idea as it prevents your compressor from cutting of most of the time. Seriously 24-25oC is good enough if your air cond HP is correct for your room size.

Yorks are cheap and cheerful
To me they are the baseline for comparison and the preferred brand of installers because they can make money on the spares
Until the cost of maintenance for R410A comes down, Daikins are preferable for me, especially the R22 inverters.

Haven't had my Daikins breakdown on me yet... these days Daikins are all export quality as they are sourced from Thailand so I seriously doubt their build quality can be worse than locally assembled Yorks or Panasonics. I know some aircond installers grumble because the compressors are freaking huge. Also the wiring is different from other air conds and in theory should be less prone to the PCB frying compared to York. Another reason some air cond installers may not like Daikin is that usually these are serviced directly by their own technicians so less chance for outsiders to cari makan from them....
So far in use I find they are extremely quiet so no complaints so far. However if you are the super impatient type who wants the aircond to blast cold air at you the moment you switch it on, please don't get Daikins: Daikins take their own sweet time to power up.

I've heard so many conflicting comments especially on York and Panasonic. Don't know much about Mitsubishi.
Going by stereotypes, York is cold but noisy and Panasonic is quiet but underpowered
In terms of cost of ownership, it should be fairly easy to get spares for Panasonic and York if they ever break down. Seriously though, if you are really planning to use air-conditioning for a long time, an inverter will better bang for buck in terms of electricity bills rather than worrying about warranty periods

The start up is a bit slow because there's a built in logic to move the louvres up and down to drain out any potential condensation before powering up the blower. Noticed this on both their inverter and non-inverter models. As you say, even their compressors are really quiet..

Since Penfurnex was happening nearby, I popped over and grilled the Mitsubishi guy for you and had a look at their brochures
As you say they have a 7+2 warranty which must be their biggest selling point at the moment. At very least they claim to be quieter than York. Build quality wise could be similar to Daikin since they are also made in Thailand. Another interesting feature is the easy to clean design.

Daikin is the 2nd largest air con manufacturer in the world. They've been in Malaysia for decades, but their first local distributor screwed up I think. Only in recent years have they reestablished their presence here. Daikins are popular in Singapore, and I think they bought up OYL here in Malaysia. OYL makes Acsons and Yorks btw.
Yes, likely they may not be displayed as often, but that does not mean spares are much more difficult to find

Carrier concentrates on the industrial market here in Malaysia. You can find them in factories. Reliable workhorses but not really suited for homes as they are quite loud

Less BTU/H means less cooling effect. It is the output you get but it should be relative to your input kW. The less the input kW relative to the BTU, the more efficient your air cond and the more you save on electricity bills. Of course this is also dependent on you buying the right aircon HP for your room size. If your aircond is underpowered relative to your room size, the compressor will struggle to cut off and you have high electricity bills. If your aircond is too overpowered relative to your room size, it will cut off too often before achieving the optimum efficiency, and so you have high electricity bills too....
A simple analogy would be comparing to a car: If you want to drive all the time at 130km/h you shouldn't get a kancil. If you are always stuck in traffic, no point getting a ferrari either.

So it is not just about raw BTU/H but about what you really need. Did you do a proper calculation on your required HP based on your room size yet?
As long as any air cond you buy is operating within its optimum efficiency range it should be fine whether it is +/- a few BTU/H

You should inform the wireman that you are using daikins. They should know what to do.
If they tell you the wiring is the same as other airconds, better get another wireman..

This post has been edited by oe_kintaro: Aug 1 2013, 08:08 AM