Blue Playmate Elite MaxCold™ - 16 Qt. Review

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(More customer reviews)I have other larger Igloo Maxcold coolers, which have thicker walls of insulation, and actually do keep things colder longer than a regular thin-walled cooler. Maxcold is supposed to be their "premium" sub-brand. This product, however, is nothing more than a conventional Igloo Playmate cooler dressed up with the blue-silver color and a flimsy, thin piece of styrofoam under the lid. I was very disappointed.
The walls of the cooler are no thicker than a cheap Playmate cooler, and as you would expect, it does NOT keep things colder longer. Any ice placed in this cooler will be melted within 12-18 hours at room temperature, not 3-5 days, as is typical with a Maxcold cooler. The only difference is a useless piece of thin styrofoam under the lid, which will surely break up and fall out soon. As any teenage science student can tell you, cold air falls, so insulation ABOVE the cold mass is nearly useless. Why did Igloo do this instead of make the walls and floor of the cooler thicker (as they do with other Maxcold coolers)? The answer is that some marketing guy at Igloo (who flunked science and had never used a cooler) thought it would be clever to slap the Maxcold label on a cheap Playmate cooler to fool consumers into paying more, without spending anything to add thicker walls.
Message to Igloo marketing geniuses: This will backfire on you. The fastest way to kill a higher-end brand is to put the label on a low-quality, non-performing product, and disappoint your target consumer. I will never buy an Igloo product again.

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Igloo FR180 1.7-Cu-Ft Stainless Steel Door Refrigerator Review

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(More customer reviews)For the most part, this refridgerator has done a good job keeping the drinks cold, and the size is reasonable: small on the outside, big on the inside, perfect for the dorm room. The interior is sound and the temperature is very cold, even on the minimum setting.
So why did it lose three stars? Because of one minor flaw, and one serious problem. The minor flaw is that while the fridge keeps the things inside cold, the top and sides get uncomfortably warm. Not enough to set anything on fire, but definitely not the thing you want to put your bare hand on for long. Good if you want to keep lunch warm though.
As for the serious problem-- the pipe in the back gets really, really cold. After running this for three weeks, my mother noticed that the fridge was leaking water. Upon further inspection, I noticed that it wasn't a leak...it was water dripping from MELTING ICE THAT HAD FORMED around one of the pipes in the back of the fridge, just outside of the insulation that had wrapped around the pipe. The chunk was about an inch and a half in diameter, and looked like a chunk of white foam wrapped around the pipe.
It took me 15 minutes to ease the ice off, then as I was inspecting the pipe under the insulating cover, another chunk of ice popped out. All told, it took about 20 minutes to get the mess handled, but I'm glad my mother noticed the water dripping when she did, otherwise, I fear that the fridge might have short circuited and cost us $100 in the process.
EDIT: In regards to the ice--the refridgerator's parts seem to be watertight, so you don't have to worry about the ice harming it. I do recommend that, should you buy this fridge, to either put some foam/insulation around the pipe to reinforce the one already present, or, more simply, just putting a tray under the ice to catch the drips.

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