GoldStar GHD Dehumidifier Review

I bought a new house in 2000 and quickly learned that the basement smelled damp and musty. The cure was a dehumidifier and I bought an inexpensive GoldStar DH3010B, a model that is now obsolete. The DH3010B worked fine for about six years, then the unit's fan seized. I fixed it without too much trouble but it seized again in a few months. Time to get a new dehumidifier. I have another dehumidifier (in another house), and it's been working fine for 15 years -- and continues to work. I thought six years was an unexpectedly short life for a dehumidifier.

I looked at several stores but the best deal was on another GoldStar model, the GHD30. This is GoldStar's bottom-of-the-line unit with the capacity to remove 30 pints of water per day. That's all I need in my basement, so I bought the GHD30 for $140 at Home Depot.

I show the control panel in the pictures above. The round knob is a humidistat, which switches the GHD30 on and off depending on the ambient humidity. So far, it seems to work well. Since the unit is on the floor of the basement directly below my bedroom, I wanted a unit that was reasonably quiet, Unfortunately, noise specifications simply aren't given for dehumidifiers (at least not the ones I looked at), so I had to take a chance. My other dehumidifier -- the working one -- is quite noisy and it's annoying to be in the room when it operates. My old and now broken GoldStar unit was pretty quiet, so I took a chance that the new GoldStar unit would also be quiet. The new GoldStar is not nearly as quiet as the old GoldStar, but its noise is acceptable. It's not terrific but it is not overpoweringly noisy. There are two fan speeds and I use the slower speed.

June 23, 2008 Update: The GoldStar GHD30 dehumidifier slowly became noisier and noisier until my wife and I couldn't stand it anymore. We found that if we pressed on a certain spot on the top of the cabinet, the buzzing and vibrating was much better. So we disassembled the case and stuck a piece of foam between the case and the top of the innards. Now the unit is much quieter. I'm taking away another star because of all the noise this thing makes... it was VERY loud.

Front To Back

One odd thing: The GHD30 blows air from front-to-back, just the opposite of the other dehumidifiers I've owned. This is not a problem but I am planning to partially build this unit into the wall and the airflow could have been important. I just assumed it was back-to-front like other dehumidifiers but it is not.

Also, the drip bucket pulls out from the front (see photo) instead a more typical back location. The most strange thing of all is the location of the hose connection for continuous flow: It's about halfway up one side on the back (again, see photo).

None of these things are bad or dealbreakers, just unusual. I wasn't prepared for them, although they should cause no problem for me.

As for its operation, the GoldStar GHD30 seems to do a good job of keeping my basement dry. That's the most important thing, of course, and the unit seems to do a good job in that department. I just wish my previous GoldStar dehumidifier gave me some confidence that the GHD30 will last more than five or six years. I guess I'll know when I get there.

It's In The Stars

I give the GoldStar GHD30 dehumidifier two stars. It's not a bad unit but it is much noisier than I expected and it operates in ways that I found surprising. In fact, it was so noisy that I took it apart to find the source of the noise.  I'm also not sure about its longevity, so two stars it is.