I’ll start by saying this is my first electric fireplace—and all of the things that I see as drawbacks are drawbacks in electric fireplaces in general. This particular model is very nice. Manufacturing quality is good, the flames and embers look sort of lifelike, and I LOVE that it’s got a thermostat so you can set it to whatever temp you want and it will hold it there. It’s almost certainly cheaper to run this for heat than my gas furnace. Assembly is not bad at all and install is literally nothing more than putting it where you want and plugging it in. Super flexible in terms of trying it out in different spaces. My main negative is noise. I wish it sounded like a fire. Instead it sounds like a pretty loud fan (blowing the air from the heating element). It’s silent when the light is on but not the heat