Product review (4 stars): Good machine. Not for IKEA cabinets!
If you are used to the usual under $100 hoods, the first thing you realize right out of the box, is that this is a different beast. For one, it is really heavy! It looks and feels well built. As for its main purpose, it delivers rather well, especially considering that it was installed on an existing 6 inch vent instead of the recommended 8 inch. I've had it for about a month and apart from when I had my restaurant, I've never had a hood that worked this well.
Now for the gritty part. You are not going to be able to install this on an IKEA kitchen... unless you are a very talented handy person. Since you need to cut such a big hole in the bottom of the cabinet, it totally compromises the integrity of an IKEA cabinet as you have to remove the fasteners holding the cabinet together. I find it amazing that Xtreme Air does not take in account the number of people who have IKEA kitchens today. The installation was a nightmare and I had to totally modify my IKEA cabinet, shortening it, reinforcing it and find creative ways to fasten the hood. I also had to shorten the doors and opted to buy stainless steel doors that matched the hood and other appliances in the kitchen.
Xtreme Air suggests mounting the front of the hood with screws and resting on the bottom of the cabinet. Well since I had to make a huge hole in that bottom part, what was left was a thin piece of particle board that could never hold the hood in place without breaking, even though I doubled it. So I used a combination of supplied and different brackets to attach the hood to the vertical left and right sides of the cabinet. The back is suposed to be fastened to the wall but that will only work properly if the studs are perfectly positioned with the mounting holes in the hood. Which they weren't... So, in modifying my cabinet, I had to add a solid plank of wood to the back. I was able to bolt the middle part of the solid wood to a stud and in turn, the hood is bolted to the solid wood and into the wall.
Last and maybe least, the color of the LEDs is horrendous! It's that cold, not bright enough LED color spectrum of early LEDs. It looks like Xtreme Air got a good deal on a bunch of these old LEDs and they are using those until they run out. If that is the case, it really cheapens Xtreme Air's image.
So, after a month or so, and now that it is mounted (and still holding), I am still happy with it. But if I had to do it again, I would get a different Xtreme Air model that does not force me to cut the bottom of my cabinet out.