Product review (5 stars): An excellent, near-silent fridge for beer collecting
When it comes to purchasing something expensive, I am a bit obsessive, spending days and sometimes weeks reading product reviews, comparing specs, taking measurements, and otherwise driving myself (and my wife) crazy with my indecisiveness. This process was no different when I wanted to buy a built-in beverage/wine cooler for my new wet bar. I say "beverage/wine cooler" because I didn't know exactly what I wanted, all I knew is that it had to be 24" wide to fit the space and I absolutely did not want a fan-based unit, it had to be a traditional compressor type. I'm a beer guy, and after spending even more time researching the proper way to store and/or age beer, I realized that a wine cooler would not always drop to low enough temps for beers with lower ABV (like pale ales, pilsners, IPAs, etc). For those kinds of beers you want to be able to reach around 40 degrees, maybe even lower if you like those beers extra cold. So I eliminated a dedicated wine cooler from my search and focused on "beverage coolers" which could drop to temps in the 30s. Enter the Kalamera 175 Can Beverage Refrigerator!

What mainly drew me to the Kalamera was the fact that it had removable wire shelves. With some beers you do not want them laying on their side like wine bottles. Especially if you're aging beer - you always want that beer standing up, so sediment doesn't form a circle on the bottle, and if it's corked, so the cork doesn't impart its own "flavors" into the beer. No traditional wine cooler is going to let you store a bottle upright due to the design of the shelves. But this Kalamera unit accommodates that by removing shelves. While you lose some overall capacity, you gain the ability to store beer the correct way, which may or may not be important to you. (Beer snob note: A lot of aging experts don't think you should age beer long-term in a cooler/fridge, because over time the moisture can infiltrate the beer and have negative impact. While I can't say with any degree of expertise if this is true, I tend to err on the side of safety, and plan to keep the more expensive bottles I want to age in the garage or a closet in the basement, for a more "natural" environment without extra moisture. This fridge is more for my everyday beers I plan to drink within a few weeks).

Another great feature of this Kalamera is the switchable door handle. The way my wet bar is set up is such that if the handle is on the left and the door opens to the right, you wouldn't be able to easily walk around it and get into the fridge. Putting the handle on the right so it opened left made it much easier to access everything. Also, the blue LED is a nice touch that makes people go "Oh hey, you have a beer fridge." (Interesting note: put some cans of Boddington's on the top shelf and check out how that LED lights them up.) I am impressed by the sturdy nature of the fridge, with a super heavy glass door, solid hinges, and a compressor that really is near-silent. I mean I only hear it when I am right next to it and lowering the temperature which forces the compressor on. I can't even tell it's running when it's operating regularly.

While $750 is still a chunk of change for what is essentially a glorified beer fridge, it's actually cheaper than almost every other 24" model out there from other manufacturers, and when you see how well it operates and how solidly it's built, you realize it is actually worth it. I know my beer (and my wife) thank me for finally deciding on this guy.