Coleman PowerChill Thermoelectric Cooler (40-Quart)

I am what they call a "professional driver" and I was using that cooler in my truck for about 3 month. I was letting that thing run in the daytime when i was driving, at nighttime I unplugged it. I used it to keep my perishable fruit- and vegetable juices cool. Anyway... it stopped working after 3 month (fan turning but no cooling). Now I'm going to spent $550 for a waeco. That one should at least last me two years. Why is so much garbage being produced?

I bought this electric cooler for car camping. It stopped working the 4th time out. I would take it to get repaired except that it cost only around $75 at Wal-Mart (My Wal-Mart no longer carries them) and I figure that's what it would cost me to get it repaired. I'm shopping for another electric cooler (different brand) because when they work, they're great! I freeze a couple of bottles of water and stick them in the cooler the night before and then the cooler is really cold. About three days later, when the ice in the bottle has melted, I have ice cold drinking water.

This cooler saved me enough money in bagged ice to pay for itself over the years we used it. It doesn't keep things ice cold, but I don't know of any electric cooler that does.
For our family of 6 we use it for a variety of things. When we go on long car trips, we use a power inverter and plug it into our car. We keep drinks in it and sometimes sack lunches. Saves us a lot of time and money over stopping and buying these items on the road. We have a camper and camp often. We use the plug in cooler outside the camper (we bring it in if it rains) and keep drinks only in it. That way we can get cold water/soda out of it without fanning the camper refrigerator so often. (The camper refrigerator cannot keep food cold enough if the door is fanned all the time.) When we do get to go to hotels as a family, we usually bring the cooler and use it once again for drinks and lunch supplies and sometimes milk for breakfasts if needed. It keeps things much cooler when it is in an air conditioned room than when it is fighting against the high temperatures of camping in the summer, so I can use it for more food items when used indoors.
We used it several years, and I'm replacing it this year. Finally the fan is making an extreme amount of noise. I imagine that sitting it on the ground at dusty campsites over the years and letting it suck dust into it's fans is likely the culprit. It is still working, but I doubt for long. It has also become so noisy that it drives us crazy to have it running anywhere near us.
I think I got my money's worth on this unit, despite needing to replace it.
I knocked it one star because I wish it could keep things colder than it does. Also because the light color design gets dirty looking quite quick while camping.
I never used the heating option so I have no comment on that feature.
It will drain a car battery, so don't plan to plug it into the car battery when you are not driving.

We bought this cooler to take on weekend camping trips. Since we have a portable battery, we thought it would be perfect because we would not have to run it off our car battery and risk a dead car.

The cooler took up quite a bit of space in the back of our large SUV, due to the size of the cooler and the cooling mechanism on the back. Additionally, the interior storage space was relatively small due to the very thick (several inches thick) walls - MUCH smaller than the average ice chest, even though it took up about the same amount of space.

Much to our dismay, the cooler ran our portable battery completely down halfway through the first night. Thank goodness it wasn't plugged into our car battery. It didn't keep the food nearly as cool as the plain old ice in our "regular" cooler did, and the cooler ran constantly trying to keep up in the 75' weather.

To add insult to injury, after the battery had been run down, we couldn't lay the cooler on its side and fill it with plain ice to finish out the weekend, due to the danger of ruining the electric wiring and leaks.

In theory, this is a great gadget. In reality, don't waste your money unless you don't mind lukewarm drinks and you plan to only use it while your car is running, or you have access to an established (permanent) power source.