Sometimes when you're considering a product purchase, it helps to know how other people are basing their purchasing decisions as well. Maybe there's something you didn't consider, or maybe there's something that's really highly valued by a lot of people which you might want to take a harder look at.
Luckily, Lab Manager Magazine posts surveys of different lab equipment buyers and last month's survey was about homogenizers! They reported the top 10 features and factors that people look for when buying a homogenizer, and the results are:
| Durability of product |
79%
|
| Results within minimum deviation |
71%
|
| Low maintenance - easy to use and clean |
67%
|
| Value for price paid |
60%
|
| Service and support |
58%
|
| Safety features |
55%
|
| Variable speed controls |
55%
|
| Reliability of vendor |
53%
|
| Warranty |
51%
|
| Reputation of vendor |
44%
|
More people value durability than anything else, and it's not all that close. Here's what I like to tell people about durability: Look at the warranty duration. More than anything, warranty duration generally tells you how confident the manufacturer is in their equipment. If it wouldn't cost them anything to provide a longer warranty, they generally would.
For most homogenizers, a 2-year warranty is fairly standard but a 1-year warranty isn't unheard of. Relatively few homogenizer manufacturers give a 3 year warranty. IKA and Seward are two such manufacturers. More than 3 years is fairly unheard of among homogenizer manufacturers, but Talboys, who really prides themselves on their instrument reliability but isn't really known for homogenizers, makes a high-throughput bead mill which is particularly good for 96 well plates and comes with a massive 5-year warranty.
The Talboys High-Throughput Homogenizer
Just about any homogenizer will give reproducible results when used properly. If you're not getting reproducible results with your equipment, pay better attention to your upstream sample prep. The machine itself will do the same thing, day in and day out.
FYI, you can view the full survey results here.
If you're looking for a homogenizer that is particularly reliable, cost-effective, low-maintenance, or has any other attribute, give us a call! We're homogenizer experts and we have the largest range of homogenizers in North America.
