Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

No, the title of this review isn't warning you about making kool-aid in a water purifier. Rather to tell the truth about carbon/charcoal filters. They don't go bad. I've been using this filter for 9 months now filling it up three times a day, but more to the point, I used to work with a large water filtration team in charge of cleaning up an EPA superfund site. They had great big tanks full of sand and carbon to filter out a bunch of little nasties that you and your tap water can't even imagine. When the flow was restricted they'd just shoot the water back the other way for a bit and then return to normal operation. The carbon (little black sand) in your filter does not go bad, no matter what the manufacturers tell you. That's how they make their money, by selling you a plastic cup filled with black sand every couple of months. The filter, over a very long period of time, may become clogged. If that happens, take it out, run water over it, turn it upside down, bang it on the counter, I don't care. Whatever you do, buy another filter only as a last resort. Let me repeat this. These filtration people are selling you a cheap plastic tub with sand in the top and a nozzle on the bottom. The only high tech thing about this is the electronic filter-alarm doohickey that I've never even turned on. Use it until the water just won't go through it any longer. By that time you'll probably just want to buy a brand new one. Edit: I was trying to make as simple a statement as possible about how infrequently you REALLY need to change your filter. The activated charcoal inside the filter can absorb so much more than the company would have you believe. If you use this for a city water source, the only thing you'll really need it to filter is chlorine. If you begin to taste chlorine in your filtered water, change your filter. I use mine for well water, so all I need is to filter any detritus that may come up from the ground. Therefore, as long as the water flows, I won't need to change my filter. I hope this will satisfy the further questions.