Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Wanted to love it, and really need it to work at least a little as the space I'm in has no place to vent a portable AC, and read the reviews about the item on NewAir site (none yet posted on Amazon at time of purchase), all very positive, and it looked good, had the Frigidaire name, came with cooling blocks for water tray, all that, but had to send it back after giving it a proper try. I live in a small older cottage in arid and very often sunny Northern California with minimal to no insulation in walls and attic, and so even on very mild days (60's to mid 70s) the inside of the place still warms a lot in spite of mild outside air temperature, so the test was to see if on one such low challenge day the unit could cool the bedroom off after the sun had warmed the cottage as much as it could by late afternoon. I filled the water drawer (an awkward item that, tough to access and to cleanly put back in once full of water), added the frozen cooling blocks to the water, started the unit up, closed the bedroom door (the warmest room) leaving the window closed, and hoped for best. Outside the bedroom I opened the front and back doors, and door and window of bathroom, and the increasingly cool evening air and cross breeze cooled the rest of the tiny cottage off quickly and noticeably. After a couple of hours of the bedroom test of the swamp cooler, however, the room wasn't any cooler at all, was till very warm, and was now also muggy from the humidity the unit sends out in 'cooling' mode, and so was even less comfortable ambiently than it was when I turned the unit on. The fan part was pleasant enough if sitting in front of that, but it's just an oscillating fan, and those are cheap. One needn't spend $200 for one. I couldn't have picked an easier or clearer scenario to try unit out (a very mild day), and this type of climate should be its sweet spot, but it didn't cool at all. It just added humidity to the air. If this is a good example of swamp coolers, I would have to conclude that they probably can't work unless a unit is sending very cool air (not moisture), chilled somehow by ice. This concept doesn't work, and actually makes things worse with the humidity.