Like those mentioned by Consumer Reports and elsewhere, I made the mistake of buying an Oreck AIR8B "Professional" air cleaner, only to find several years down the road that this product has to be considered disposable, as it has a blower which has gone bad twice, the first time about 1 month out of the box and once two years later, operating 8 hours per day. The problem centers around a very cheap sleeve bearing used in the blower motor to save a few bucks, rather than a sealed ball bearing as one might expect in a "professional" or top quality product as Oreck marketers would lead you to believe theirs is. As noted here and elsewhere, the motor stars screeching and making lots of noise, and then ceases to rotate.
If you contact Oreck, you will be directed to a store, which quotes $200 to change out the blower (or less to lubricate the failed bearing, which solves the problem for about a week). Oreck fails to own up to this defect in their "premium" product.
While not the focus of this report, our two Oreck vacuums—the XL and the shoulder portable, were also pieces of junk and died early, but we didn't fix or replace them. I'm convinced this company only has competence in one area—marketing.
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