HoMedics WRF-REL EnviraScape Illuminated Rainforest Fountain with 6 Natural Sounds

I brought this for my son's room. His room is in a rain forest decor. Awesome addition to any room. It adds ambiance and style along with great sounds!

I adore this waterfall, with the soulful loon calls!! Relaxing!!

If this fountain would work it might be relaxing. The problem is that besides too much water splashing out of it, there is too much effort needed to get it to work. The streams don't drop equally. Sometimes, even when "full" it will have one or two trickles of water. I have to overfill it to get all of the streams working and that is with distilled water so mineral deposits can't be blamed. It is also fairly noisy as well, further detracting from the relaxation it is supposed to bring. It uses water rapidly, so the cost of running it is higher than it should be. That is because of the splashing. I even tipped it slightly to the rear to try to minimize the amount of water coming out of it but to no avail. If you want to relax, go for the HoMedics aroma spa machine I purchased. It isn't cute but it emits fragrances and has a half dozen sound effects like surf, birds chirping in the woods, etc. It has a voulume control and my grandson took it because it helps him relax before he has to go to sleep every night.

First of all my wife would probably give this four or five stars - she loves it. As it is reasonably cheap it earned an extra star from me. If I had paid any more for it I would have been tempted to give it two stars. If I disliked this item so much we could have returned it. However I must admit that it makes a nice decorative conversation piece - however we had purchased it for relaxation purposes - which I think is what it was designed for. I feel on this level it fails considerably. It was simple enough to put together - once you figured out how to do it properly. As is too common these days the instructions just werent clear enough. Most of the times I tried to submerge the pump under the water (something I didnt figure out I had to do for a while) the connecting tube would come away from the pump - but I got it there in the end. YOU SHOULD NOTE THAT WATER WILL SPLASH OUT OF THE DEVICE ONTO YOUR SURFACE. This can be annoying - they have however provided a little matt to sit it on, but I feel this isnt the most decorative way to display such an item. So be prepared to have to wipe down the surface at least daily. Ok so when its on and your awake - it looks nice - with the water running down in constant streams and the nice colourful subtle lighting. We looked forward to firing it up when we went to bed (we have alot of street noise which we hoped to dampen out.) The description of this item says it sounds like some tropical downpour in some country or other. I would personally describe it as sounding like a toilet cystern that is constantly filling up after flushing and needs fixing. It doesnt sound like rain to me. Secondly whilst the electronic "natural" sounds are ok, with no noticeable loops and a decent sound quality, they could have been timed to sound more relaxing. They are too intense. For example for the one sound setting - instead of a couple of distant crickets and the odd insect chirping up every now and then, it sounds like a hundred animals before an earthquake - chirping loudly and constantly to the point it is annoying. The loon setting is ok but sounds like a horror movie audio-track. Sunrise sounds like the music to a cheap Yoga DVD and windchimes sounds like a two year old child messing around on a casio keyboard. I thought that the item could redeem itself with "Thunder". I find thunder storms very relaxing. However I was disappointed to discover that it is literally constant rolling thunder. There are no natural gaps between thunder claps, it sounds more like a warzone with bombs hitting in the distance all the time. As I said my wife loves it, I however dont. But as the wife loves it its staying - and it looks pretty I guess.

Overall, I am pleased with this purchase. It did require assembly, and the instructions could have been clearer. The lights really do look nice and create a relaxing effect while the water is falling. The sound quality (and sound selection) is good with no noticable loops. I personally found the weight of the water falling to be somewhat heavy sounding - even with the pump set to "lowest" and the water speed dial turned far down, the sound of the water falling was rapid, and it wasn't - at least to me - entirely calming. But, the fountain gives you lots control over the amount of water that is released. As for pump noise, I noticed that in a silent room with the pump at face level, within a couple of feet of space, the pump was audible. However, just placing it about 6 feet away removed any recognizable sound from the pump. There is a volume setting for the recorded sounds, and you may adjust the sound of the water at will, so I'd recommend turning those up, and moving the pump somewhat away from where you're resting. One reviewer wrote that the plastic looks cheap - I disagree. It's visibly plastic, but that shouldn't come as a surprise. The plastic itself looks perfectly fine. It works well, and doesn't cost much. I'm happy with it.

I returned this product to the manufacturer. I wanted something to mask the sounds typically heard at night (plumbing, furnace, a car going down the street, etc.) but my computer's fan is louder than this thing. Not a good deal for the money.

I bought two of these units as Christmas Gifts and when it was Time to wrap them up and give them away I wanted them. I have been searching for this unit online and only found this joker selling a 39.95 unit for close to a hundred dollars. Wait until Amazon has a new unit like I did and get it for retail and don't get got.

I like all the natural sounds on this machine, except for the loon sounds. The sounds are realistic and soothing. It took a while for me to get it set up. The first one did not have all the parts (which makes me wonder if I actually got a new item or if this was a used or returned one). The exchange through Amazon was very prompt and my husband set up the new one. So far so good, I would recommend this item.