They have changed massively in general mostly due to better setups like high dense lithium batteries, fridge stands, stainless bottles, vacuum insulated bottles, in my case utterly superior tech like gravity feed virus filtration setups yeilding 42l per 2 hours from any dirty stagnant water sources, yet packing down to tiny volume, it all helps make fridges so much better. The new national luna fridges are an absolute game changer, due to their basket system they have amazing organized storage and so quite literally the big 125L holds as much as a full blown 300plus liter upright yet is much much smaller and still offering amazing low processing times to get to food.
As far as the questions go:
Comparing my 42l snomaster to 38l Engel.
The snomaster is like a high tech euro sports car, and the Engel is like a 96 falcon.
The snomaster used as a dedicated drinks fridge (12l of stainless bottles and 9 cans opened alot for 2people- at times dumping 6l of semi hot water in it) in a simulated hot day ( 40 degrees C by 10am held there to 4pm etc... then slowly lowered to 26C by 2am)
Used 52ah per 24hours and the mid 2000s Engel 40l in exact same setting 62ah.... Both off lifepo4 battery.
So as far as consumption goes, not much diff. But the chill down times on SM were a whopping two hours less in brutal 40degree heat, when you understand thermodynamics that's a big deal.
Yet as a food fridge fruit, veg, snacks and only a few liters of drinks the SM used alot less, like 33ah, Engel did worse. Can't remember.
Why did I go the SM over Engel? Simply due to better volume arrangement and much better cooling consistency ( no warm food at all on top). Also the premium stainless look, superficial yes....
The two best brands are snomaster and national luna, they literally draw bugger all (crazy small) in temps up to 20C, yet sadly in 40C they cycle on like it's the silly season. Still better than anything else imo. However these fridges run VERY hot and I don't have much faith in longevity tbh. Ohh and the Turbo modes on both these new brands DO NOT cool drinks down faster AT ALL, imo they have terrible cooling and so the extra heat on turbo is literally dumped back into the cabinet,
turbo modes make the comp cycle on/off alot more it's quite funny or sad really, nevermind they work so well on low mode.
