Quiet Fridge Freezer

Hi, (Skip to the end for a TL:DR)

Around 4 years ago I replaced my old Hotpoint FF with a lovely Liebherr auto-defrost model for the convenience mainly. The Liebherr barely made any noise, split circuit, temp displays…but I couldn’t open the doors! Hadn’t factored the door ‘swing’ angle into measurements and the installers didn’t mention it so I didn’t know until after they left. Due to the shape of this kitchen, swapping hinge side wouldn’t work either.

Had to quickly exchange it for the only slim 50/50 auto-defrost model that was in stock at the time, which is a Fridgemaster Total No Frost model. Size is fine, can open doors, but immediately noticed the fridge was warm quite a lot of the time and making a huge amount of noise, hissing, cracking, creaking, etc. Got a pair of wireless thermometers to test fridge & freezer temps, and found out that the freezer goes into auto-defrost mode roughly once every 48 hours. That does a ‘super-freeze’ down to -25c first. Then defrosts to a maximum of -15c. No problem there. But as this is only a single circuit system, the fridge can’t be chilled while this is happening, and it doesn’t even seem to check fridge temp before starting a freezer defrost. So long story short, the fridge is hitting 8-10c every other day in summer for an hour or two, which isn’t food safe, and also means that drinks often aren’t chilled when I go to grab one. I tried contacting Fridgemaster technical to explain the issues but didn’t get anywhere with them.

Ending up replacing it with a Candy, that I made sure was NOT auto-defrost. Unfortunately, the Candy made a horrible high pitched whine all the time the motor ran which was causing migraines. I ended up returning that one and have just put up with the Fridgemaster that doesn’t keep food cold for the past 4 years.

This year I thought I’d give it another go… Bought a Hoover this time, again specifically NOT auto-defrost, but this one makes a horrible water gushing noise all the time the motor runs. It was left to settle for a couple of days and has been running for a couple of weeks (thankfully not in my kitchen!) and the noise is still the same. I appreciate that I’m more sensitive to noise than many people, but considering how many people have open plan living and kitchen areas now, I simply cannot believe this amount of noise is considered acceptable at all.

TL:DR – Does anyone know of a slim but tall fridge freezer that doesn’t make a horrific noise and actually keeps food cold all the time? Obviously this isn’t something that can be tested in store so I’m hoping an installer or repairer will be able comment from experience of listening to many of them. I don’t mind trying another auto-defrost as long as it’s a split circuit one, and I would prefer to have digital temp control over the fridge at least.

Thanks in advance.