I purchased several humidipaks for my various guitars this winter hoping they would work as described.

We have bad winters and I have an old house with an oil furnace

Does what it's supposed to do--kept my acoustic humidified and buzz free through another miserable East Coast winter.

I now have these packs in my guitar, mando, and violin cases with the hope that my instruments during summer will be way different from this horrible past winter...

I live in Omaha Nebraska which has high humidity coupled with colder winters.

This product has kept my Taylor 814ce acoustic at a constant humidity level of 53% while the furnace and space heater warms the studio on our cold winter nights.

Then we had an unusually cold winter and it started losing water and shrinking until I could start to feel the little hard granules forming

I tended to go through three or four sets in the course of a cold winter

We've had a relatively warm and wet winter where I

I check the packs when I open the case up - a simple squeeze test - and I am pleased with the time the humidpaks are lasting - between 2 and 3 months during this cold winter

If not, I will use the old Planet Waves sponge-based humidifier which I found effective last winter.

These lasted me all fall, spring & summer in Maine, then once winter got here they lasted a couple of months into winter.

I should stress that I have not had any problems with my guitar, no cracks or anything of that nature, but this system just can't put out enough humidity to keep the guitar safe in a climate with cold winters

It has been a cold winter and my house dries to 2-3% humidity.

So my conclusion is that the low humidity, about 24 percent may have stressed the product, but if I have to buy replacements every 7 to 10 days for three severe winter months, then I need to do something different.

My Taylor developed a split in the soundboard last winter.

Further, the packets go bad in just 2 or 3 weeks of harsh winter temps