I bought it because I worry about the waste of disposable cartridges. This one is permanent, but it must be cleaned every 6 months. I just completed the first cleaning. It took about 30 minutes. The directions are pretty clear, but I had to use Google lense to translate them. There is no English. It requires citric acid, which I bought at a 100 yen store. Handling the acid made me a bit nervous. It wasn’t as hard as I thought, but you do need to plan in advance to clean it. A bunch of white gunk came off, so I assume it has removed stuff from the water like a filter should. The manufacturer doesn’t really specify what chemicals or biological agents are removed though.
