I've graduated from using a True GDM-12 glass fridge that I got off of Craigslist for $200 with a SS Brewtech conical to now using a Blichmann glycol chiller with a Spike Flex+ fermenter. Pictures attached.
View attachment 720659
View attachment 720660
The fridge worked fine, but I was limited to only fermenting batches at the same temperature. The True GDM-12 is nice because it has a plug for the condenser to kick in underneath. This let me plug the condenser into an Inkbird and run the temp prob inside the fridge/fermenter so the fan runs most all the time, but the condenser only kicks in when temp adjustment is needed. I now use the fridge for cold storage of kegs and yeast.
I've only used the Blichmann glycol chiller for about 4 batches, but I have to say it works great and is amazingly fast at bringing stuff to temp. It keeps it nice and steady and I'm able to do multiple batches at different temps right in my regular brewery space. The downside is it's a bit cluttered with tubes and such as you can see here. It's also great at bringing a batch down to pitching temp - you can easily put a batch in your fermenter at 100° and the glycol system will bring it down to 64° within 20min. I've been slowly raising the temp of this fermenter up a degree every day for the last 5 days.
I do recommend if you run tubing, you get insulation, like I have here(from Spike), otherwise I got a lot of sweating in the summer. Also, if you are doing glycol, I highly recommend getting self-sealing hose coupling to reduce any glycol leaking. I was able to find them
here. Here is a picture of them. Get the 1/4" ID ones. Any glycol that leaks needs to be cleaned up.
View attachment 720662
NONE of these options are cheap though. I'm also only dealing with 5gal batches. I would think that a chiller system would be the only real way to go with larger batches.
Cleaning is cleaning... I either use a cleaning ball or soak the whole thing in PBW. I tend to just fill up the fermenter with PBW and hot water, put the cooling coil in the PBW solution and let it do it's thing for an hour or so. But no real difference for me between the fridge vs chiller for cleaning. The new Blichmann G4 cooling coil looks great and much easier for cleaning than normal round coils like Spike's or SS Brewtech's.
Power wise, I feel the fridge is worse, probably because it seems to kick on more often and is louder, but I don't feel I have anything else to necessarily base it off of.
Overall, I really do like the glycol system and feel it's easier, more flexible and has more capacity if I want. But cost is the downside. I do miss being able to dump the yeast/hops like I was able to with the SS Brewtech conical, so I I were to do it again, I'd get a conical that had a dump port like the Spike Conical or the Blichmann G4. But if you can afford one of the glycol chiller setups, it is very nice and I do recommend.