1st floor or 2nd floor? We bought a Whirlpool Duet Sport series about 1.5 years ago. It damn near shook my house down (on 2nd floor). The repair man came by and said to get a new one. Lowes delivered a new one and it did the same. I called the manager and told him that we couldn't live with it and wanted something else.
He was nice enough to let us swap. After reading around a bit, we decided to give Samsung's with VRT (Vibration Reduction Technology) a try. The inner drum is surrounded by an outer drum and it is packed with stainless steel ball bearings. When the load starts to spin and becomes off balanced, the inner drum shifts and pushes the ball bearings to the opposite side, nearly 100% balancing the drum during the spin cycle. The machine seems to detect being off balance much better than the Whirlpool did and will slow down and reverse the load a few times until it becomes well balanced. Any noticeable vibration is quickly stopped by the machine itself as it adjusts accordingly in the programming.
They have been wonderful. The only issue that I've had is that I spent too much on them (as they were on sale for about half price about 8 months after I bought them!)
I love them so far. As for the smell, run about a cup of bleech through them (empty) on the hot water cycle about once every two months. No more mold/smell.
And no, you do not have to use the HE detergent (IMO). Just use much less than you normally would of the regular liquid stuff. If you use too much, you'll get too many suds. Because it uses much less water, it uses much less detergent too.
Finally, not sure how big your laundry room is but mine is tiny (sadly). These were a blessing in that we stacked them and now have lots of room. Had to remove a shelf, but replace it with a floor shelf that actually holds more and still have much more room.
Good luck.
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