If you have short hair, it’s easy to think that one blow dryer is the same as the next. But with different technologies, shapes, and motors available on the market today, there’s quite a range in what hair dryers can be. The Conair Infiniti Pro 3Q Brushless Motor Hair Dryer is a great example of how new technologies can change what’s inside your dryer.
The hair dryer’s “3Q” name stands for three different Qs: quick, quiet, and quality. It’s a moderately-priced dryer out of Conair’s higher-end Infiniti range, and it debuts the brand’s brushless motor technology.
What makes the motor of the Conair Infiniti Pro 3Q Brushless Motor Hair Dryer different
The Conair Infiniti Pro 3Q hair dryer has a brushless motor, which uses magnets and electronics in order to funnel air through the dryer. Traditional hair dryers use a physical motor system, whose contact-based carbon brush design means that friction and wear can burn out the motor faster. Conair promises that their brushless motor will last up to 10X longer than a traditional AC motor for up to 5000 hours of use, extending the life of your hair dryer and (theoretically) minimizing your cost-per-use.
How much that impacts your purchase will depend on how heavily you use your hair dryer. I use mine very lightly, relying on air drying for the most part, so a longer-wearing motor doesn’t greatly influence my purchase. I’ve never had a hair dryer burn out on me, and my last Conair lasted more than a decade. I replaced it with a smaller model for convenience, but my old dryer still works to this day.
If you’re blow drying your hair for 15 minutes every day, 5000 hours of use is 20 000 uses – or over 54 years of daily use. You can see why I think it’s a little unnecessary to extend a dryer’s life by that much, right? Globally, people only shampoo their hair an average of 3 (and a bit) times a week … Meaning those 5000 hours would last a single person for more like 108 years. (For a family of four, that’s a much more reasonable 27 years.)
The Conair Infiniti Pro 3Q Hair Dryer isn’t just unique because of its motor, though. It also promises to reduce drying time by up to 70%, using a lower temperature combined with faster airflow to minimize heat damage during use.
The rest of the Conair Infiniti Pro 3Q tech specs
The Infinti Pro 3Q uses ionic technology to maximize shine and decrease frizz. (Conair says it produces 75% less frizz than a hair dryer without ionic technology.) It heats with titanium ceramic elements, using infrared heat to dry the hair more gently than a traditional coil.
The biggest difference that I noticed in the Conair Infiniti Pro 3Q is that it’s designed NOT to get too hot. Instead, it uses more air pressure than a standard DC motor dryer from Conair, with a lower maximum temperature. Despite that, the brand claims that it dries equivalent to a 2000W BaBylissPro dryer (also by Conair).
The 3Q Hair Dryer makes 40% less noise than the 3Q dryer without noise reduction technology, and it’s designed with a 7-foot heavy gauge power cord. It has 3 heat settings, 2 speed settings, and a cold shot button that locks. The filter is removable, allowing you to clean the device with ease and further extend motor life.
My experience with the Conair Infiniti Pro 3Q Brushless Motor Hair Dryer
I liked the Conair Infiniti Pro 3Q Brushless Motor Hair Dryer – but I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s a level above the rest of the Infiniti line. With a faster motor and less heat, I found that the 3Q blew my hair around more than it actually dried it. It made blowouts and directional styling more difficult than usual, and left my hair a little tangled every time.
If you blow dry your hair on a daily basis, I think it’s a good thing to take a little longer and use a lower heat setting. In the long term, it’ll mean a lot less damage for your hair, which will cut down on frizziness and breakage. But if that’s the case, why not go with a traditional hair dryer and use it on medium most days? That way, when you need to rush, you can amp the heat level up to “hot” and get in and out of the bathroom faster.
With the 3Q, you don’t have that option. The motor is extremely strong, making directional styling (like using a flat or round brush with your hair dryer to give your hair shape) and blowouts marginally more difficult than usual – the hair gets blown right off the brush. I found that it took a little longer than usual each time for me to finish drying my hair, but not by too much.
Conair makes three main comparisons with this hair dryer, and I agree with one of the three. It definitely provides up to 70% more air pressure than Conair’s DC motor dryers, and that does help minimize heat damage. But it also promises to dry up to the equivalent of a 2000 watt dryer, and I don’t think it does. The 3Q left me with less flyaways and static than my 1875 watt travel-sized dryer, but it took longer to finish the job.
The last claim is that the 3Q dryer makes up to 40% less noise … Than the 3Q dryer without noise reduction technology. While I believe this to be true, the dryer itself certainly isn’t quieter than a standard dryer. It’s louder than what I’m currently using, to such a degree that my cat (who usually ignores blow dryers) runs out of the room whenever I turn this hair dryer on. He’s more afraid of this blow dryer than he is of our vacuum, and hides at a distance from it even on medium.
With all that said, then, who is this dryer for? It’s not as fast-drying as I felt it had been promised to be, and at 2.3 lbs, it’s only moderately lightweight. But it is powerful, and it did give me the “shiny, healthy-looking hair” that Conair said it would.
The 3Q is a visually gorgeous hair dryer, and despite my whinging, I enjoyed many aspects of it. The switch-based cool burst option makes setting your hairstyle very easy, and in my opinion, it’s far superior to your standard hold-button mechanism. It has three heat settings (cool, warm, and hot) and two speed settings (low and high, or as I like to call them, “scary and absolutely terrifying.”)
The cord, too, is fantastic. That’s usually the first thing to go on a hair dryer, but Conair stepped up their 7-foot cord to match this motor’s extra-long life. It’s heavy-gague with reinforcements at both the dryer and plug-in ends, and it comes with a hanging hook attached. (The hook is the most delicate part of this hair dryer, and is likely to be the first–or only–thing to break.)
The 3Q hair dryer is best for someone who blow dries their hair a lot, but has fine or fragile hair. Both its motor and its cord will last through rigorous use, and its lower heat settings mean that your hair will accumulate less damage over time. It should be hearty enough to be used by the whole family for at least a couple decades, and comes with in-box attachments to work for any hair type.
What’s in the box of the Conair Infiniti Pro 3Q Brushless Motor Hair Dryer
The Conair 3Q Hair Dryer comes with a flattened concentrator for directional styling, a diffuser for curly or wavy hairstyles, and a hang ring on a heavy duty cord for easier storage. The dryer itself is 2.3 pounds and is well-weighted.
Shop Conair hair dryers at Best Buy online.
