Thinking of getting one for home brewing purposes, I already have a temperator controller to override it's thermostat.



My questions are:



- is it ok to use them inside the house, e.g. the kitchen where the regular refridgegerator is?

- what about water condensation? Will it leak all over the floor if inside the house

- Are they noisy?

A stand up works better IMO because things don't get buried in the bottom

I keep mine in a shed, and it doesn't leak at all.

But a chest freezer is MUCH more energy efficient.

I own a Fridgidaire chest freezer.  It's very quiet, doesn't leak anything (has a plug near the bottom for cleaning/draining), and is not frost-free.
If you have room inside for it, nothing wrong with keeping it inside.  Just make sure it has the proper ventilation, and you're fine.
I love ours.

Brewing Lagers I assume. Why do you want to put it int he place where your fridge is? Just curious. My brewing partner has one in the garage to lager his brews, it works just fine. No leaks no problems. I don't think it's any louder than the fridge. I only brew Ambers, Browns and Stouts, so I do all my fermenting in the dining room, once the beer is in the keg they go into the closet until the keg in the fidge is empty. I keep four kegs in rotation.

This is true, but with the climate where I am it is COLD here most if the year.

I also only open it every few days.

Look for one that has a hot wall condenser as opposed to one that has a aircooled condenser with a fan. Less moving parts , the condenser is on the outside wall of the freezer thus no coil to clean and no fan to fail or make noise.

Also think about the choice of frost-free or not.  Frost-free is nice because you don't have to defrost and clean it out about every year, but it's not as good for the products inside it because it goes through cycles where it actually heats up the walls of the freezer to keep them defrosted.  Upright freezers are easier to access the contents and take up less floor space.  Shouldn't be any condensation either way.  Noise should be no worse than your regular household refrigerator.

I have no room in my garage, I have space in my kitchen to put a small chest freezer.  I would like to use the chest freezer to ferment lagers as well as keep my 5 gallon corny beer kegs chilled.  Beer is more convenient if in the kitchen.  It's a toss up for me whether to get a chest freezer or a kegerator



 

I dont think frost free would matter since I'd be using an external thermostat to keep the temp inside 35F-52F, the 52F range for brewing lagers, the 35F for chilling the finished and kegged beer.  In other words I wouldn't ever be freezing anything in it





 

I'm debating on an upright vs a chest freezer. It seems that with an upright every time you open the door a lot of the cold air comes pouring right out.  With a chest freezer the cold air just sits there.

So what happens if you have a lot of meat to put away.  Let's say 1/4 cow or a deer.  You stand in front of the upright freezer, all the cold air pours out the entire time the door is open, and you fill it up with warm meat.  How long will it take for that freezer to recover?  I'm told a key to preventing freezer burn is to quickly freeze the meat and then keep it below zero degrees.  It seems like the upright would have a lot harder time doing that, although I would prefer one as the shelves are much more accessible.

Both my buddy and I use the smaller chest freezers for what you are looking to do.  Works great, no problems.