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Comment by technocratius | Hacker News Reader

In last few months I've travelled to the US a few times. In all 3 hotels I've stayed in, I've had to switch rooms (in one hotel even 3 times in the course of a week) due to low frequency noise of ACs of neighbouring rooms and/or general ventilation system. Ear plugs simply don't cut it anymore these days.

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The US is generally pretty noisy. House walls are thin and there is a lot of AC and heating noise. Whenever I come back to Germany I notice how quiet the houses are due to brick walls.

The church bells create a very regular cacophany from seemingly every direction however, at least here in Switzerland (can't speak for Germany). This seems to be much less common in the US.

The church in the small Swiss town I lived in rang its bell every 15 minutes, even in the middle of night. Maybe the locals find it comforting. It kept me up.

Church bells are the same in Germany. Church bells don't bother me but I hate white noise like heating or AC. Americans on the other hand often seem to find white noise soothing. Maybe because they grew up with it.

I guess it depends, when I returned home from Cologne, I noticed how quite it is. No tram sounds, no cars sounds, no drunken crowds sounds, nobody is taking a piss in the dark corner etc.

I have that in the UK, so it's not just a US problem. IME, unless you pay for an expensive/specific room, hotels seem to push you towards the horrible rooms first, mostly the noisey ones - front facing near traffic, rear rooms next to ducts/aircon systems, etc. I suffer with insomnia, so the first hint of noise and I'm off to complain/change room!

> IME, unless you pay for an expensive/specific room, hotels seem to push you towards the horrible rooms first, mostly the noisey ones

So a weird tip a lot of people don't know is you get different rooms depending on how you book (this is also true for seats on airplanes). If you use Expedia or something similar you are buying from a different pool of rooms (even if the price is the same). So if you book directly with the hotel/airline you will likely get a better room/seat.

There isn’t a different pool of rooms (at least not in a standard chain hotel with 80 to 150 rooms), you’re just a higher value guest since people coming from travel agents offer less net income due to having to pay commissions. Also, rewards members with status get priority, because they’re spending more year round.

Thank you for the correction. My limited understanding is it's actually a mixture of both (and will vary on a case by case basis), but I admit I'm not an expert.

Hah. Last time I stayed in Chicago at The Palmer House, they just left "complimentary" earplugs on the nightstand.

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