A brown out is a voltage reduction. The video says the soft starter works by reducing the voltage. Sounds to me like either way, the air conditioner sees a brownout. One way it's being provided by the generator, the other way by the soft start device. I realize the generator can make ugly sounds when the air conditioner starts, but I wonder if there's much difference from the air conditioner's point-of-view? All that debating aside, I can see devices like this being built into the air conditioners sometime in the future. At least one municipality is already requiring them for residential air conditioners to reduce the startup impacts on the grid. When my heat pump at home starts up, all the lights go pretty dim for a fraction of a second. With 400 amp service to the house.
