The Lopi Answer is very unique.
There are stoves, like the Pacific Energy Summit. Which is a stove at heart, that can come with a surround and fans that give you the ability to convert their normal stove into a fireplace insert with little modification. You can't put this shroud around a summit stove and have it sit in the open, it would look ridiculous.
The next, are inserts. They come as one piece, shroud surrounding the firebox and there is no such thing as a stove model of it. My Hearthstone Clydesdale is such, it's a cast iron unit (even some of the air channels surrounding it are cast iron with a couple of sheet metal plates on the very outsides). They usually have heat shields on all sides and the hot air only comes out the front. Mine happens to be lacking a heat shield on the back. They produce the maximum quantities of heated air that you can move around your house and great at evening the heat througout, or moving it where you need it and not roasting you out of the room it's in but, you do lose some heat to the masonary and the blowers make a difference in their effectiveness. After going from a freestanding stove to an insert I'm never going back as I'm now, after 25 years, able to do what I never could with my freestanding stove and all that damn work with the channels, registers, fans with my stove... crap my insert single-handedly heats my house now like my freestanding stove never could and I don't need a single register or vents... just the inserts blowers and the side with my insert stays around 71, the other side of my house 68. Wow, a 3 degree temp difference and my house is so inefficient and went from 8 cords to 3.5 cords. I don't need to keep the area around the stove 85 now, so I can try to keep the other area 70 in my house.
Now, comes the ultimate convection unit. The Lopi Answer. It's an insert true & true, convection shroud surrounding it completely on all 5 sides. But, you can get legs for it and put it into the open. It's the only "insert" that can be in the open, and has all the benefits of an inserts producing lots of extra heated air, without the inserts loss of some heat to the masonary. It's actually a "convection wood stove" of the truest form, the ultimate wood convection heater. It's too bad it's the only one of its kind that I've seen and I've looked everywhere. Some stoves have heat shields only on the rear, some have it on the sides and rear but not top and bottom, an insert has it on all sides but can't sit in the open. The lopi answer is the only one like an insert but can be in the open. I really wish there was a large model, the lopi answer is a very small unit but, probably what I'm going to put in my basement to heat it. Give me extra amounts of convection heat anyday.
[Edit] Not to say the Lopi Answer is the only one that has the heat shields on 5 sides and can be in the open, I just haven't come across another. I'm still out if the Pacific Energy "Fusion" is also one with heat shields on 5 sides.
