Bear is the acknowledged expert on MES smokers and I would never contradict his knowledge on the subject.
I'm speaking from personal experience with
MY MES 30 Gen 1. Like the ads always say 'results may vary". LOL.
I could never keep my
AMNPS burning in my MES. I followed ALL the suggestion posted here with no success. So I did the mailbox mod, put legs on the
AMNPS for better air flow and never looked back. So my advice??
Try the AMNPS in the MES and if it works, great. If it doesn't, then try the mailbox. Exactly--My thoughts too!!
As for the value of the window. If it's in the budget, fine.
I don't have a window. When Miss Linda bought me my MES for Father's Day times were tough in the Hibbert House, so no window. To be honest I don't miss it. Kinda like the old days, before I had air conditioning in my first car---I didn't miss it one bit. Once I had it in my next car I could never go without it again.
Once my food's in the smoker, i don't spritz or baste so the door never gets opened until it's time to remove the food. I just trust my therms and cook by temp.
When it comes to smoke, I always just stick my nose in what's coming out the exhaust to check the smell. I could go two weeks without using my smoker, and it would still smell like smoke at my top vent. I used to try to look down the hole, but that's not easy on the eyeball. So much easier to see the amount of smoke through the glass. On a perfect day I can't even see the smoke, but if I can smell it then I'm happy.
Until you can afford to upgrade, there's no reason not to get a second inexpensive remote therm. Then use one to monitor cook chamber temp and one as a meat probe. Just be sure to check the accuracy of both therm by boil testing them. Then ALWAYS use the same probe with the same therm. If they aren't completely accurate then you know how much to compensate for each therm.
Gary