DISTILLED- Is similar to RO but in most cases you can only but it in plastic bottles or from water dispensing machine in stores. It is also an acidic water and does not remove all the chemicals out. The only use I can see for this is using in your iron, steam cleaner or using it to disinfect surfaces. Both of these are not whole house systems but a alternative to Tap Water for drinking. The higher amount of filtering by these methods the cleaner the water and the worse it is for your body. The cleaner the more active the water becomes, which is ok in cleaning but not for consuming in your body

Removes contaminants from liquids and gases through a process called absorption.This is the most important filter a family should possess. If you don’t have any other water filter in your house, this is the one you should have. This one can be combined with any of the other water filters, but is the most important!
This filter method can come in many forms, but its most basic is to remove 95% to 99% chemicals from your drinking water, and believe me they are in your water! You can start by the least expensive, which would be a portable pitcher. You would add your tap water to remove chemicals and bad taste.Most new refrigerators if you have a water dispenser, have a activated carbon filter installed, but check to be sure. The odor and some new models may not have this filter. Like all activated carbon filters, these will need to be replaced periodically.
The next method would be to add an AC filter under your sink with a spout on the counter, which some sinks have a hole for placement available (some metal sinks), otherwise a hole would have to be drilled in the sink. Some houses may already have a spout to accommodate dispursement of this filtered water.Other filters can be added or connected to your AC filters and should be added in front of the activated carbon filter, such as a reverse osmosis or sediment filter. You need to check replacement guide line on these and all filters.
So for you, your family, pets, and even plants this is a must-have filter for your basic needs and health. For those of you that feel this filtration is not enough, I applaud you! Whole house system as I mentioned before is for your whole body.To take this a step further if you want to would be to check out an alkaline drinking system.

SOFTNERS- There are different ways or methods of removing most of the hardness(heavy medal minerals) from the Water. One of the most popular or well known is the ionic bead (softener) method , which uses a salt brine system to recharge its beads to collect the hardness onto the beads and then is washed with salt water(brine) to recharge the system. As long as the system has an effective and thorough rinsing cycle your salt intake should be minimal. As everyone knows sodium is not good for your system (high blood pressure) although the salt used in the softener is not a processed salt and it is less harmful. But if your have a condition that warrants you to look further into this kind of system I would advise to do so. The softener does not take out chemicals from your Water.

One important area one should look into for your further water filtration would be an Alkaline/ionic filter. There are many one to choose from. The basic function of this filterwould be to choose from drinking Alkaline water to using acidic water for cleaning and other purposes. To add a plus Ph water and oxygen toyour body and brain would be great. There are many forms to choose from, the basic and portable one for individuals, this is somewhat good if you have other filtered water toput into these containers. It would be good to increase the Ph level of the water, but if you don't have water that would remove chemicals andsediments from the water you're using to put into this filter. If you're using activated carbon filtered water lets say from your refrigeratorinto this portable filter that would be somewhat okay. This way doesn't filter out the sedimen amount in the water. If you can afford to install a full Alkaline filter would be great, and by installed it may not need any plummer help! Depending on the brand and style you choose depends on if you cando this yourself or need help. Some are on the counter and some are under the sink with the water outlet and controls on the counter top. Some filters come with the pre filters and some don't. Once again the sediment and activated carbon filters would have to be replaced periodically. Theydon't need electricity, and even are self cleaning the plates withinthem. It does use some of the water that goes to plus side and the negative water to the drain, but this is far less than an reverse/osmosis filter which filters 1/5 gallons of water and the Alkaline uses 2/3 of thewater. The acidity water from this filter can be used for many purposes, sanitation cleaning and even facial cleaning. The acidic water cannot be used for plants or animals.

CONDITIONERS- A softener but also removes chemicals and may or may not use a different system other than the salt bead method to remove the harmful minerals and chemicals throughout your entire home. If you can afford this... this would be the system that would be good throughout the entire house. This is what I would consider a safe system for you and or your family. There are other ways that chemicals in your Tap Water can be harmful aside from consuming them internally, your skin can absorb these chemical while you shower or bath, also breathing them as they are released through the air. If you are rinsing your fruits or vegetables to get the fertilizers and pesticides off, what Water are you using to do this? If you're using Tap then you are just trading chemical for other different chemicals, if your re cooking with Tap then you are cooking some of the chemicals into your food. Then again if you only have a softener the same situation happens. There are some other areas that a conditioner can be beneficial in your home, cleaning your kitchen and bathrooms.you wouldn’t need to remove the hard water deposits that dry and spot everything. So there is less cleaning and less water to use to get things clean. You see it takes more detergent (chemicals) to over take the hard water in before you even start to actually wash whatever it is that you are washing, so more chemical gets added to our eco water system by not having a softener or conditioner. Plus it is costing you more to use more chemicals than what would actually be necessary to clean. This would also allow you to use Bio-degradable cleaning products that would cost you less and be twice or more better for our eco water environment. SO Let me get this strait. The harder the water the more chemicals we need to add into the already plethora of chemicals that is already in it, and it takes more water to try and rinse out those chemicals with water that has chemicals. CONCLUSION: the harder the water the more chemicals for cleaning the worst our eco Water system gets!!! The next stage is getting the chemicals out of your drinking water. A combo of a softener or conditioner with an activated can do this carbon filter at the sink or if you have a refrigerator you can add a filter to your waterline into the fridge. The carbon filter will take out 95 to 99% of the chemical in your water. You can also use a pitcher that has the carbon filter on top so running the water through should eliminate most chemicals. Now these activated carbon filters only reduce the chemicals, if you don’t have anything in front of them you will still be in taking the heavy medal minerals. Up to this point this info about WATER could be totally new to you, some may have known about most of this already, but the next stage of filtration most to all of you this will be new ground breaking info. So stick around for the finale!! What do you know about Ionized Water? the significance its role plays in your body!! Here's one mere fact that should get your attention. More than 90% of women over 40 are chronically