Great espresso, beautiful styling, rock solid reliability. Also, the heat exchanger system is a must if you ever want to steam milk.
Negative Product Points
Tough to come up with much. It takes a little more care to learn how to operate and maintain than other machines.
Detailed Commentary
This machine makes great espresso. The moment you see all that crema just SLURPING out of portafilter, you know there is something special going on.
This machine did take a little fiddling with to get the settings right. I had to adjust the boiler some early on. This was fairly simple though, and Chris Nachtrieb (of Chris' Coffee) was just as amazing as everyone says in his support and helping to set the machine up correctly. For whatever extra effort is required to operate and maintain the machine, the payback is well worth it.
Having a good grinder is also very necessary. I'm glad that I buckled down and went all the way in buying a complete setup and not just the Tea. Also, going for the Tea over the Zaffiro (none HX model) was a good choice for me. I think anyone who steams milk more than 10% of the time will appreciate the heat exchanger system which expediates the whole process.
Buying Experience
Chris' Coffee was excellent. They had the most competitive prices, best reputation, and best service out there. It's tough for me to see why anyone would purchase an Isomac elsewhere.
