Don't fall for all the hype! Stick with french press!
Positive Product Points
I actually like the looks. Brews at 200 degrees.
Negative Product Points
Carafe is a piece of s@#$%! and poors all over the place if you're not using a cup with a large mouth. There is no automatic off switch. You need to stir the grinds because it doesn't saturate the coffee entirely. Makes weak coffee if you do not operate the manual on/off on the filter housing. Spills all over the place when you pull the carafe out. Over all, very poorly designed.
Detailed Commentary
this maker is over-priced at 250! if the carafe did not pour all over the counter when using smaller cups, I may not be complaining as much. It was just the final annoyance. The first annoyance is that you need to stir the grinds with a chopstick to get decent coffee which kind of defeats the purpose of having a drip machine. Along with that, you have to operate the on/off switch on the filter housing (turning it off for a minute to let the coffee saturate for the required four minutes) or you truly wind up with coffee that is weak Without doing this it is very inferior to french press. Also, the coffee spills out all over the place when you pull the carafe out. Especially during the brewing process (automatic off switch does not work!!). You have to wait five minutes for it to slowly clear out or it WILL make a mess! The only thing that is good is that it does brew at 200 degrees. I think it looks great (am I the only one that feels this way?). Other than that, it is not worth the price. If it required no work to brew a decent cup of coffee, it would be worth it. Unfortunately there are no other choices other than french press or vacuum pot (both which make a far better cup of coffee IMHO). They also require the same amount of work if you are using a swiss gold filter in your technivorm. If not, you are saving a little bit of cleaning time. Aside from the looks, the hype, and the industrial (200 degree) heating, this machine truly is a piece of crap. Anyone with there head out of the sand will agree. I am writing this to save people money. Stick with a french press or vacuum pot and save your 300 (with shipping and tax) to get a nice grinder like a rocky or a mazer.
