Advantium 120
Written: Aug 21 '02
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Pros: Fast oven with many features.
Cons: Non-ergonomic controls and poor instructions cripple this product.
The Bottom Line: Advantium has great features, but unergonomic and controls and poor documentation. I suggest waiting for these kinks to be worked out before buying.
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| ratsauce's Full Review: GE Advantium SCA1000D Microwave Oven |
I purchased a GE Advantium 120 in my new home after reading positive reviews and hearing glowing reports from acquaintances. My thought was that this was an oven that could accommodate that 'one extra item' that always appears when I am cooking for a crowd, or cook a simple meal by itself. It is a good oven but has some definite flaws and limitations.
This oven includes a microwave, an oven feature (with - I assume resistive heating), a halogen light speedcook feature, sensor cooking and several combined modes. It is capable of competantly baking cookies, tho' I think complex items like baked bread is not practical. It is capable of competently 'roasting' a small chicken, but the cleanup required is extensive making the task nearly futile.
Minor nits include the necessity to change oven plates from glass to metal as the use is changed from microwave to speedcook or oven. The exhaust fan is loud but has an effective carbon filter and the 'under'lights are too dim. The small turntable restricts the size of the oven load so that even two small soup bowls will not fit at one time.
More serious is that the manuals do not explain the operation of the oven to the point where a competent cook can begin adapting a conventional recipe to the Advantium. In fact there is no explanation of the three heating methods employed. Yes there is a clear description of how you turn on the oven or speedcook features, but no clue as to how you would choose between these. There is a CD which is essentially a video-advertisement with sample speedcook usage, a usage brochure that includes instruction for the control panel and some warnings, and the obligatory recipe booklet. As usual this manufacturers recipe book is ignorable except that it is the ONLY useful documentation on how to use speedcook. It's possible to read between the lines of these recipes and determine how you might use the oven in speedcook mode. Of course microwave operation is well known by all, but the Advantium oven and sensor cooking modes are left nearly undocumented. It's too bad that learning the basic usage has to be such a research project when a three page description by a home economist would resolve the issue nicely.
The controls on the Advantium are rather non-ergonomic and even 'clunky'. There is no numeric keypad, and there are many 'modal' controls often requiring use of a spinning selector dial. The dial selections involve a some generic operations like 'defrost' or 'custom time' OR 'beverage' which is good, but the dial is cluttered with specifics that aren't helpful. For example the first selection for microwaving is "bacon", another speedcook setting is "potato". I would much rather select time and power levels rather than use someone elses idea of how my food should be cooked. I'd strongly prefer to avoid having to dial past all these seldom used specifics too.
One very common task, microwaving my coffee for 50 seconds is not even possible on the Advantium ! If I select the express microwave I can choose 30 or 60 second period. Alternatively I can select 'microwave', and dial around blindly for 'custom time', then select either 45 or 60 seconds. Alternatively I can select the 'beverage' heating option which appears to use a humidity sensor, and I'll end up with very oveheated coffee. I have three ways to do the wrong thing and no way to do the right thing.
GE has an innovative and powerful unit in the Advantium, an oven with great functional capabilities, but the documentation and controls do not match the level of sophistication of the oven.
Oh yes - the sensor cooking modes on my oven failed six weeks after installation. The oven would operate for 30 seconds and enigmatically display "-F4-" and the manuals and GE email support could not explain this message. The entire processor board was replaced. Service was fast and efficient. I'm sure this would have been a very expensive problem if it hadn't been under warrantee.
Update - I've now had this unit for 9 months and it's essentially an overpriced microwave - I seldom use the speedcook features. Works well, but not much additional convenience.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 750
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Epinions.com ID:
ratsauce
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Reviews written: 6
Trusted by: 1 member
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