Excellent but not hassle-free
Written: Feb 16 '01 (Updated Feb 16 '01)
|
Product Rating:
|
|
| Ease of Use: |
 |
|
| Durability: |
 |
|
| Ease of Cleaning: |
 |
|
| Style: |
|
|
|
Pros: Quiet, good-looking, cleans and dries well.
Cons: Expensive, fingerprinting, can wet floor when opened mid-cycle, not great capacity, odd smell when new.
The Bottom Line: Excellent product at a high price. Might be able to do somewhat better for somewhat less.
|
|
|
| larsdjensen's Full Review: Bosch SHU53 24 in. Built-in Dishwasher |
Any dishwasher will clean the dishes; you pay Bosch bucks for quiet and looks. So how does it do?
Quiet: It's not "so quiet you have to put your ear against it". It is, however, quiet enough that you mostly forget it's on, even in the same room. Usually it makes a soft, not unpleasant sloshing sound. At a couple points in the cycle it briefly makes a louder, low hum that isn't too bad.
Looks: That stainless steel is gorgeous but most of the time, even in our kid-less household, it's got the dreaded fingerprints on it. "Normal" household cleaners (Windex, 409, etc.) don't work on stainless. Even the special stainless cleaner we bought requires more elbow grease than you'd expect. Compare this to our textured white fridge, which we _never_ clean, but which _always_ looks factory-fresh.
Other observations:
- Gets dishes real clean and real dry in 92 minutes.
- After 8 months, we have yet to see appreciable material in the filter, let alone get up the energy to lift it out and rinse it off.
- Had an unpleasant metallic smell inside when new, and 8 months later it still lingers, though I mostly stopped noticing it months ago.
- Displays cycle time (which is less handy than I anticipated), but not which part of the cycle it's in (which I'd like; I often pull out a dish after the rinse).
- Doesn't fit our dishes as well as our old one, which means capacity is lower. Is this because it's European and the old one is American? Who knows -- I'd be sure to take a good sample of my dishes to the store next time though.
- Have to open the door slowly in mid-cycle or it can squirt some water on the floor before stopping.
- The first door panel had dark streaks on it when delivered. The store cheerfully replaced it, but the installer put it in wrong as a result of ill-designed control panel tabs. Eventually I got it in by bending the tabs. I mention this because another epinioner had oddly similar comments about the product.
Don't get me wrong -- it's a fine product, worth the money for the quiet and I'm happier for it. But if I had to do it again, I'd look hard at KitchenAid, which I have listened to in various houses and which comes in some pretty nice-looking models these days, and which I think might fit our dishes better. And which I think costs a bit less. And I'd nix the stainless, but if my wife insisted on it, I'd look at the Bosch with the handle that projects out, to keep hands off the door more. (It also conceals the controls along the top edge of the door, yielding a cleaner look for the style-conscious.)
I give it 4 stars because it's a quiet, stylish performer. If it fit more dishes, had a more useful display, and didn't squirt water out -- or if it cost several hundred less -- I'd give it 5. (The fingerprints are our own dang fault.)
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 950
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
larsdjensen
|
|
Reviews written: 1
Trusted by: 0 members
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.