Bosch or Asko? An easy question . . .
Written: Aug 26 '00 (Updated Oct 02 '00)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: quiet, well constructed, great racks
Cons: none so far
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| LSMillers's Full Review: Bosch SHU68 24 in. Built-in Dishwasher |
We recently exchanged our five year old malfunctioning Asko 1475 dishwasher for a Bosch SHU 6806, and have been delighted with the latter. Here's why . . .
The Sales Pitches
When we purchased the Asko, we were looking for something that would be more reliable than our old General Electric unit, whose ongoing problems had led to an ever-deepening relationship with their toll-free repair advice service. When they suggested replacing the pump, we decided it was time for a new unit -- and a new manufacturer.
We also wanted a much quieter unit, as our dishwasher sits fairly close to our family room area and the GE used to drive us to distraction when it was running. And we wanted a unit that was energy efficient as well, given our ever-increasing electric and gas bills.
Also important was the issue of durability, as our GE unit was showing rust stains through the rack covering, as well as wear on the inside walls.
Of all the models that we looked at, only Bosch and Asko seemed to meet all of our criteria, especially with their stainless steel walls, durabie racks, energy efficiency and abundant insulation to reduce noise (within our price range).
The salesman back then touted the Asko as being the better of the two, so we took his advice ("I have this unit at home and it's worked great!"). We also purchased Asko clothes washer and dryer units, but that's another story.
We found out much later (several months ago) that Consumer Reports rates ASKO as having the worst repair record among the dishwasher manufacturers that they evaluated. In the interim we had continuing problems with our ASKO, which I'll detail below.
The pitch for the Bosch came from reading reviews of satisfied Bosch customers over the internet, including those from Epinions and especially epinionator Ptieman.
The Installations
I'm a do-it-yourselfer, so I installed both units. The Asko installation was fraught with difficulties, including problems setting the drain time, leveling, drainage hose configuration and door latch play adjustment. (their washer & dryer were even more fun, including water pressure problems and the company's failure to set the units to run on US voltage. I figured the latter out using a voltmeter after the dealer's technician spent an hour on the problem and then gave up).
The Bosch installation, by contrast, was a breeze. The front panel comes off with two screws (unlike ASKO's wacky multi-layered panel set-up), providing easy access to water and electrical connections. Leveling is quickly accomplished with a front screw adjustment mechanish that links to the rear legs, making this task dramatically easier than ASKO's requirement to level each leg. No drainage problems to address by changing timing, etc.
The Performance
One of the advantages of doing your own installations is that you get to see the "nuts and bolts" of the machines. For me, this has been one of the biggest difference between the two units.
Noise, Bosch uses significantly more insulation than ASKO, and this is quite apparent during the installation and later when you run the two. Although the ASKO was appreciably quieter than our old GE, it is clearly less so than is our new Bosch. We've had to ask ourselves several times if the unit is actually running, and could only find out by checking the front panel display.
Racks. The functionality of the Bosch's racks far surpasses ASKO's. We can't believe that we're getting so many more dishes into exactly the same space. Not only that, but there are more rack mechanisms for holding special kinds of dishes such as stem crystal glasses. You can also load the top and run an energy saving cycle, and you can adjust or remove the top rack to accommodate special dishwashing needs. No contest compared to ASKO.
Cleaning With the ASKO we would enjoy periods of well-cleaned dishes, interspersed with calamities of spotted dishes and problems associated with poor drainage. And water at the bottom of the unit, even though we adjusted the pump settings to compensate (they require a weird button-pressing programming sequence to accomplish this). Several visits from the dealer's service tech would fix this for a while, then the problem would come back. Arrrrrrgh!! This is what we'd paid extra to avoid!
Note: we always made sure to rinse food off of our dirty dishes beforehand, and we always checked to make sure that the drain overflow vent wasn't clogged. I even replaced the vent once, thinking that this might be the cause of the drainage problems. And we always checked the inside drain filter to make sure that it was clear.
With the Bosch, it' too early to make a fair comparison re long-term cleaning performance, but so far we're getting dishes that are sparkling clean, more so than they ever were with the ASKO. No residues, no spotting, no nuthin'!
Repair history With ASKO, it was a new problem every six months to a year. Drainage problems, spotting, leaky door seal, and water leaking underneath the unit. Re the latter, the ASKO has a "drainage pan" underneath which got a lot of use -- to the point of overflow -- during its tenure with us. When I took the unit out there were thick mineral deposits in the pan, indicating that water had been down there frequently. One might ask what such a pan is doing there in the first place, which seems to imply that their machine is prone to leaks.
Again, it's too early to tell with the Bosch, but I can tell you that there's no big pan underneath per the above. What is there is an impressively solid construction design, much more solid-appearing than ASKO's. If the performance is anything like that of Bosch's power tools, then I'll be most happy.
The Bottom Line
For us, Bosch has been far and away the better choice for a dishwasher. We strongly advise that you read Consumers Reports' most recent ratings, and be sure to ask your dealer lots of hard questions about the repair histories of their dishwashers before you buy.
Recommended:
Yes
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LSMillers
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Location: California
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