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perfect. i tolerated it for about 2 months, then wrote to hamilton beach. now i am free to be in love w/ my coffee-maker again. loved the look and the idea. 5-star performance now that problem is solved. they sent a new reservoir - not an exact replica of the original, but an obviously redesigned one - voila.
4 stars b/c of all those mornings i had to clean the counter. i bought this as a birthday gift for myself last september (2009). it worked fine, but leaked baaaaaad. works great.
Hard to see how much coffee is left in the upper pot.Overall, very clever design but has some functional setbacks as compared with conventional coffeemakers. You have to frequently clean the metal disc on the bottom of the coffee (upper) pot, especially after having it on for a couple of hours or more.2. I got this coffeemaker based primarily on the high rating from the Consumer Report magazine. I am mostly happy with the purchase but want to mention a couple of areas of improvement:1. Very small openings for pouring water into the water reservoir (bottom pot).3.
Easy to program. Won't burn coffee while storing, turning base makes it easy to access various parts even while under cabinets, will fill even tall thermal mugs.CONS: Takes a few minutes to learn how to use since it's not a traditional carafe-based multi-cup coffee maker. PROS: No carafe to break, leak, or stain. No paper filters needed.
Back to the drawing board again. However, when I tried to clean the water, (not the coffee) filter, the one they sent me was for a completely different model. Anyway, this time when I did some research I thought it was a great idea to have a system where there was no carafe. When I tried to remove the filter, which in retrospect, I guess I should not have done, I must have damaged the lever, because now it leaks and is useless. Something breaks or the carafe breaks, and then the replacements carafes "mysteriously" disappear from the store shelves where we bought up it.
Bad design and even worse instructions. The H-B Brew Station worked well, at least at first. Mr. It seems like my wife and I have been through coffee makers once a year. Coffee in particular seems notorious for this.
Poor directions were inscribed with pictures imprinted on the side of the coffee/water reservoir.
I lack a sophisticated and discriminating coffee palate, so take this comment for the little it's worth, but to me the coffee tastes good. Oh, by the way, it IS possible to burn coffee in this thing if you keep it on when it is near empty, so be careful with that.
If you don't care about color, you might see if you can still get that deal. I rarely DO it when it tells me to, but I still think it's cute.
I think it's cute that it has little lights that come on every 30 days to tell you to change the filter or clean the coffee maker. One more thing: I bought the white one here on Amazon and it was seriously like $20 cheaper than the exact same thing in black.
I've had this coffee maker a few months now, and it has been great. It's the little things in life that give us pleasure, right., and in this case the fact that the coffee can stay warm for up to 4 hours without burning brings a smile to my face every time.
Bottom line, a good machine and seems to be holding up so far.
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