I am going to remodel my kitchen and researching appliances. I am going to need gas range, dishwasher and microwave. I am considering near high-end to high-end models. I have budget of about $2200 for gas range, have not yet figured out for dishwasher and microwave. I checked some online stores and found that only Jenn-Air has gas ranges for my budget. Does anyone own Jenn-Air ranges, are they good? Are there other brands to consider? What about microwave and dishwasher?
Jenn Air has not gotten a lot of favorable reviews. I think you can do better.
As for t he DW, Kitchen Aid, Whirlpool, Maytag and some models of Kenmore (made by Whirlpool) have been favored. We recently bought a new KA and I thought it was one of the best built.
Microwaves Panasonic and Sharp seem to be the leaders. Most are made by the same few companies anyway.
With high end appliances come the latest technology, it's often not ready to sell. Expect high repair bills. When people ask I always suggest middle of the line because that's where you usually get the best value.
Jennair, some people love them some are sorry they ever bought one. If you live in a cold winter area they can make a room pretty chilly if they are not properly installed, you will have a 5" or 6" hole exiting a wall somewhere for the downdraft vent. Second problem is slow cooking on the top of the range. The same downdraft fan that cools your kitchen in the winter will be pulling the heat away from the food you are cooking on the stove top.
Have you seen the Kitchenaid 2 drawer dishwasher? Pretty neat and if you want top of the line then this might do it for you.
trying to pick out a range by price rather than function and purpose is backwards. Sure you can buy a exotic car to drive to get your mail, but why would you do that? Because you can?
I purchased a $1000 gas range for my last remodel. Made by GE no splash with controls. My application was in a island and I needed something flat. I thought that was a lot of money for something that is nothing more than a controlled fire.
Depending on what you want. 4 burners, 8 burners, fryer, well, single oven, double oven. Spending $2k for a range will be easy. Try looking at commercial units, like Vulcan.
Jenn-air/Maytag same company. I bought a Jenn-air cabinet depth refer last February. Been good for my application. It is a LOT smaller inside than the others and could be an issue for a family.
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second on the search that I made
Verona, five star, Viking all have ranges in over the $5 price tag.
My entire kitchen has Jenn-air and maytag appliances. They are the best value out there. I would only consider Maytag or Jenn-air, or thermador, unless you can afford sub-zero. I've owned Kenmore, Whrilpool, and frididare in the past. Kenmore is cheap crap, poor quality cheaply made. Whrilpool and frigidare are not built to last.
Some of us like all the extras in spite of the cost.
A flame is a flame and it will boil water. Higher priced units tend to have more feature, better quality, heavier materials, and yes, more things to break.
When I bought one of my cars, a co-worker made the comment that is will break sooner, the trim will rust and a lot of reasons why the "second line" would be a better buy. I still own it 14 years later, runs as good as the day it was new, he is on his third car and has had major repairs on two of them.
We all have different values. Give $1000 to ten people and everyone of them will do something different with it. Some will bank it, some will invest in stocks, some will take a vacation, buy an appliance, throw a party. Is this a great country?
I know what you mean when you speak of quality. Jennair and Maytage refrigerators were/are Admilal refigerators. The biggest problem I recall with these is that the refrigerator door seal retaining screws were screwed up against the inside door liner which was plastic. Eventually the screws pushed through the liner and the inside panel fell off. Ah, quality.
These are not big sellers around here so I don't know if that was ever corrected. At one time they used metal retainers under the screws and the door liner problem never existed. Ah, progress.
I never had much confidence in their appliance ratings. I've seen the same appliance under different brand names with very different ratings. How can that be?
As someone that is somewhat familiar with household appliances, I can tell you that I'm talking "the same" machine with very different ratings. The parts are interchangeable. The assembly line is the same. The only difference is the name that's painted onto the control housing.
I think you should survey all your friends and neighbors, asking what brand they have, how long it has been in use, whether it has been repaired, etc. See of there is a source of repair parts near your home. I just spent a long time looking for a source of the plastic ends for a shelf bar in a frig. Gaskets, drawers, shelves need replacing from time to time.
I installed Magic Chef appliances back in 1992. The dishwasher and trash compactor are OK. The microwave and stove are awful. Both have lots of plastic parts that break and like all plastic, attract dirt and grease. The stove has lots of inside curves and creases that make it hard to clean. The stove went through a spell of displaying "F1" but nobody on the web or on the phone could tell me what that meant.
May I add one additional suggestion. Ask a few people who own stainless steel appliances how they like them. The few people who I know who have them may like them, but they all seems to have a bad thing to say about keeping the finish looking good. Spots and fingerprints are a problem
I suspect your price for microwave and dishwasher are going to bump up quite a bit for the SS feature.
I have had excellent results with Kitchenade for stoves and fridges. The Whirlpool, Armada, Maytag, and GE are also supposed to be very good. Most of technology that goes in to these are made by the same manufactures. The design is different to fit to their particulars for the model type. I particularly like the new Maytag line.
As for the Microwave ovens, I have been very satisfied. Our last 4 ovens since we've had microwave ovens, has all been Panasonic. I would not change the brands that I like.
I had a Maytag fridge for 8 years - worst refrigerator I've ever had, and as we just put in a new kitchen we bought a new one and donated the Maytag to someone on PhillyFreeCycle. Before the Maytag was 1 year old we had to replace one of the brackets on the freezer door. When it was just 4 years old the seal around the freezer door had to be replaced, and the seal around the refrigerator itself has now come loose and will need to be replaced. When we went to an appliance store to purchase the new stuff I mentioned this to the owner and he said that he no longer handled Maytag refrigerators because he got too many complaints.
I have not had good luck with my Maytag Model MSD2957AE side by side refrigerator. It was purchased in 1999 for $1850, was replaced by the retailer within a couple weeks, and the replacement had the same bugs as the original - leaks water on floor, does not cool evenly, ice dispensor and water fountain failures. Many parts have unglued themselves such a drawer pulls and drawer supports, outer doors will not stay shut. I ended up using digital thermometers in the freezer and the refrigerator as we have lost food several times and Maytag says they did not design it, they only put their name on it.
When I asked for a new one of a different model due to many of the same repeat problems, Maytag said they are fixing the bugs as they come up in the field and encouraged me to continue to renew my service contract.
Next time, I will probably buy from Costco. Its been my experience that Costco stands behind their items unlike Maytag.
We all have our own agendas and value sets, so it's nearly impossible for many of us to accept another's opinion on -anything- at face value. And let me say that I'm not here to defend CR, they are well able to do that themselves.
Having said that, I cannot be an expert on everything. Even if I was, I could never hope to have the resources available to me that CR has. Nor can the sum total of all the people that read and post on this group be expected to be experts on all appliances, only those with which they have had contact, and even then, to a limited degree. They don't test them, they fix them. Don't get me wrong, there IS a wealth of good information available on here though.
Also, it's hard to believe publications that accept free samples for testing and then sell advertising space back to the same companies are completely unbiased or anywhere near it.
As I mentioned in my original post, the thing I value the most from CR is their descriptions of the overall current market offer in terms of features and their usefulness for a specific commodity. As often as not, I don't buy their "best buy" items, rebel that I am :)
So, I'm quite willing to look to a better independent source for product reviews, if anyone knows of one. Who IS CR's competition, anyway?
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