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Why every microwave sucks these days
- corethree 3y agoThere's one feature that changed the game. Alexa. Now I don't punch in those stupid numbers. I just go "Computer! microwave for 3 minutes and 30 seconds!" bam!
- huytersd 3y agoWhat is this article? It doesn’t even mention why microwaves suck besides handwavyly saying they break in a year (not my experience).
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- flanked-evergl 3y agoIt seems to be some excuse to tell people that capitalism is horrible: > what can we learn from this? i don't know. capitalism will destroy everything it touches.
- quacker 3y agoYeah, of all the appliances in my own home, the microwave is the one I never complain about. I press the +30s button a few times, and the food is hot after a minute or two. Yes, there are ten other buttons I never use. Yes, they could conceivably be “better” in small ways. Yes, modern ones can break like every other appliance does, but the ones from the 80s and 90s broke, too.
- bambax 3y agoSamsung, Panasonic, Siemens, LG, Toshiba, Sharp all have microwaves on offer. Are they all made by Midea? Seems unlikely. The diversity of models, sizes, prices is striking when searching online.
- kakwa_ 3y agoToshiba, given Midea bought their home appliance division, yes: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-03-17/china-s-midea-buys-majority-of-toshiba-s-home-appliance-business#xj4y7vzkg https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-03-17/china-s-m... Looking through amazon, all the most basic models at a ~$80 to $110 price point really look almost identical beyond a basic facelift. They nearly all have a power and timer knob, the same stamped steel internal and side panels and roughly the same max power. At most, you see different generations.
- willcipriano 3y agoI'd like to see a Zojirushi microwave. I feel like they could make one that seems a little magical and worth the upgrade.
- atonse 3y agoI got excited when I misread this thinking they had one already. Their thermoses are so amazing. In fact, they’re so good that I often have to keep the lid open cuz my coffee stays too hot for too long.
- fomine3 3y agoThey entered to the market recently (maybe JDM). I've considered to buy it but finally not, due to it's expensive. https://www.amazon.co.jp/-/en/dp/B0B7GZ3DCG/ https://www.amazon.co.jp/-/en/dp/B0B7GZ3DCG/
- tantalor 3y agoThis "your browser is stalking you" shit is annoying
- ChatGTP 3y agoWhat are you talking about?
- andersa 3y agoThe author had the incredibly genius idea of making a website that doesn't work on the most popular browser. Ridiculous.
- hnshitpostt 3y agoI do say, the defcon 1 freak out over googles latest way to track you is quite amusing. its peak HN yuppie hipster bullshit.
- paulpauper 3y agoyes same here.
- tptacek 3y agoThis is basically a blog summary of Amanda Mull's Atlantic story from this summer: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2023/06/instant-pot-bankrupt-private-equity/674414/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2023/06/insta...
- xnx 3y agohttps://archive.ph/DKBzB https://archive.ph/DKBzB
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- resolutebat 3y agoExcept that that article is only about Instant Pot, and this one is (mostly) about microwaves. I for instance had no idea that a company called Midea existed, much less that it's now a near-monopoly supplier of shitty OEM microwaves to the world. Here's hoping my indestructible Toshiba keeps on ticking, since looks like Midea swallowed them too in 2016. https://www.midea-group.com/our-businesses/smart-home/toshiba https://www.midea-group.com/our-businesses/smart-home/toshib...
- solardev 3y agoInteresting, I have a Midea white labeled window air conditioner from Costco and that thing is SUPERB. Extremely quiet, cold, smart, all around just a fantastic device. I wonder why their microwaves are so bad
- unixhero 3y agoCostco is not messing around when it comes to quality.
- clausecker 3y agoLast time I checked it was a duopoly now. One company is Midea, the other is Galanz. However, some companies (like Panasonic) still make their own high-end microwaves.
- zbrozek 3y agoI look forward to direct synthesis solid state microwave ovens. I want to actually get power control.
- h2odragon 3y agoooo repurpose-able arrays
- dreamcompiler 3y agoInverter microwave ovens do PWM (which I guess doesn't sound as sexy as "Inverter"?) so you get much finer-grained power control than standard microwaves. Still they don't give you direct wattage control, which perhaps is what you're asking for. https://www.techlicious.com/review/microwave-ovens-with-inverter-technology-really-cook/ https://www.techlicious.com/review/microwave-ovens-with-inve...
- solardev 3y agoDon't regular microwaves also do PWM? How's that different from just cycling on and off?
- kadoban 3y agoIf the new ones are doing PWM (I hadn't heard that's how it works, but have no reason to doubt it), it must be cycling several times per second. It's indistinguishable from having true control over the wattage. The old cycling on and off, it's full power for several seconds and then off for several. The full power sections are long enough to nuke the shit out of many items. Butter doesn't do well, soup and pizza either, just to name some.
- solardev 3y agoThanks for the explanation! I didn't realize PWM specifically referred to fast cycling. I thought any sort of deliberate on/off pattern to modulate power would be PWM. What you said makes sense though, that the regular microwaves can't lower their power output enough (whatever The mechanism) to be safe for some foods.
- scblock 3y agoThere's no "why" in this "why" post.
- pnathan 3y agoCorrect. This analysis misses a LOT of economic factors. As well as corporate control factors.
- kelseyfrog 3y agoIt was easy for me to spot the why, so I'll distill it. Once a market is saturated and business growth can't continue by selling more of the product(see microwaves), growth occurs through M&A(consolidation) or reducing costs(eg: removing the moisture sensor). The author reflects on the microwave market having single supplier Midea as an example of the former, and their removal of the moisture sensor as an example of the latter. Naturally, the author asks, "what are the incentives that create these behaviors?" They identify the economic structure as the proximal cause of these incentives. Thus concluding that the economic structure that creates microwave markets ultimately concludes in the creation of the shitty microwaves. The author extrapolates this to the multicooker market a la InstantPot - a bonus predictive why InstantPot will get shitty soon.
- teo_zero 3y agoMarket saturation is clearly stated or hinted at.
- flanked-evergl 3y agoI guess you missed this gem then: > what can we learn from this? i don't know. capitalism will destroy everything it touches.
- ericpauley 3y agoThe worst part about this article for me is that there is a reason for some people to buy new microwaves. Inverter microwaves (yes, these have been around a while) have become far more broadly available. This is a worthwhile upgrade for many users.
- solardev 3y agoWhat do they do exactly? Just operate on a variable power level, without cycling on and off?
- lazide 3y agoCorrect
- solardev 3y agoI don't understand why that is dramatically better than cycling? Isn't the overall energy input into the food roughly similar over time? It's not like microwaving gives great texture or browning to begin with?
- ericpauley 3y agoThe cycle time is too long for sensitive items like butter. Even at low power it will bubble over before it fully melts.
- ForkMeOnTinder 3y agoAs a chronic comparison shopper, this is a first-world problem that's near and dear to my heart. I think the reason microwaves (and appliances in general) suck is because comparison shopping is so hard. I wish I could get a list of all microwaves and filter by criteria such as: - Does the +30 seconds button start cooking immediately, or do you have to also press "start" afterwards? - Does it beep every 30 seconds after it finishes, and if so can I turn that off? - Better yet, can I turn the beeping off completely without taking the damn thing apart and desoldering the beeper, and of course in the process risking my life near the high-voltage electronics? But it's basically impossible to know these things without buying it and opening the box, so there's no competitive pressure pushing manufacturers to make their appliances less annoying, so we all have to live with these little papercuts throughout our daily lives for perpetuity.
- gobins 3y agoThe Samsung microwaves, although with good build quality, are notorious for having a very bad UX. - The buttons don't give have tactile feedback. - Setting time is very confusing. - You have to press multiple buttons just to start. - If you want to cancel/clear timer, you have to press multiple buttons again.
- nvy 3y agoI've had the misfortune of using a Samsung microwave, electric oven, dishwasher, and phone. I've concluded that Samsung products are just generally dogshit.
- bick_nyers 3y agoAfter owning LG, GE, and Samsung appliances, I am now an LG fanboy.
- gobins 3y agoI do have to mention that out of all their appliances, I do love their washing machines. I have owned a couple over the last 10 years ant they just keep working.
- da768 3y agoGot a Breville recently, seemed like the only units that weren't the same as every others out there... Not sure it's more durable, but at least it's super quiet, I can mute beep sounds, I can change time and power while food is cooking, and it's got a stainless interior so there's no cheap paint that'll start falling off after a few months.
- paranoidrobot 3y agoAlso got a Breville microwave, too the "combi-wave" one or something. Amazingly quiet. I usually hate all device sounds, but surprisingly this has a reasonably quiet singular bell-like "ding" option, rather than the typical "beep-beep-beep" that drives me nuts. The only thing that concerns me is the oven modes. It's got this plastic spinner piece that supports the glass turntable that I'm not sure about leaving in, and you can't use the metal tray in microwave mode. So I just leave it in microwave mode all the time.
- anjel 3y agoMy fridge, Drip Coffee Maker and Toast, 3 devices, from 3 different manufacturers all use the same three beeps (same pitch, same time delay between beeps) so its ambiguous to deduce if my toast or coffee is ready or if my fridge door isn't entirely closed. But hey, great component pricing on that beep chip.
- nameless912 3y agoI've never understood peoples' obsession with matching appliances for this exact reason. No, I don't want my fridge, microwave, stove, and dishwasher to come from the same manufacturer and make the same noises, thank you very much.
- theamk 3y agoIt is not as unlikely as you might think... The cheaper buzzers have a single, preferred frequency (like [0] has 2.4KHz). And engineers like round numbers for time delays. So I can imagine a spec which says "do a cheapest buzzer on its preferred frequency, 1 second period, 50% duty cycle, 3 times" being independently written in 3 different engineering offices, and multiple devices ending up with identical beeps. [0] https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/pui-audio-inc/AT-1224-TWT-5V-2-R/5011404 https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/pui-audio-inc/AT-...
- notacoward 3y agoI have a Panasonic "Genius" microwave that I actually like quite well. The "inverter technology" does seem to cook more evenly than previous microwaves I've had, and the "air fryer" (not really) mode works very well for a bunch of frozen things that should be a bit crisp on the outside (e.g. samosas or taquitos). Day old fries often come out better than they were when fresh. Is it an amazing indispensable life-changing invention? No. But does it suck? Also no. The premise of the article is seriously flawed, and comes across as somebody who just didn't like anything but old-fashioned stove cooking (probably by someone else) in the first place.
- function_seven 3y agoYeah I feel the same. I have an LG inverter and it’s absolutely fine. Definitely better than the 70s microwave I grew up with. I sympathize a bit with those who would like to have physical knobs and simplicity. I’m not a fan of the capacitive touch buttons. They are easy to clean, so I understand why they’re popular, but it would feel nice to just spin a knob to 3:30 and press the start button. And it was 1/10th the cost of the “good old days” models. I appreciate the cost-cutting that went into my microwave.
- zeteo 3y agoI got rid of my microwave several years ago and don't miss it anymore. (It took a while to get used to its absence.) I still have an Instant Pot but use it very rarely, maybe once a month. Investing in a high quality set of pots and pans has made up for it: copper pots for things that need to be heated quickly (e.g. boiling water, which is almost as fast as the microwave in a copper pot) and high-quality cast iron for things that need to be heated thoroughly (e.g. frying, baking). I also own a toaster oven because I'm too lazy to toast bread in the frying pan :) That one is electronic, but you can still get analog toaster ovens I believe.
- foobarian 3y agoI got an Instant Pot because so many people I personally know swore by it, and in the end I just don't get it. Maybe I know too many people who live the bachelor/college dorm lifestyle. It does everything pots do, but it's big and heavy and cleanup is a colossal pain.
- progne 3y ago”what can we learn from this? i don't know. capitalism will destroy everything it touches.” Microwaves are better in countries with less capitalism?
- atonse 3y agoYeah I find this fashionable statement often meaningless when used. They literally gave an example of how when people were buying them, there was a lot of innovation. That was capitalism too, right? In fact, if there is any innovation do be had here, it’ll only happen because of monetary motivations.
- jacknews 3y agoThe problem with any argument over capitalism is that it is responsible for both good and bad. On the one hand all the innovation and cheap prices are a result of capitalism driven competition. On the other hand, all the deceptive marketing, addictive vacuous features, vendor lock-in, planned obsolescence and enshitification are also a result of capitalism, which only cares about maximizing profits and return on capital.
- bazylevnik0 3y agoJust was need a spicy drama in article
- teddyh 3y agoTechnology Connections covered microwaves: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiS27feX8o0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiS27feX8o0>
- harel 3y agoAs soon as you open the site in Chrome it complains that my browser is stalking me (I know and don't care) and that this site does not work with it. So I closed it. More annoying than my browser's stalking habits is the assumption that one knows best and can decide for others what they should be using. This is the first time I see something like that. Hope it's the last too.
- Boatfaceing 3y ago[dead]
- paulpauper 3y agosame here. and no option to close it. is this some sort of joke or someting
- account42 3y agoEnjoy you advertiser-driven web.
- harel 3y agoThis won't stop an advertiser driven web. Only an alternative approach that maintain provider profits. Adverts exist because we refuse to pay for every service. This doesn't offer an alternative, but presumes to know better by removing user's choice.
- tristan957 3y agoIf people listened to the author of the web page, it would stop an ad-driven web. Because the world continues to use Chromium skins, we are inevitably going to get some technology that ad blockers won't work on any more. See FLoC, Web Bundles, or Web Integrity. How do you all use a browser that comes up with these adversarial technologies?
- harel 3y agoBecause on a daily basis, it doesn't affect me. Personally. I don't care. That's the honest answer. On days I do care, I have my means to be undetected. When the ads bother me, I switch on the pihole. Some sites don't work with pihole enabled so sometimes it's either off or I create exceptions. But I like Chrome. The convenience I get from chrome is invaluable to me. No other browser can give me that exactly. But all of the above are based on MY decisions. I chose to use X or to ignore Y. When a site decides that for me, well... I just walk away.
- natch 3y agoAs far as I'm concerned there is only one microwave on the market worth buying. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B074RCGYLB https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B074RCGYLB ONE dial. One. Zero buttons. Perfect. It does not have a turntable, but it's never needed one.
- solardev 3y agoWhy doesn't it need a turntable?
- natch 3y agoNo idea, it seems to cook things pretty evenly, but if I'm say pre-cooking potatoes for 6 minutes before frying them, I do manually turn every couple minutes to be sure. If you want a turntable this is not the one for you, but the ease of the turn-and-it's-on UX destroys any other concern here for me.
- alpaca128 3y agoAfaik models without turntables rotate the emitter instead.
- Turing_Machine 3y agoSome use a "stirring" fan with metal blades, which is designed to reflect the microwaves to all parts of the oven cavity.
- huytersd 3y agoHow do you set power levels? That’s a feature I use extensively.
- natch 3y agoA feature of mere perceived usefulness. Not to be confused with an actual useful feature.
- foxylad 3y agoWe have a Phillips microwave built in 1987, still going strong. In this domain, older is WAAAAAAY better.
- udia 3y agoInstant Pot died primarily due to private equity greed, not because of Instant Pot reliability. In 2017, Cornell Capital bought the company for a total $500M of which $300M was financed by debt. Then 4 years later in 2021, it refinanced and added on debt, bringing the total debt to $535M. $245M was immediately paid out to shareholders as a dividend. Cornell Capital got paid back all the cash it invested in the company's acquisition, and then some. In 2023 due to high interest rates the company was no longer able to service its debt, costing the company ~$50M a year, and the company had to file Chapter 11.
- hotnfresh 3y agoWhat are the magic words these people use to get a bank to give them millions of dollars, let them walk off with it, then eat the loss?
- voisin 3y agoThe debt likely wasn’t a normal bank, and the interest rate was likely quite high. The parties making the loan were likely fully aware of the risk and thought the interest rate appropriate compensation.
- teo_zero 3y agoAre those banks the same that failed to recognize what a bad idea it was to bet on sub-prime loans before 2009?
- IAmNotACellist 3y agoThose WERE a great idea--as long as you weren't the one caught holding the bag
- ChoHag 3y ago[dead]
- chongli 3y ago
- QuarterReptile 3y agoWell, my instant pot is a piece of junk. I got it ca. 2019 to replace my worn out rice cooker, and within 2-3 years the control dial failed. Now I have to spin the dial at a wide range of speeds while various pushing on, pulling on, and whispering incantations to the stupid thing. Worth making extra waste to replace? No, but it sure makes me mad that I need 90 seconds to set the cook timer.
- yunwal 3y agoMine seems to detect burning about 3 mins into pressure cooking (which stops the heat). I’m fairly certain nothing is actually burning, but even if it is, there seems to be no amount of liquid I can add to get it to stop.
- hotnfresh 3y agoThe best microwave I've ever used was probably from the early 80s. It was in my maternal grandparents' house. The controls were two knobs. There were no other controls. No start button. No open-door button. Both knobs felt Very Serious. There was no spinny platter thing, but it didn't seem to really do any worse than the new ones with it—but it was easier to clean. It was pretty big for a microwave. One knob was power. One knob was a timer. You turn the timer knob to start it. It physically ticks down until it dings (real bell, not a speaker) and stops. You pull the (heavy) handle on the door to open it. It's secured with (I suppose) one or more of those mechanisms where a flared tab goes between a pair of little wheels, so it's secure unless you pull fairly hard, no need for a release button. It was still mounted in the exact same place and working just as well as it did in the 80s and 90s, when my grandma moved out to live with my parents in the 2010s. I've seen a few kinda similar models on offer, but they're expensive and without feeling one in person I really doubt they're actually as good. (A bunch of the finishes on their very-modest poor-rural-town house—outlet and switch cover plates, some of the trim, the front door, the storm doors of all things, and the doorbell, were all luxury-tier by modern standards—some of those, I've never seen anything as good on any house built since 1970 or so, and I've been in some "nice" ones; some stuff's simply gotten worse, and I tell you what, the solid feel and butter-smooth action of some of those things really did make life better)
- coffeebeqn 3y agoI also remember our microwave as a kid had a power level knob. Now that property is hidden behind some combination of pressing 5 different beeping buttons that I never use
- aidenn0 3y agoI'm fine with digital entry for time (30 vs 45 seconds can be a big deal when heating up your coffee), but just have a knob for the power level. Every single microwave seems to have a different way of selecting power, when a knob would be so easy.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- peteforde 3y agoI actually have one the the Panasonic microwaves whispered about at the end of the article, and it's been the best microwave I've ever owned. "Panasonic NNSC688S Mid-Size 1200W Inverter Microwave Oven, 1.3 Cuft, Black Stainless Steel" which Amazon sells for CAD$300, although I see one used is available for $180 - a steal, IMHO. The key word in the description is "inverter". I am very much in the pro-inverter camp. In an inverter microwave, power is supplied through an inverter circuit to supply a steady and constant amount of power throughout the cooking time without cutting in and out. So if you select 50% power, the microwave will deliver 50% power throughout. Inverter microwaves are also more energy efficient than standard microwaves.
- tzs 3y agoI've also got one, although mine is the larger NN-SN946W model. It has had one odd behavior that has me quite puzzled. I was regularly having for breakfast a microwaved frozen breakfast sandwich and a couple hash browns cooked in a toaster. The hash browns took 10 minutes, and the breakfast sandwich 1 minute. I'd program the microwave for a 9 minute timer stage, followed by a 1 minute cooking stage, and then start the microwave and drop the hash browns in the toaster. I could then go do other stuff and when I heard the microwave beep I'd know it was time to go take the hash browns out of the toaster. This worked great for weeks, then one morning the microwave would not start. Some experimenting showed that it would still start as long as the first stage was not a timer stage of a multi-stage program was not a timer stage. E.g., cook stage + timer stage was fine. Cook + timer + cook was also fine, so it wasn't that timer stages could not precede cook stages. Timer only was fine, too. This is not an internet-connected device, so it wasn't some sort of stealth firmware update. Reset didn't help, and neither did unplugging it overnight. It was this way for a couple days (as a work around I'd do 1 second cook + 9 minute timer + 1 minute cook)...and then it started working normally again and has continued working normally ever since (about two years since the glitch). I can't even come up with a reasonably hypothesis to explain this.
- rrr_oh_man 3y agoWhat... is a "frozen breakfast sandwich"? I googled it and it looks like... a regular sandwich that needs to be put in the oven for some reason?
- armchairhacker 3y agoHow do we avoid this problem and sustain companies who make long-lasting products? - Subscription service? - Annual government funding? - Annual private funding for "best product in category"? Also how are some companies who make long-lasting tools which are apparently good quality (such as Lodge, PYREX, Patagonia) seemingly doing just fine?
- nameless912 3y agoLodge and Pyrex are probably not the best examples - Lodge cast iron has gone down the tubes recently, making thinner pans with worse factory coatings, and Pyrex switched away from the high quality borosilicate glass they had used for decades to a cheaper formulation recently. Patagonia has even lowered their standards somewhat - I know a guy who bikes to work every day in Seattle and has used the same Patagonia waterproof panniers for something like 15 years, and I would be willing to bet that new ones are more cheaply made and less waterproof, while costing more.
- clausecker 3y agoPyrex still uses borosilicate glass in Europe (or so it appears).
- solardev 3y agoDidn't Pyrex move to some cheaper glass formula? I don't use cast iron, but I heard that Lodge quality has declined a lot in recent years? Patagonia also isn't particularly high quality (I own dozens of their clothes because I like their environmental activism, but many fray out of the bag, fit poorly, have crappy zippers, etc.). Arcteryx and European brands often make much higher quality clothing. Patagonia's on par with REI store brand clothing, IMO. But at least now they're wholly owned by a nonprofit! I'm not sure any company can avoid this fate long term if they need to keep growing. And these days, with everything from electronics to materials science to coatings to additives all changing so fast, maybe fast and cheap and easily replaceable is just what the market bears, for consumer and manufacturer alike?
- 3y ago
- LRVNHQ 3y agoI'm not an advanced or regular microwave user (try keeping a straight face while talking like that about microwaves lol, but I use it maybe once or twice a month averaged over the year) but frankly I don't see any performance issue with my cheap microwave compared to what one could expect from a microwave. Put food in, wait 4-5 minutes, food comes out hot. What infuriates me are vacuum cleaners. To make them more "eco-friendly" it's even regulated in the EU now that vacuum cleaners may not use more than 900 watts. But it's not like vacuum cleaner technology has improved tenfold since I had my good old 1500 watts vacuum cleaner in the 2000s (rip). So how did they achieve this magic? Well, new vacuum cleaners don't vacuum for shit, that's how.
- lambda_lord 3y agoThe Sebo E3 is 1200 watts and has a 10 year warranty. Built like LEGO, every part is serviceable too. Miele and Lindhaus are also good.
- LRVNHQ 3y agoMaybe you have an older version from before the regulation was introduced, but The Sebo E3 is now 890W as advertised on their website. Yes I have a Miele which is decent but not as good as my previous one from before the regulation (also a Miele that died through no fault of its own).
- eduction 3y agoThis is like a textbook example of Louis CK’s adage “everything is amazing and nobody’s happy.” Microwaves are great. Amazon will have a Farberware or RCA for $70 to my home in two days - including shipping! What exactly is the problem? No one has ever used them to do anything other than heat things up. I was a child of the 80s. No one ever used these supposed features the post complains are disappearing. Instant Pot. Introduced millions to pressure cooking. Pork shoulder or brisket in 30m instead of 3 hours. Same for beans. Mine stopped working after several months and I called the company. They sent me a new one, actually a nicer model than the old, for free, that week. And told me to throw the old one out. Years later it’s working great. Who cares if the company went bankrupt? Yes private equity seems to suck but guess what, you can still buy a cheap great Instant Pot. Then he has the nerve to complain about capitalism, the reason we have this stuff. Does the author think in the Soviet Union it was easy to get a microwave? Does the author think communist citizens lucky enough to own microwaves had all the features they could want, and could be one tenth as picky as he is? Please tell me in what system other than capitalism you get to publish your nitpicky complaints about your abundant selection of consumer electronics to the world at the click of a button, on your computer or phone or tablet, that you own and hook up to your broadband internet which is readily available to your heated and cooled home, in one of the most prosperous countries on earth, so you can sneer at capitalism, which literally is the reason you have all this. What a bizarre post. In summary, not every microwave sucks, and instant pot isn’t dead.
- huytersd 3y agoThank you. Everyone seems to be talking about number pad bad.
- smaudet 3y agoI don't think you read the article and are probably new at life, or just out of touch. Microwaves should last for decades, this is the same type of thing that you may have heard your parents complain about "I had a can opener that I got from my mother and it just broke, the five new ones I bought same price all broke within a year". There is really nothing complex about one. It's a timer connected to some voltage equipment and a couple transformers. But, the way you make it, fused steel, well oiled joints, cheap copper wire barely within tolerance or thick wire able to withstand 2x the amperage, varies wildly. As demand goes up, you build fancy microwave factories with expensive well tested molds that can churn out hundreds of thousands of them...until demand goes down and paying for maintenance and power at the factory no longer make sense, let alone having anyone staff the place or prevent looting and squatting. So you cut corners and your microwave is made of plastic, every time you use it it fries its own cheap water based glue, and the thing falls apart every 6 months. That's what he's complaining about. Yeah, capitalism works great assuming constant or increasing demand, but it's really bad at financial planning or literally anything else, and then it creates garbage and human suffering. I think probably the microwaves in the Soviet Union still probably last decades, because unlike the American ones, there were still people willing to buy and or repair their own. Sure they might be "trash" in build quality, at some point in history, but what matters is not all money.
- Eliah_Lakhin 3y agoI moved to a new place around 8 years ago. In my kitchen, I have all the usual kitchen essentials, and perhaps even some less common items, such as a Cappuccino machine. But I don't have a microwave and never consider buying one. I used to live without it. When I order fast food, couriers usually deliver a warm meal to me. When I buy prepared food at a local grocery store, I always ask the salesperson to reheat it right in their microwave at the store. When I cook food at home, it will be hot. If I leave something in the fridge, it's not a big deal for me to eat it chilled later. Chilled food does not lose its nutritional value anyway. The reason I decided to live without a microwave is that I can't find a device without any built-in smart-scheduling functions; instead, I want one that would offer me complete manual control. What I really need is a device with three simple features: 1. A manual knob to control the microwave power generator output. 2. A manual shut-off timer knob. 3. A manual grill spiral knob.
- meristohm 3y agoWe don't like our LG microwave capacitive-only buttons or the periodic "I'm done!" cute chime, but it works and I use it multiple times a day, because I mostly eat cooked grain and pulse sprouts plus vegetables (vs GERD, and because I like fiber), and a microwave with inverter is the best way to quickly cook this and beets, for example, without boiling over. I set it to 30-40% power (of 1100W max) and increase the time accordingly. My feeling is that low power longer time gives the heat energy time to propagate and minimize hotspots. I stir it all once partway through, often when I add the zucchini or other quicker-cooking veg. We use our InstantPot daily, too, for all sorts of foods and especially steel-cut oats or oat groats, scheduled to be ready in the morning.
- philistine 3y agoThat website has the only banner ad I have clicked since 2010. Not going to buy the breadboard, but my curiosity was piqued.
- rsync 3y agoWe have a Panasonic NE-1258R. It's a commercial kitchen microwave oven and is built like a tank. It requires a 20amp circuit and it has no turntable because it has two magnetrons. https://www.manualslib.com/products/Panasonic-Ne1258r-Commercial-Microwave-Oven-54399.html https://www.manualslib.com/products/Panasonic-Ne1258r-Commer... Recommended.
- gonzo41 3y agoWell at least you know your electrical system will be up for fast charging an EV. a 20A microwave is probably something you'd want to supervise pretty closely.
- shepherdjerred 3y ago> a 20A microwave is probably something you'd want to supervise pretty closely Aren't standard microwaves 15A? Wouldn't a 15A -> 20A microwave just be 33% more powerful? Is that a dangerous jump? I know very little about electricity
- huytersd 3y agoIf I’m not mistaken 15A is a standard residential wall outlet with 14 AWG wires. 20A isn’t that much more but since it’s not standard, I think it would require a higher gauge of wire such as 12 AWG and an updated breaker. I don’t know much about electricity either
- rssoconnor 3y ago20A is now standard in kitchens[0]. For example, when I moved in, all my kitchen outlets were 20 amps. The sockets look like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:NEMA_5-20R.svg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:NEMA_5-20R.svg [0]Requirement: Provide at least two 20-amp, 120-volt circuits to supply power to GFCI (Ground Fault Circuit Interrupter) electric receptacles for countertop and eating areas. -- https://www.thespruce.com/kitchen-electrical-code-basics-1821527 https://www.thespruce.com/kitchen-electrical-code-basics-182...
- SanjayMehta 3y agoI have a really old microwave made in Korea which I bought used 20 years ago. It has two mechanical knobs: power and time. You can hear the timer whirring down. That’s all I need. Live long and prosper, nameless microwave.
- sfmike 3y agoNot to be tin foil hat, and I have no idea what I'm saying, but something just felt unnatural and wrong about microwaves, so years ago started using a toaster oven and I use it now over microwave and oven as well for toasting and baking everything. Please tell me how I'm doing it wrong my mind is open.
- yummypaint 3y agoMicrowave ovens heat things mostly by heating the water they contain. Microwaved stuff can absolutely end up different from other cooking methods and there's nothing wrong with having a preference. Most people prefer toasted bread to microwaved bread, but a microwave is the champion when it comes to things like bringing milk to a near boil and defrosting.
- huytersd 3y agoIt depends. I like microwaving rolls of bread because they still come out soft and fluffy. Can’t do that with a toaster or anything else really without drying it out.
- chongli 3y agoThe microwave oven operates at around the same frequency as wifi (2.4GHz). This is far less energy than even infrared, let alone visible light. These waves are flying all over the place anywhere you go and they’re totally harmless. The microwave oven is a lot more powerful than a wifi transceiver but all that power is contained inside the interior which is designed as a faraday cage to block and reflect the waves back toward the food. The amount of microwave energy that actually escapes the oven is minuscule to the point where it just barely interferes with nearby wifi signals.
- rrr_oh_man 3y ago> The microwave oven operates at around the same frequency as wifi (2.4GHz) Thank you for solving a mystery that I didn't know I wanted to be solved!
- piuantiderp 3y ago
- ISL 3y agoWe are considering purchasing a new microwave, so I dipped my toes into the review-water earlier this week. The Wirecutter folks have done an interesting job of disassembling the microwaves from many brands and visually demonstrating that they're all made by one manufacturer. Unsurprisingly, when they test them, they all perform the same, too: https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-microwave/ https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-microwave/
- olyjohn 3y agoWhen I was looking for a microwave, I went to an local appliance store because I didn't wanna go to Home Depot etc and get some piece of shit. They told me the exact same thing and that's why they didn't have a huge selection. They basically told me pick the one that looks the best, they all had the same 1 year warranty and same internals. I wasn't gonna get an actual high end microwave without going commercial.
- willvarfar 3y agoI hadn't heard of wirecutter before! Very refreshing review, thank you for the link :)
- bambax 3y agoOh this is obviously the main (or only) source of the article we're discussing. Only more interesting and with actual information in it! Thanks!
- Aloha 3y agoI have a fancy GE Microwave, its a built in, over the stove job, that is also a convection oven (a lousy one perhaps), but when used in hybrid convection cook mode, its pretty spiffy. The boyfriend does not like using it with the moisture sensor active (he strongly likes to cover his food with a lid, to prevent splatter), but I find just a paper towel is good enough for me - and when left to its normal pre-programmed modes it works surprisingly well when I just let the intelligence the engineers at GE programmed into it at the factory do its thing. I am also the least likely person in our household to actually use one, I have a perfectly good stove and oven, and I'm much more likely to warm my leftovers with that. Then it doesn't come out being uneven in temp, with a weird rubbery texture, or devoid of moisture. Of course - it cost 600 dollars - as the saying goes, you get what you pay for. The wife and boyfriend however? the microwave was for them.
- spoonjim 3y agoYou have a wife and a boyfriend?
- __turbobrew__ 3y agoIt’s the wife’s boyfriend
- Aloha 3y agoYes. I'd never expected to be in a poly thing, but it works for us.
- jpalomaki 3y agoCouple of things I'm now looking at microwave: 1)inverter 2)no rotating plate. My understanding is that with inverter the microwave can actually adjust the power instead of doing the on/off/on/off cycle you get with the cheap ones. I guess the rotating plate is there, because it's hard to distribute the microwaves evenly inside the oven. Some time ago I tried to find one without the rotating plate, but the only ones I could find were professional ones (>$1k) Now at least Panasonic seems to have models that meet my criteria [1], but they are not on all markets. Haven't checked any reviews yet. [1] https://www.panasonic.com/au/consumer/household/microwave-ovens/microwave-only/nn-sf574s.html https://www.panasonic.com/au/consumer/household/microwave-ov...
- somat 3y agoThe rotating plate is a weird one. I am not really sure why they are found in most consumer microwaves. It feels like a fancy feature? Not having one is definitely the better options. easier to clean for one. Without a rotating plate there will be a hidden metal fan-like object ether in the ceiling or the floor. this is a rotating reflector designed to scatter the waves a bit. Don't consider this a recommendation(it may well be utter garbage) but my next microwave is going to be a Sharp R-21LCFS mainly because it hits all my key points. no rotating platter, no modes or features, just one big dial to set the timer... it's... well perfect. Plus I was able to find the service manual for it. I always feel better about a product if it has a service manual. https://www.sharpusa.com/ForBusiness/CommercialCooking/CommercialMWO/R21LCFS.aspx https://www.sharpusa.com/ForBusiness/CommercialCooking/Comme... "Perfection is reached, not when there is no longer anything to add, but when there is no longer anything to take away." -- Antoine de Saint-Exupery
- rrr_oh_man 3y ago> The rotating plate is a weird one. I am not really sure why they are found in most consumer microwaves. > this is a rotating reflector designed to scatter the waves a bit I remember watching a daytime documentary testing different microwaves with some frozen pocket and then measuring the surface and core temperatures. IIRC, the low-quality (=/= cheap) microwaves would basically just Gauss rifle your food with a high powered wave while trying to mitigate it by spinning around the tray.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- f6v 3y agoGot the cheap no name microwave at my local supermarket with no reviews. It just works, I’m happy I didn’t go to Amazon for reviews.
- olyjohn 3y agoI'm gonna say it. Instant Pots suck. They're too small compared to a crock pot and aren't really fast for a lot of things. Most things that you can cook quickly on a stove take forever due to pressurizing and depressurizing. I can cook noodles faster on a stove top. Rice is barely faster than my old rice cooker, and if I'm going to make a stew or something, does 4 hours really matter vs 8 hours? I suppose I could start the stew at noon instead of in the morning... But I'm still not gonna get a stew by coming home and cooking it in the evening at the last minute.
- danielbln 3y ago4 hours in a pressure cooker? What are you putting in your stew, hooves? A nice stew is 7-8 minutes in high pressure with quick release, otherwise you end up with mush, in my experience. I do a lot of seitan, and that's 25 minutes compared to nursing it for hours on a light simmer. And that's the other thing with the pressure cooker, I press a button and walk away and do something else, the pot does it's thing and keeps the food warm at the end. Having something in a pot on a stove requires more involvement.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- dataflow 3y agoAnyone have experience with Panasonic's "Cyclonic Inverter" microwaves? [1] Are they good? [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEILEEPYiEs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEILEEPYiEs
- chongli 3y agoI will never go back to a conventional microwave oven. I run mine at 30-60% power pretty much any time I want to reheat food. Running at full power just creates tiny pockets of steam inside the cold food that then explode all over the interior. At lower power the food heats evenly and this never happens! I used to use a lid on all the food I microwaved but I learned recently that microwaves and plastic are not a good mix. Low power with my inverter microwave has rescued the device as something useful for heating food! By the way, the “inverter technology” isn’t really anything special. It’s a switched-mode power supply like you’ll find in millions of devices. The main difference is that this one can output the high voltages needed to drive the magnetron. It’s also a lot lighter in weight since it uses a much smaller transformer!
- dataflow 3y agoYour comment seems to completely fail to answer my question? I know what an inverter is. I was specifically asking about Panasonic's Cyclonic Inverter technology, not about inverter technology in general.
- rrr_oh_man 3y agoTo be fair to GP, "Cyclonic Wave" seems to be Panasonic's fancy marketing term for "inverter microwave, but with two magnetrons instead of one".
- dataflow 3y agoPutting in two magnetrons doesn't automatically imply field rotation, does it? They seem to rotate the fields here for better heating. Regardless, I've seen inverter microwaves. The entire point of the question was to find out how this technology performs compared to other microwaves (with inverters or otherwise).
- teo_zero 3y agoI wonder how much the author has traveled abroad, because when TFA mentions "the world", I don't recognize what I see here where I live: I've never found a pocorn button, for example, or moisture sensors, not even in the good old times. And Instant Pot is completely unknown, Covid notwithstanding.
- vanderZwan 3y agoYeah, I wonder if this is a US specific problem, because there seem to be plenty of "stable" established household appliance companies in Europe that are perfectly happy living on the margins of products that only get bought when the old model fails. In this particular case I bought a simple "one knob for power, one for time" model at the local Swedish supermarket for the equivalent of about fifty dollars (because it was in the discount) just a few years ago. It was during covid times so it can't have been more than three years. It works fine, precisely because it's dumb. They don't sell that model any more, but another local chain has the equivalent for (at current exchange rates) about 90 dollars[0]. [0] https://www.clasohlson.com/se/Fristaende-mikrovagsugn-vit/p/Pr443979000 https://www.clasohlson.com/se/Fristaende-mikrovagsugn-vit/p/...
- patchymcnoodles 3y agoI had the exact same thoughts, that this might be centric to the US. I also never seen a popcorn button and popcorn for the microwave exists and is fairly easy. Not as good as from a popcorn machine, but still ok. I also don't know anyone using an Instant Pot. And so far I also don't know anyone whose microwave broke after just one year, no matter if cheap or expensive.
- pxmpxm 3y ago> capitalism will destroy everything it touches. The irony of some US based kid, who's literally been the biggest benefactor of capitalism his/her whole life, coming up with this line of argument isn't lost on me. The first time I've personally even seen a microwave was around 1992-93, because communism.
- jannyfer 3y ago
- theshrike79 3y agoAs a slight tangent, here's a weird thing for you to notice: No two people you know have the same microwave.
- trimethylpurine 3y agoYou've done what looks to be a sincere job of blaming capitalism while complaining about a manufacturing monopoly hosted by a self proclaimed communist party. That is to say, for me, your example paints a dark picture of communism being weaponized against capitalism through the exploitation of well meaning globalist agenda. Trust in good foreign relations, in this example, has allowed a foreign bad actor to skirt around antitrust rules. Capitalism sure has its flaws, but naivety is an aspect of politics, not economics.
- foul 3y agoNaivety is an aspect of economics when the globalization/dropshipping dynamics comes at play. For a lot of Western brands it's cash in, cash out, just some worries about sales-related personnel and maybe (not in this domain) some R&D. Unless you want to treat stories like Amazon and its sellers or rise of brands like Xiaomi/Mi as a cost optimization, in that case you're right that naivety goes entirely out of the field of view.
- trimethylpurine 3y agoI may have missed the meaning. Are you saying that the fact of foreign relations is inherently economic? Any economic system would be just as vulnerable if foreign trade is allowed to exploit extra judicial privileges. Imagine a communist economy where workers determined to make a product are undermined by the incentive of trading raw materials to a foreign company for personal gain. Foreign trade in this example, much like the microwave monopoly, is outside of judicial reach. It doesn't have to be. But it's not a problem that would be solved by switching to a new economic system. It's absolutely something to solve through legislation. So, for this microwave monopoly, it doesn't make sense to blame capitalism, as best I can tell.
- raffraffraff 3y agoI still have my stainless steel Bosch microwave that I bought in 2004. It has no display, no buttons. Just two rotary knobs: power, and timer. Simplest thing in the world. I had to replace the turntable motor about 4 years ago, and the replacement part was a generic unbranded "microwave motor" that cost little. Any time I'm in someone else's kitchen and I just want "900w for 3 minutes" I curse the grid of buttons that show pictures of chickens and fish and who knows what else.
- Ekaros 3y agoI love how my Samsung with nearly all the features does not do the microwave part evenly... And now I use cheap one that was left in the "condo"... Maybe I need to look into replacing it with slightly better model with inverter... As power scaling might be useful.
- diziet 3y agoI've used around 15 different microwave ovens consistently though my live, from cheap to relatively expensive ones, between homes I've lived in, apartments I've rented and offices we've furnished. Each one lasted at least 3 years, with some lasting over 10 without any problems. I've had vastly different experiences than the author.
- EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK 3y agoBut did you have a top HN submission with record number of comments? Rage is the recipe of social media success.
- mnky9800n 3y agoI wanted a table top oven, my flat doesn't have room to have a built in one. At the shops it was impossible to find simply an oven. Everything was some kind of oven, rotisserie, smoker, steamer, microwave, air fryer contraption. They all wanted 500+ euros for the honour of owning such a device. There were no knobs or buttons. Only a touch interface with dozens of icons with no description as to what they did. And when you use them, they seem to use all of their functionality with some kind of optimization routine to cook whatever it is you fancy. Finally I did find a simple oven (simple meaning, it has one function and that is too be an oven). But it shouldn't be so difficult.
- thfuran 3y agoI could do without all the food preset and "AI" crap that they seem to like adding, but convection is nice, and steam is a great add too.
- t0bia_s 3y agoOur family don't use microwave over 10 years. I don't miss it.
- softskunk 3y agoI have a combination oven that I bought from MediaMarkt (European electronics retailer) a few months ago, since the small studio I live in didn’t come with one. It has microwave, grill, convection and standard heating options. The controls aren’t particularly intuitive but it works fine and seems to be of decently high quality.
- MattPalmer1086 3y agoIt's fascinating to me how many people here yearn for a simple set of controls. Two dials, maybe physical not digital. I feel the same way. I can't remember if it was in "The Design of Everyday Things", or "The Inmates are Running the Asylum: Why High Tech Products Drive us Crazy", but a story is recounted about trying to buy a usable video recorder. He assumed that the expensive ones would have solved the UX issues (like being able to set the time correctly!), but no. The more expensive ones had control interfaces for all kinds of useless functions and were incomprehensible. He just wanted something easy to use, and ended up buying the cheapest model.
- bazylevnik0 3y agoHave an idea, the space microwave - without this time bullshit but only count of circles while rotating in the loop.Slogan: believe or not, will be hot!
- simonebrunozzi 3y ago> what can we learn from this? I don't know. Capitalism will destroy everything it touches. Sad, but somewhat true. Brilliant post.
- piuantiderp 3y agoMy late grandmother had a microwave from the 80s. Still working to this day, not even sure it had any sort of maintenance.
- helpfulmandrill 3y agoI've had my microwave for 16 years. Was thinking of replacing it with new one with a smaller counter footprint. Now thinking perhaps I won't.
- uxp100 3y agoCool, I just bought a microwave that is so much better than the one I had. Things better about the modern microwave: It heats food faster despite the same power rating. It has a higher CFM vent which is noticeably better than what I had before at getting cooking gasses off my stove. It has a brighter stove light. The panel is completely blank aside from the time when not in use. (I find all the buttons kind of mentally disruptive, odd maybe.) The buttons are kind of annoying capacitive things, but other than that I’m very positive on it.
- gumballindie 3y agoOpening this page in Chrome i get the following message: "your browser is stalking you." I love this. I will adopt it.
- tim333 3y agoPeople say this - you can't buy a microwave without all the flashing annoying junk but you can. In the UK for example Argos has this https://www.argos.co.uk/product/8999247 https://www.argos.co.uk/product/8999247 no electronic junk, 4.8/5 reviews. But people seem to want to buy the annoing computers stuck in there versions.
- crazygringo 3y agoThere's a big innovation I'm looking for in microwaves and I simply do not understand why nobody sells it yet: An interior IR sensor/camera that will cycle/adjust power until my food is fully cooked to a certain temperature but not above it. I don't want to pick a duration and I don't want to pick power levels and I don't want hot spots and I don't want to have to check the food every 30 seconds or 3 minutes or whatever it is. I just want to cook to a certain temperature, and avoid hot spots above that temperature. So instead of fiddling with dumb things like 100% power for the first 2 minutes and then 10% power for another 8 minutes, I just want to reheat my chicken breast to 145°F or my salmon to 120°F or my soup to 165°F or my maple syrup to 180°F or my water for tea to 205°F. (Just examples, not looking to argue over temps!) So let the microwave blast it full strength until there are hot spots, then cycle off to let hot spots spread their heat to the rest of the food, then blast more, until the whole food exterior is within a range of the desired temperature, then ding it's done! And while it can't detect interior temperatures directly, you should be able to use the rate of exterior cooling during the off cycle to determine whether the interior has come up to temperature. E.g. the outside of a chicken breast with a still-frozen interior cools rapidly; the outside of a chicken breast with a hot interior stays hotter for longer.
- Tagbert 3y agoMy microwave has "sensor" modes for cooking various things but you don't have any control over the temperature it targets.
- crazygringo 3y agoYup, that's a humidity sensor. It's entirely useless in my experience -- the steam generated by food tells you that something is cooking to some degree, but you're still just as likely to wind up with rubbery overcooked hot spots while half of your item is still frozen.
- Tagbert 3y agoAh, i wondered what it was sensing.
- silverlake 3y agoThere has been plenty of innovation in microwaves. Commercial kitchens use speed ovens, a combination oven + microwave. The oven cooks the outside of food as expected, the microwave cooks the inside faster than normal. See your local Subway sandwich shop for an example. And Instapot was killed by private equity.
- leephillips 3y agoWhen I moved a few years ago I decided to try existing without a microwave oven to see how it went. I haven’t bothered to buy one, and I don’t miss it. I don’t eat crap like frozen TV dinners, so I have little use for this appliance. My point is, try going without one for a while. You may find it’s one of those things that you think you need because everyone has one, but in fact has little utility, and is just something else that you need to clean. Then, get rid of your garbage disposal.
- ProllyInfamous 3y agoPOWER [setting on microwaves] -user, reporting: I just purchased an air fryer [which has greatly reduced my microwave usage, generally]. I specifically purchased the unit because it had analogue controls, including dual twist-dials (one for time, one for temperature). As an added bonus, it has a single "DING" from an actual mechanically-struck bell... and it cost 1/3rd of the digital [controls] model I had initially considered purchasing. To not leave anybody "hanging," the air fryer I purchased was the in-store Mainstays [WalMart] cheapo unit, which air-fries for one.5 PERFECTLY.
- abosley 3y agoDid 15? seconds of fact checking the blog post since, as a home owner, it seemed wrong based on my little experience researching, purchasing and installing kitchen appliances in my own home. Midea controls 90% of the countertop microwave market. Even then, Panasonic, GE and others still manufacture their own. GE, whirlpool and Samsung control the Lionshare of the US market ~ 55% AND there is some evidence that the market for microwaves is growing at ~5% per year. I think there are better examples of total monopolies out there that the author could have chosen.
- oldnetguy 3y agoI would really like to be able to read this on the browser I want without some box in the way. I'm not changing a browser just to read this.
- mbar84 3y agoI have a microwave with two knobs: power and time. Both controls are haptic and I imagine the circuitry is the same as what might have been built in the '60s. It's perfectly fine.
- EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK 3y agoI remember a time when Panasonic microwaves cost a fortune (like a monthly salary), they came in huge boxes with thick colorful cooking books and included a subscription to real, offline Panasonic cooking courses.
- jackson1way 3y agoI was a bit shocked reading all these comments, because many reflect exactly the issues I had with microwaves and I always thought I'm alone with that. When we moved in 2019 I had to buy a new one, living in Germany, you would usually go with BOSCH or SIEMENS, but at that time, all their models below 100 EUR looked almost identical! And of course had a loud beeping that you couldn't disable and generally looked low-quality. It took me quite a bit to find a decent microwave for around 100 EUR. It's a Samsung! A brand that in Germany is not used for kitchen appliances at all. Just TVs/phones etc. The exact model: Samsung MS23K3515AW/EG (not available on amazon.de anymore) There is a bit of a hit: The beeping returns on power loss. And you have to press 2 buttons for 3sec to disable it again, took me a while to remember them, since we have power loss only like once a year. I guess you could do a small sticker with the instructions. I count the "beeping off" not as a "great feature" - it's just common sense to me. But there is a great feature: the "endless wheel dial" to precisely set the timer in 10sec intervals! That thing is awesome. It's very smooth to turn, but has small clicks for each 10sec interval AND you can use it WHILE the microwave is already running, for example when your wife tells you "but the food has been out of the fridge since 30min" - so you go 10-20sec less. Pressing the START button immidiatly starts the microwave with a 30sec runtime. Press it again and you add 30sec or just use the "wheel dial". Wanna heat up a cup of milk from the fridge? 70sec. Only half a cup? 40sec. Wife wants the milk extra hot? 80sec. Milk wasn't in the fridge? Minus 10-20sec - and so on. For families it's really useful. It's 4 years old now and used 10 times a days, and runs still fine. It's a bit loud and the glass is very dark so you can't peek inside (probably the biggest disadvantage).
- WirelessGigabit 3y agoIs there something wrong with my browser that makes all sentences start with a lowercase letter? The way I read makes it really hard to follow the flow of the text.
- thefringthing 3y agoSee also: Shaving Is Too Expensive: https://www.johnwhiles.com/posts/shaving https://www.johnwhiles.com/posts/shaving Your Stuff Is Actually Worse Now: https://www.vox.com/the-goods/23529587/consumer-goods-quality-fast-fashion-technology https://www.vox.com/the-goods/23529587/consumer-goods-qualit... Your Sweaters Are Garbage: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2023/10/sweater-clothing-quality-natural-fibers-fast-fashion/675600/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2023/10/sweat...