Gorgeous and well made
4/5
This is a very good looking microwave with a glossy, all black exterior and a gorgeous enameled interior. The buttons feel good and the display is simple (and not too bright, considering it has blue LEDs). The cavity seems a lot bigger than my previous microwave despite the exteriors being the same size - the spinning plate is also about an inch larger in diameter.
There is a significant downside to it looking so good though - the lovely black-looking glass on the door is actually that dark because of a very dense mesh inside so you can't see anything at all when it is cooking - the interior light is just not bright enough for that heavy mesh. I'll be very wary of things like porridge which need cooking just to the point of boiling up but you don't want to boil over.
In operation, it's very different from my last one so I'm still learning how to best use it but the basic operation is simple enough - set a power level and then set the timer by adding 30 seconds at a time. That's a bit weird at first as it starts working immediately you add the first 30 seconds so the timer has already started counting down and when you get to your "five minutes", the display will be showing something like 4:48. The "quick defrost" also takes a bit of fiddling - you have to choose a number and a weight - which means learning or looking-up your "chicken curry" or "bread roll" on a list. As to cooking - it's quick as you'd expect for the wattage and seems to cook a lot more evenly than my previous one. It's pretty quiet too. Mine is wall-mounted and it doesn't move around at all when opening and closing the door despite only having a single rubber foot (strange set-up - the other three feet are metal and that's not because any rubber feet are missing, it's just made that way - but it actually does the job)
So, a couple of negatives but some of that is just down to me needing to get used to it. It looks amazing and feels built to last. Overall - any shortcomings are minor - it cooks as it should and looks extremely classy.
Peter N