I have had the work horse of a shredder for 4 years now and I have never had 1 single problem. I don't think they make it anymore. I paid $200 for it and it has been an amazing piece of equipment. I got so tired of the cheaper machines that jammed and were basically unusable if you wanted to put 5 sheets in at a time. Think this machine can handle 15 sheets at a time. Excellent, fast, easy to empty. I also ordered a bottle of shredder oil and followed directions once a month to make sure it was oiled properly. Seriously, this might be the last shredder I ever use. A friend's mother died and I told her to bring me the paperwork and I'd shred it for her. So easy and it's kind of fun to just get it done with NO PROBLEMS, no jamming. If it gets hot, it stops and cools off. Noise level is fine. I highly recommend this shredder or the latest version. I wish I had paid $200 10 years ago because I wasted so much money and this shredder it so worth the price. Read more
Before I even get started with the details, I'll just say I put it through 10+ years worth of household use over 4-5 days and this shredder does all that is expected. Highly recommended. Unit arrived within about 2 business days. With Amazon Prime, shipping was free and the size and weight of this unit, though not great, is not it trivial. I had a lot of "stuff" to shred. There were boxes of manila envelopes filled with old bills, cancelled checks and tax returns. Some were from as far back as 1988. I shredded everything up to 2002 or about 15 years worth. The shredder preformed perfectly. I ended up filling 5 yard sized black, plastic bags with packed, shredded paper. Off and on over about 5 days, I spent about 5-6 hours feeding this shredder. At first I was concerned about staples. The owner's manual is pretty small but seems to be all you need. It simply stated to not put large paper clips, plastic (except credit cards and CD,s as instructed), and gummed labels into the shredder. After reading that, I didn't worry about staples any longer. I'm not sure how many I ended up putting through the shredder. Not a lot, but several. It never seemed to notice. One of the common stapled items was check registers and they were shredded as easily as everything else. A few minor inconveniences along the way that are to be expected include the following: Shredded paper builds up in the waste container triggering container full light and stopping the shredder. This is resolved by sliding the container out and packing down the shredded paper, sliding the container back in and continuing. Repeat until the container is full and needs emptying. I was shredding so much the temperature indicator came on. The shredder would stop and would need to sit for 30 minutes to an hour before shredding could continue. This would typically happen while I was in the middle of the SECOND container of continuous shredding. This is not something you are likely to encounter in typical day to day use. If anything, it is good to have safety features like this. Who wants an overheated motor sitting over a basket of combustible, shredded paper? It can be a little messy. Again, no big deal and to be expected. At the end of shredding 1 or 2 containers of paper, I would have a few scraps inside the cabinet, in the waste container that managed to avoid the plastic bag liner, and on the floor. A couple of minutes with a vacuum cleaner fixed that issue. The waste container is about 9 inches wide, 15 inches deep, and 15 inches tall. This is about the size of a good sized office trash can and I assume it will not be hard to find suitable plastic trash bag liners to fit and anyone of a number of stores. A few liners come with the shredder. With a little care, I simply emptied the liner into a larger plastic bag and reused it over and over. There is an electronic touch sensor at the paper feed entrance. If hand or fingers come in contact with any part of the feed slot the shredder stops. This is a nice safety feature, especially if you have nosy little one around the house. The anti-jam feature works well. There is a sequence of lighted LED's from green, to yellow, to red that indicate how much paper you are feeding the shredder. If its green, you and feed more, yellow is about right, and red means you are feeding too much or too thick a stack of paper. There is forward and reverse button that allows you to back up the paper if you put in too much. I found that several times, if the amount of paper was marginally too much, the red LED would light, the shredder would stop for a second, back up a wee bit, then proceed shredding on it own. Occasionally I would have to back it up myself, lighten the load, and proceed. This shredder is rated at 17 sheets. I found that to be sufficient. The majority of bills and bank statements seem to consist of two to five, 8.5 x 11 sheets of paper folded twice to fit in an envelope. The 17 sheets this shredder is rated at handles those folded sheets easily. This is a very nice convenience since you typically do not have to manually unfold the paper before feeding it, especially if you have several to shred. Finally, the instructions say to lubricate the shredding head after you empty each container. A small bottle of oil comes with the shredder. You drizzle a small amount in the opening where you feed paper, and use the forward switch to run the head briefly to lubricate. The instructions say to use vegetable oil so I don't think you need buy anything special. What you have in the kitchen should work fine. Read more
*** Update - 7 years later *** Still going strong. The infrared sensor has failed so it keeps running. I have to shut the unit off from the rocker switch in the back. Not that big a deal but not ideal. *** I'd still buy it again. I purchased this shredder 12/2008. There are a lot of reviews already but I thought I could add a few things. A reviewer commented about the mess in the shred bin. Yeah, but it is only a minor problem. All my past shredders were worse. I shredded some CDs and DVDs and they make a mess because of the paint on the non-writable side. If you jar the bin slightly and push the pile down with your hand before pulling the bin out the rest of the way, you can minimize the mess. But with CDs and DVDs, some of the stuff is so light it blows around. Someone commented about the on/off switches. There are two. A master rocker switch in back that I would guess you always leave on. The switch on top you might turn on and off. If you leave the unit on (both switches) all the time, the blue light will run and use a little power. If you really want to be green, I guess you could turn it off. I want to stress what some other reviewers said about this monster. This is by far the best shredder (and most expensive) I've owned. I owned about three el cheapos before. They all burned out. I use this at home and I'm a nut about shredding anything with any personal information on it. So I might use it more than the average household and I can't imagine ever stressing this beast. But I did give it a shot (below). For day-to-day shredding, this thing wouldn't break a sweat. It is almost overkill but I could see this unit lasting years. While vacuuming out the unit after shredding the DVDs, I looked at the business end of the shredder. There is a spindle of nasty looking, sharp metal teeth between plastic guides. The power cord is bent at 90 degrees so the unit will sit closer to the wall. Nice touch that a lot of other manufacturers should do. I had a pile of paper to shred since my last shredder burned out. It sawed through that pile in a few minutes. My old shredder would have loudly churned through the pile in about two hours. I always dreaded shredding before. Now, I'm looking for things to shred. The other thing is, this unit is very quiet. It produces a low hum as opposed to the much higher pitched whine of cheap shredders that beg for mercy if you give them a couple of sheets at a time. The teeth are metal so follow the instructions and oil them. Nuff said. Now for the main selling point. I had about 250 CDs and DVDs (old computer backups). You don't want to just toss your personal data in the trash - you have to shred that stuff. Most reviews of most shredders never mention shredding DVDs which seem a little tougher to me. This unit had no problem with the CDs or DVDs. I shredded them in groups of ten. I oiled the teeth a couple of times during the process. Awesome! I used the guide for the credit cards, CDs and DVDs. I think there are probably tougher teeth in the middle and the guide makes sure the plastics go through in the right path. The auto shutoff works as advertised. The teeth are so far down that I can't see a baby's finger getting in there. There's no way an adult's finger could get in. Maybe Gene Simmon's tongue (Kiss) could get in the slot. :-) Look no further. Buy this shredder. Read more
