Was not prepared for this microwave
Allow me to paint you a story of our time before this microwave. My husband and I have gone through exactly 2 microwaves in our 11 year relationship before landing on this one. Our first was a tiny thing made in 2004 that could barely manage cup o' noodle. It finally died sounding like the cries of a thousand whales back in late 2017. It had a good long life of burnt popcorn and cold reheated food. We went without a microwave because we were dirt broke at the time from finally becoming homeowners (oof our savings), and then my in-laws graced us with their microwave that *they* had gotten as a wedding gift in Canada in.. 1988. I used to say that the microwave was almost as old as I was until we found the manufacturing date was April 1988. Dang, the microwave was now officially one month older than me. Still had to deal with uneven cooking, burnt popcorn or half popped bags, and a defrost function that only seemed to work half the time and literally cook the food the other half. This beast of a microwave is an enigma in the fact that it has somehow survived all these years without even needing anything replaced. Honestly the microwave still "works". I can relate heavily to this microwave. After the last few years of me completely swearing off of trying to make microwave popcorn, my husband complaining about even more burnt popcorn and unpopped kernels at the same time, I finally asked if we could manage to scrape some money together to get an actual working microwave. After much debating, I was tasked with researching a good microwave that was big enough and mostly inexpensive enough. I had heard a bit about this microwave and a few others and ultimately decided on this one. The price was right, the size was perfect, the functionality was great, being able to turn off literally all the beeping was fantastic. Unfortunately the first one we got was mostly DOA and it was really disappointing, especially since I had to move a microwave that I'm sure weighed about 50lbs, I wish I was joking. Amazon took care of the return and replacement real easy and quick, and the new-new microwave came today. The first test was popcorn. Oh boy. Since everyone says "don't use the popcorn button", I definitely didn't. Unfortunately the microwave did burn the bag of popcorn at full power. So, I decided to actually use the popcorn button. I hit the popcorn button twice (setting for a 3oz bag) just to make sure it would have enough time to heat up and pop. Oh boy. I was not prepared for what happened. The popcorn actually popped! And it only took maybe a minute and a half! No burnt popcorn *and* most of the kernels were popped. Our toddler rejoiced that mommy had actually popped a bag of popcorn, "Yay! You did it mommy!" Second, I defrosted a 1lb package of frozen ground beef. Woo, that was a breeze. Set the defrost for the weight and let it go, though it did warm the edges a bit too much but it was quick and didn't cook it like our last microwaves. Third and most terrifying. Before this microwave, I had gotten used to putting a mug of coffee/tea/water/whatever to heat/reheat for a minute or more and it not even being hot-hot. I stuck a mug of water (with a few tapioca pearls in it) in the microwave to test and set it for one minute, after a short time I glanced into the microwave and discovered it was actually boiling. A very loud proclamation of "Oh my god!" rang from myself in the kitchen. I promptly called my husband over to also observe what the mug of water was doing. He also loudly proclaimed "Oh my god!" In short: I can't believe what I used to consider "normal" for a microwave. This one is more than leaps and bounds better than what we "had to just deal with" in a time of penny pinching and saving money. We're finally mostly comfortable and were in desperate need of a good quality microwave. In very short: I love this microwave. Read more