Advice ,Any one used one?

One-a-day

Hello All
In the not too distant future I'am going to upgrade from my trusty old faithfull plunger to a so called "budget end" manual machine , I was impressed by the breville cafe roma stainless at the local Domayne coffee expo the breville rep told me she had been using one as a demo non stop and it showed no signs of dieing. There is also a new breville model called "Barvista" it gets a excellent write up on designawards.com.au as it has been submitted for an ADA and has some new features not found on other machines in this price range. The sunbeam cafe crema also looks fine ,does any one have experience with these machines? I plan on getting a good grinder any suggestions?
Thanks
Steve

Greg41

Hi Steve, I have the Breville Cafe Roma machine and it can make a decent coffee in my opinion. I find steaming the milk can take some time though.there is a little wait between pouring the first shot and waiting for the water to heat for the next shot, so be very patient if your making a few.As most would agree the grind of coffee is most important for any machine so get a decent one of those if you have nt already. You get what you pay for, i have a commercial machine that i use for events and coming home to my little Breville,well you know what i mean. Good luck, Greg.

mattyj

I used a sunbeam cafe crema for 18 months. I've only looked at the other machines in the shops, but I've moved on to greener pastures... What I didn't like about the breville was the steam wand - it's fixed, and you can't swivel or move it in any direction. That can suck. The sunbeam could swivel almost 360^o, which can help in steam tip positioning, jug positioning etc etc. Apart from that, the sunbeam and breville are basically identical. Sunbeam are bringing out a new version of the cafe crema, with a digital temp readout, preinfusion etc etc for about $350 (edit: I saw it in myers last night for $299). I don't know if it will be all that amazing ... wait and see! After a while, seals start to perish, and they generally don't last all that long. And it takes forever to make 6 coffees.

One-a-day

thanks for the advice Matt , most of the time I will be making 1 or 2 cups a day and more on the odd occasion. How long do the seals generally last and could they be replaced. The updated Sunbeam sounds like it will be like the breville barvista but it hasn't got a temp gauge.

mattyj

my personal opinion is that in this part of the market - they're all the same machine (same 15 bar ulka pump, same cheap aluminium thermoblock made in china, same die-cast metal portafilters (some sunbeams come with chromed brass), same crema-enhancing filter baskets etc etc) with different bodies. This new sunbeam with digital readout doesn't seem to be temp adjustable, it tells you the time, and what the temp roughly is. I found that at my usage (what you could also call 'abusage'), the seals lasted at most three months, and you buy them from sunbeam service centres (usually little electronics stores) for about $4 a pop. They last a bit longer if every week or two, you pull them out and give them a good scrub with an old toothbrush, to get all the old coffee grinds out of them.

One-a-day

Well doing that doesn't sound too bad until I graduate to something better , Iam going to put off getting a machine till after I celebrate getting older in late January so I might be able to push the budget up a bit and get something sturdier. I will look at more machines between now and then might end up with a name brand machine?