Russell Hobbs 8 Cup Coffeemaker

An excellent coffee maker.
Despite being mostly plastic, this is a very well designed unit. It looks and feels well built and high quality. The removable reservoir has a nice folding handle and clicks in and out of its cradle smoothly, requiring only one hand, and never leaks a drop. The filter basket door clicks into the fully open position and stays there till you close it. The power button has nice positive click and a red LED. The one small issue I found is that the valve on the filter basket that allows you to remove the carafe while brewing drips once or twice after it closes. The coffee is not as good as that made in a French press (is that even possible?), but it's as good as any drip coffee maker I've had and better than most. I bought this after returning a Bonavita that leaked all over my counter right out of the box and am very happy with it.

The good, the bad and the beautiful
In our home we have both a standard 12 cup coffee maker and a Keurig that get daily use. While I love the convenience of the Keurig, it makes more sense to use our coffee maker when needing more than one serving. Our current coffee maker is still going strong after 5 years, but doesn't look it's best, so this is what attracted me to the Russell Hobbs 8 Cup Coffeemaker.

The Good:
* The best feature of this machine, hands down, is the removable water tank. I love that I can carry it to my fridge water dispenser and get filtered water or put it in the dishwasher for sanitizing.
* 8-cup capacity is perfect for our two person household, as we never make the 12-cups that we currently have.
* The removable brew basket makes it quick to clean and the coffee filter is a standard one so it's easy to find and pretty inexpensive too.
* The design is very nice and extremely attractive. The carafe...

What it does it does well. And it looks good doing it.
There is a lot to like about this Russell Hobbs 8 cup coffeemaker. First off, it makes a nice cup of coffee. Compared to my Cuisinart DCC-1200 Brew Central 12-Cup Programmable Coffeemaker, Black/Brushed Metal , another cone filter drip coffee maker, the Russell Hobbs makes a similar cup of coffee using the same grind and the same amount. They both efficiently use the coffee to brew a nice strong cup at about the same speed (for 8 cups). Where the Russell Hobbs leaves the Cuisinart behind is in ease of use. The removable water reservoir is so much nicer than the nearly blind tank filling required for the Cuisinart. As for looks, the Russell Hobbs is very sleek and shiny while the Cuisinart is really Stainless steel on the face plate and sides. They both have carafes that pour drip free effortlessly.

What the Russell Hobbs does not have is any function other than on and off. This is a one button...

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