Philips 1200 Series Fully Automatic Espresso Machine, Classic Milk Frother, 2 Coffee Varieties, Intuitive Touch Display, 100% Ceramic Grinder, AquaClean Filter, Aroma Seal, Black (EP1220/04)

Life changer
I LOVE this machine!! If I thought I was addicted to coffee before I had this thing, now it’s out of control. Espresso at the touch of a button. It did take some tweaking in the beginning to get the grind size correct for the beans I use. I find that a dark Italian espresso with a little bit of Colombian blended in gives the perfect flavor.The water in Central Texas is way too hard so I’ve been using bottled spring water to fill it up. I still have to decalcify it from time to time when it gives the alert. I don’t use the Philips tablets for decalcification though, I just used two tablespoons of citric acid mixed with distilled water up to the decalcification fill line and follow the instructions on their YouTube channel. I’ve also used a degreasing tablet once and will continue to use those every few months, again following the YouTube channel instructions.Cleaning it is pretty simple, I don’t use soap and just run underwater and use paper towels to remove whatever gunk is on there and let it air dry. Just rely on the occasional degreasing procedure and the daily wage rpurge to keep the lines clean.This this is crazy simple to use, and requires just a little “getting to know it” to get perfect coffee and keep the machine maintained. The convenience of getting freshly ground coffee in 60 seconds from turning it on (and maybe 20-30 seconds if it’s already on and purged it’s line) is a huge luxury. I like making a double espresso shot into two ice cubes, then add 36grams store bought carmal macchiato creamer. Blend for a perfect morning carmal macchiato. I have 2-3 of those every day 😅

Serious Problems
In writing this review I was conflicted in whether to give a one or five star rating. In the end, unfortunately, I must give it a one star.First, some of the nice things about the machine. If you have a Keurig, and drink coffee from that, you are going to LOVE the Philips machine. On its worst day, the Philips makes way better coffee than you will ever get out of your Keurig. Also, since this machine usus whole beans your cost per cup will be way less. With this, the machine will pay for itself over a Keurig in no times, since those little coffee pods are so expensive.For me, this is my fifth super-automatic coffee maker. Day in and day out, I use a traditional Rocket Espresso machine to make my morning cappuccino. A machine like the rocket produces the ultimate drinks, and so I like to start my day out with one of those. However, it takes a little effort to use the machine, so I got the Philips to get quick easy coffees throughout the day.When the machine arrived, I was pretty impressed. It was fairly compact, easy to add beans, water, dump the pucks and clean the drip tray.The first serious issue with this machine was I simply could not dial in a proper espresso. When the machine makes a coffee, it is very weak and watery. In watching it press the coffee out, almost immediately the stream turns clear, and almost no rich golden color. It appears to use a very small volume of coffee to make a cup, leading to a very weak coffee. Compounding the problem, it never forms a proper puck. When i look in the drip tray, I do not see anything resembling a puck, but just see a pile of coffee ground sludge. The instructions and online forums says this is an issue to start with, but be patient as it will dial itself in. So, I decided to go ahead and make lots of coffee and just pour it out to let the machine calibrate. I made 30 cups, and yet the machine could not produce a proper puck, and still made weak coffee. Made 15 more cups, and still same thing. Also I should note at some point in the process I adjusted the bean grind to finer and finer levels, trying to get a good puck and a good strong coffee. I did not find success. What I observed is, that even setting my grinder on the finest setting, it produced grounds about like grocery store drip coffee. It did not produce fine powder like you expect from an espresso grind. For a machine like this, if you are not producing a powder like coffee, you simply will not get a strong cup of coffee. To try and get at least a drinkable coffee what I found is I needed to set grinder on finest grind setting possible. Set the coffee bean amount on the largest setting possible, set the water amount on the smallest possible, and then follow the instructions to set the temperature to the maximum brew temperature. At this point I could sort of get a drinkable coffee.At about the time that I got a drinkable coffee setting dialed in, the machine malfunctioned. In pressing the go button, the machine would malfunction and the three error lights would come on. In looking at the troubleshooting manual, I tried the suggestions, but did not work. It said if the suggestions did not work to contact Philips.The malfunction appeared to be that a bean had become jammed in the grinder, and the motor did not have enough power to begin grinding due to the stuck bean. I could tell because when the machine malfunctioned you could hear the motor hum, and the machine immediately shut down. I live in East Africa, so simply no possible way to ship the machine back to Philips for repairs, so I decided to try and repair myself. In looking in the coffee hopper, I found that Philips had used though odd star shaped screws, meaning it was going to be next to impossible to remove the cover to get to the jammed grinder. I finally had to modify a philips head screw driver with a grinder, and I was able to get into the machine. By clearing the beans out of the grinder, putting it back together, it worked again. Unfortunately, I anticipate this will happen again, since the motor appears to be underpowered to have enough start up torque to hand the situation of a stuck bean. To be honest, it was so hard to take the machine apart, I will not undertake that effort again. Next time the machine jams, I will simply have to toss the machine out.So, the issue with this machine, fundamentally is, the grinder motor is not powerful enough to dislodge a stuck bean. Secondly, the grinder is not able to provide the fine coffee grind needed for a proper espresso. Thirdly, even on hottest setting, the brew termperature provides coffee that is not piping hot.Really wanted to love the machine, but unfortunately it appears to have some fundamental design errors.

Si cette une bonne machine

Espuma muy bien. Prepara buen café pero ocupa mucho mantenimiento