Cuisinart SS-20P1 Coffee Center 10-Cup Brewer

Great coffee maker. The full pot still works. The single cup lasted 10 months. For $200 it should last longer. Quality great. Durability not so good.
But:
Cuisinart is a quality company. After going over any possible things that I might have done wrong, They gave me a new one. First class quality? backed by a first class company.

I am pleased, and thankful

Love my new dual coffee maker. It is a great space saver and the metal carafe eliminates any worry over breaking delicate glass carafes. Also love that I can make a single cup whenever I don’t want to brew a full pot of coffee. Easy to use, but I wish it came with a funnel nosed measuring cup to fill the water wells as it’s a bit tricky to do without spilling.

Switched to Pods. Tried 2 different keurigs and was appalled how awful and not user friendly they were. Purchased this machine almost a month ago and am in LOVE with it. SUPER easy to use. Excellent brews. Very quick as well. I do highly recommend this machine.

We had a $180 Keurig Elite that stopped working because that company makes their machines so that you can only use their coffee (or licensed) … oh, you can use other pods that are compatible but it causes degradation over time. In our case, 15 months and time for a new machine. So okay, if that is the way Keurig wants to play it (meaning that I cannot use my favorite coffee), we decided to look elsewhere. A lot of reading and reviews later led us to this Cuisinart. We already have an old and perfectly good 12-cup drip Cuisinart but needed the single serve (pods) machine. We finally decided to go with this one that combines both – and are very happy. We put the old Cuisinart pot into storage so now with the pot and single-serve combined in one unit, the footprint is so much smaller on our coffee bar … more room for other coffee-related items.

Before buying it, I was a little concerned about some comments, e.g., someone said it could be difficult to fill the water reservoir. Not really … note: we have the thermal pot and I do not recommend trying to fill that pot and then pour into the reservoir. Instead, just use a pitcher. The fill marks are easily visible on the side of the reservoir. I use the same pitcher (1.5L) to fill the single serve reservoir. Also, a couple reports of leakage but we have not experienced this at all.

The only issue I have, really, is that the single serve tends to be a little messy with splatter – which is not unique to the Cuisinart, just that it shows a bit more than it did on our Keurig (because of the proximity of the pot to the single-serve side). Most of the splatter goes onto the side of the thermal pot but it is an easy clean – just a wipe with a damp paper towel. Now I usually try to watch the fill, and once the cup gets about half full I just lift it up a few inches so it is closer to the where the water is dispensed.

Bottom line … we could not be happier with our choice.

Edit: One thing we have noticed (and has been mentioned in at least one other review) is the mess from grounds, i.e., exploding k-cups. We did experience this, too. Taking a closer look at the single serve side, it appears to me that Cuisinart chose to use some type of “needle” that is not real sharp – probably intentionally so as a safety precaution because of the way you have to reach in to place and remove the k-cup. My guess is that this can result in an “explosion” of the grounds from k-cups which are vacuum sealed (some are more heavily pressurized than others). We have solved this by using a push-pin to puncture the k-cup just before placing it in the holder, releasing the extra pressure. Works fine, as long as we remember to do so.

EDIT (after 1+ yrs): Just had another exploding incident! This time, it was due to another issue (discovered after calling Cuisinart customer service). It seems that the needle on the bottom of the k-cup holder gets dull over time – which necessitates another step to keep the pods from exploding. Now, when we place a pod in holder, not only do we need to puncture the cup with a push pin (because if the rounded needle) but we also must now “gently push down on the pod with our hand, so as puncture the bottom of the cup.” Our failure to know this would be necessary as the unit grew a bit older (info is not in the manual) means we ended up with two clean-ups this morning … tedious, difficult clean-ups, trying to remove grounds from all the little nooks and crannies. Not fun. Still like the coffee maker but brought it down a notch … maybe should have been two.

Edit #2 (10/25/21): Well, another exploding cup incident – and, of course, the tedious clean-up. I must have been really tired this morning – and distracted – so I failed to take the necessary precautions when using the machine. Yes, I guess that I forgot to manually push down the pod to seat it. Another explosion. Another messy clean-up. I have had it with this machine, will start my search for a new one. I will wrap this one up, store it in in the garage for those rare time when we make a full pot.

DO … NOT … BUY!!

We chose this brand because it offers a stainless steel carafe that truly keeps coffee warm for hours. This model is different from our previous; this offers the option for single serve pods, which is a nice feature. What I dislike: it is Very Hard to pour without making a mess! Water goes everywhere because of the shape of the lid on the carafe, and there’s a tall plastic piece that holds a water filter, which splashes the water everywhere. This lid is just as the original one we had; which was also annoying. It is Very difficult when you go to pour that last cup of coffee also- it spills out the top holes; you actually have to hold the pot nearly upside-down to get the last cup of coffee out! The hinged lid on the coffee maker itself doesn’t hinge back far enough to give you enough room to pour water into the machine. I also don’t care for the fact that the blue light stays on All the time, “indicating low water level” on the single serve side. I don’t want to keep water in there just to get stagnant! I feel it should have it’s own On/Off switch. We also purchased it because of the price- we didn’t want to spend over $200 to get a different brand. But I think we should have!