It seems painfully obvious to me that this question has already been, and continues to be answered by manufacturers and retailers alike. If one design were categorically better than the other, after 30 years in a shared market, there would only be one type of espresso machine. Since there is not just one type of machine the choice of what is better must come down to usage. HX and DB machines both have the potential to produce espresso so good that neither design has fallen into obsolescence nor risen to superiority so which will better suit your personal requirements. Since each person has a unique usage the answer will vary from person to person and situation to situation.

I don't need to have a general consensus from the coffee politic of which design is better. I just need to have one of each, and maybe a spring piston lever also.

Speaking of levers, I haven't looked but I wonder if there are spring piston vs: direct pull machine debates over there that go on like these do.

TimEggers wrote:Maybe it is just me but based on discussions here and abroad a little too often I just feel that HX's get picked on a little too much and DB's get praised a little too often.

I think (and these numbers are completely based on my estimations as well, but that differs from 'made up' as I put some consideration into them and labeled them as estimations....) that quite a few folk buy the DB to reduce the ways in which they can screw up their morning cuppa. Everything that is not done by the machine is done by the barista. If you can find something that the machine can do well, repeatedly, and without a lot of attention/inclusion, relegate it to the workings of the machine.
And I own an HX. I'd love to be able to own a DB and not have to worry about brew temp, other than pre-setting it to where I want it. The beans (and I agree with Marshall on this one, we're all pretty much past the fresh roasted coffee obsession. We have sources covered, and more than one, easily, and we own good grinders...) I'm drinking right now want a fairly cool pull, and I have eight ounce heat exchangers. It takes quite a bit of flushing to heat the group and cool the HX water to a cool 192F.
HX's are just more work than a DB, and that's why they get the flack that they do. Anything that gets between you and a regularly great cuppa is considered a less-than.
Some folk don't mind, or actually look forward to the regulation and calculation of making their morning cup. All 'mad-scientisty' and stuff. Others wish that someone would perfect the super-auto to the point where you cold actually depend on the product.
<Dream Sequence>
I wake up and am transported to a Starbucks, and I order a cappuccino. That's all I say, "Cappuccino, please!", and the barista pushes a button. Thirty seconds later, I get a godshot buried in a free-poured swan crafted from the sweetest, latex-paint-looking microfoam, in porcelain, at the proper temperature.
And at my house, the push of a button accomplishes the very same thing...
</Dream Sequence>

I have just now come across this thread, but thought I would throw my 2 cents in.

FWIW, a HX machine was chosen this past year to be the machine of choice in the barista competitions. Many people have the Aurelia in their coffee shops, and I know of owners who have switched from LM to the Aurelia.

At home I have an Appia. Its temperature stability is close to that of an Aurelia, which does not need to be flushed, nor SHOULD it. Flushing overheats the grouphead.

Both DB and HX have experienced dramatic technological advancements over the past few years, which is pretty exciting. I'm hoping over the next 5 years that technology will become more standard in the home machines. That being said, the equipment will become more and more temperature stable. The difference that I see is that a DB allows the user to easily adjust brew temperature. While my Appia is very temperature stable, its actual temperature is a little ambiguous. But, whatever temperature its at...it stays there. There's pros and cons to each, one of which that may not get much attention here is price: both on the consumer and prosumer levels.

Am I very happy with my Appia? Yes. Does it do fine serving 200 people at an event? Yes. Do I want a GS3? Yes. Do I have the $$$? No...

While I won't disagree with the impact that brewing temperature has on espresso, in the big wide world of espresso brewing temperature is usually very low down on the list of what is wrong with any given espresso that you may be drinking.

In the last few years it has been a big selling point for many commercial espresso machines. In fact I'd say that there are very few manufacturers who aren't producing equipment that would do pretty well under the WBC machine testing protocol. (That isn't to say every machine they build is like this!)

Temperature control was another weapon in the espresso machine arms race, but now that stable brew temps are reasonably common, good espresso has not become proportionately more available.

I worked for an HX company for three years, and during that time produced a lot of very tasty shots of espresso from that machine. It was mostly a case of great coffee going in, a tight taste feedback loop and a reasonable understanding of how to use a grinder. The machine was not some magic box, it just did what was asked of it. I now own a DB machine, but that is because it is the best fit for how I like to work an espresso machine (my hatred of buttons, especially bad buttons, is sometimes worrying.)

The coffee has and will continue to fetishize its equipment (Clover now departed, I am looking at you siphon brewers....) and right now I should probably be babbling about the shots I am getting from the Athena lever machine I have on loan right now. It isn't that I like them better or worse than the shots of the Synesso (though the Synesso does have an advantage in being the benchmark we reverse engineer the coffee against). It was a different presentation of the coffees that I consider delicious as long as it tastes like the coffee and not like the preparation and it is balanced.

Very well said Mr. Hoffmann.

King Seven wrote:While I won't disagree with the impact that brewing temperature has on espresso, in the big wide world of espresso brewing temperature is usually very low down on the list of what is wrong with any given espresso that you may be drinking.

Yes, James, but, in the small pointy-end of the stick world that most of us inhabit, we have solved the problem of consistently good coffee. We are now onto better and best coffee and just plain experimenting with different parameters to see how they change the cup.

Marshall wrote:Yes, James, but, in the small pointy-end of the stick world that most of us inhabit, we have solved the problem of consistently good coffee. We are now onto better and best coffee and just plain experimenting with different parameters to see how they change the cup.

Marshall,

Who is this "us" that you are describing? What you say may very well be true of some of the most rabid participants here, probably including both of us, but do you honestly think your comment is representative of the average reader or participant on this website?

ken

lot of good info...

but as far as I know tomorrow morning by the time I wake up and make my first espresso,the 24hours of LeMans will be over and hopefully Peugeot will be the winner...
cheers to that..!

If someone were to ask me what kind of an espresso machine to buy for in the home (someone not into espresso and not reading forums like HB), I would definitely advise him to buy a DB/PID espresso machine if he had the money for it and to get it well adjusted/configured (9 bar pressure, temp, etc.). A lot of consumers have no clue and buy this nice machine which, out of the box, is often set to the 'wrong' pressure and delivers not the best coffee without some tuning. I would think that most consumers would not know what to tune and would not open up the espresso machine. As for HX flushing, this can be done. I had trouble getting consistent temp on one HX (as measured with the SCACE), but am sure some better HX machines will produce very close results when operated by a skilled barista. Then again, the consumer is not skilled and wants consistency in quality delivered, so I would say: take out the variables as much as possible and go for a DB.

I would bet that in a year from now, the trend is towards DB machines.

SJ