Buying:
Purchased from WLL. If you're interested in buying one yourself at the best possible price, I suggest calling and asking for Mark Jackson, their head of sales, and negotiating.

It's here! It's here!
The grinder was ordered with both the standard and mini hoppers. The mini hopper is, I believe, an actual Mini hopper (Mazzer Mini, not BMW). However, the mini hopper broke in the shipping box which left me with the standard. The standard hopper isn't so much large as majestic. On the other hand, the mini is out of proportion to the grinder's body. Since we're not really worried about height limitations, we'll probably stick with the standard.


As you'd expect from a true commercial, the grinder is substantial. It weighs just under 40lbs, 25lbs lighter than a Robur E.*

It took me a little while last night to run 5lbs of instant rice and 2lbs of instant coffee through it to do some break in and begin to familiarize myself with the various control options. After pulling at least a dozen humiliatingly fast shots, and before packing it in for the evening I got grind and timer dosing roughed in (for bunk, stale, "seasoning" beans) enough for a decent flow rate. Since the beans were hose seriously bad and/or stale beans, I knew better than to taste.

Some visual notes regarding the break-in grinds:

• Unlike Jeremy (scareyourpassenger), I left the anti-static flap in place. That leads to some visible clumping, but the clumps are very soft and it's my opinion -- so far at least -- that they break too easily to represent any sort of problem for distribution; also,
• Slap shots make for more visible clumping, which supports the idea that the grind is emerging from the burrs without clumps, and develops them along the chute;
• Despite the clumps, the grinds are extremely fluffy. 18.5g into an 18g Strada basket requires a lot of very careful leveling so as to lose only a little; and
• Retention, with a loaded hopper -- not counting barely, partially ground beans -- seems to be around 10g.

First Shots Fired in Anger:

• Loaded the hopper with a 15day post-roast blend;
• First shot 21g+, ran very fast.
• Three shots later, 19g, 26sec (not counting 4sec pre-infusion) 28g output, naked pf showed lousy distribution;
• Dialing in from "zero" is no fun;
• It wasn't that I'd fooled myself into believing that what I'd done last night had advanced the dial-in process much beyond zero; but
• Working with a watch, scale, and naked pf at the same time is humbling, but not in the good way;
• The grind needed some adjustment, but dose -- set at 18.5g last night -- ran 21g with fresher (15 days) beans;
• Adjusting the dose timer is straightforward, but mass/time changes aren't exactly linear;
• Split the dose into two parts, with a slap shot level in between -- Eureka! Espresso porn;
• Successive shots were fairly consistent, about half porn and about half non-porn. Nothing really awful. Naked pfs make me feel soooooooo self-conscious;
• All the shots had GREAT mouthfeel! Super Creamy!
• The ladies had long blacks, one with cream, and were well pleased; but
• Way too soon for conclusions.

A Few Preliminary Conclusions:
*I mentioned the Robur in the interests of identifying my own bias,

I purchased the Ceado with two hopes: (1) That it would be "just like the Robur, only better;" and (2) That it would be the last piece of my espresso puzzle.

After one morning I'm fairly sanguine about the second proposition.

I'll say this about the first... if we can extrapolate from four shots of a particular, one-off blend, the Ceado delivers as much mouth-feel and texture as I can recall ever having from anything, with very good to excellent separation and balance between high and low notes. In those respects the Ceado was significantly better than Cimbali. Comparisons to the Robur, K-10, etc., will have to wait awhile.

I'm still dying to hear from Jacob.

BDL

I plan on trying it with the flapper first. I am sending the grinder back due some blemishes and should be able to report in about my shots in about a week, I hope. WLL has been easy to work with but very slow in processing the request.

For those that plan on using the mini hopper, you will either need a magnet to bypass the hopper safety built into the factory hopper or possibly short the two wires running to the metal pole.

Here is my first impressions

Jacob wrote:
I'm the 3. owner of this particular grinder so price and expectations were modest.

In many ways this is a really, really sweet grinder. Low noise, no mess, good looks and so on

The 'absolute' retention were 40.9 grams.
The 'dynamic' retention is way less than that of my Roburs.
The augur thankfully works more like a loading device than a crushing device. Despite this it's probably even more picky about hopper load than my former Roburs (one with and one without an augur), all three using the same Kony/Jolly hopper.
But with the proper load I think this will turn out to be a be super consistent grinder!

The problem is that the nature of the ground coffee is so different from that of my two previous Roburs that I need to do some reconfiguration of my pressure profilling setup before I can evaluate any taste qualities.

I prefer to use the grinder without the flapper.

The augur thankfully works more like a loading device than a crushing device. Despite this it's probably even more picky about hopper load than my former Roburs (one with and one without an augur), all three using the same Kony/Jolly hopper.

Can you elaborate on this statement? Based off reading about other grinders and my personal experience, you can compensate for hopper load by adjusting the grinder. Does this adjustment compensation affect the taste?

If I keep refilling the hopper to a certain level there is no problem. If I'm not refilling, the load will change all the time and I'm not adjusting the grinder (especially not the Roburs) for an uncerain future. I do adjust for changes in dose though.

If you're reading with interest, try to remember that my previous grinder, a La Cimbali Junior Max Hybrid is "Titan Class" (or damn near) itself; extremely easy to dial in, compared to just about everything else; scored extremely well in the "Beat the Robur" competition; and is (in my opinion) very good to excellent in every "in the cup" respect. It's deficiencies are a need for frequent and inconvenient cleaning, and a double burr set which means a fair bit of grind retention.

Beating the Cimbali in any other category than convenience is not an easy hurdle to clear. My other frames of reference are four grinders which I've used often and recently enough to have clear (and hopefully accurate) impressions. They are two, dosered Compak K-10s; a Mahlkonig K-30; and a Mazzer Robur E.

DAY 2

Changed blends to something similar (all SHB), but fresher. Dialing in wasn't quite as easy as I'd hoped. At first blush, the Cimbali is more consistent -- but it's been a long time since I was as consciously methodological with the Cimbali and it's possible the impression is mistaken.

Dialing-In:
At any rate, dialing-in the new blend required adjusting both grind and time. The task is far from impossible, it took me three shots to get from 0 to 60 on both dose and flow. I think it would have taken me two with the Cimbali, but as I said... scales, stop watches, and naked pfs, oh my.

Grind:
The Ceado grinds about as fast as the Robur and Mahlkonig, which means running the grinder with beans in the hopper while making adjustments go through a lot of beans. The Compaks are a bit slower, and in that respect, actually more convenient. The Cimbali's smooth and very fine adjustment, its consistency, and low speed make it the easiest of the five. Adjsting the Ceado's grind is not as easy or precise as the La Cimbali, but better than others -- especially the Mazzer.

Dose:
Like the Robur and Mahlkonig the Ceado is a "walk up," and using the time to dose is similar; although I prefer the location on the Ceado and Mahlkonig bodies to the Robur's. In my opinion the extra convenience of the Robur's extension cord is more than offset by the inconvenience of inevitably and frequently knocking the timer pad off the funnel or dropping it.

All three walk-ups are more consistent than either the La Cimbali with a Gralab, or the Compaks with their particular user-added digital timers (one Auber, and the other Gralab).

Grind Retention:
Hopper-on "grind retention," as defined by Chris (Bob McBob) and Dick (Peppersass) in a 2011 thread, is slightly greater than 11g; so I programmed the "Single" button to purge a conservative 14g (ish). Because I'm roasting my own and typically have so many beans around, blowing through an extra half ounce or ounce of beans per day is more blessing than curse.

That all sounds very precise, but to be honest I'm not that confident about my measurements. I'll redo them when I run through the 12oz of blend in the hopper, and will also do some more break-in grinding.

Mouthfeel:
In terms of in the cup, the one thing I can be sure about is mouthfeel. The Ceado is incredible. The Cimbali was not too shabby but its ass is well and truly kicked. Compared to four other Titans I've used fairly recently -- two Compak K-10 PBs, a Mahlkonig K-30, and a Robur E -- my impression is that only the Robur is equal in this respect, the Mahlkonig is second, and the Compaks are a little better than the Cimbali, but not the equals of the others.

Other Stuff:
If it seems like the Compaks aren't faring as well as the other Titans in this set of impressions; that's because I'm not talking about user friendliness. In that respect, IMO they are the best.

I'm told by someone who sells a lot of grinders to cafes that conicals for blends and flats for SOs is something of a trend. True? Wishful thinking? Quien sabe, amigos? Quien sabe?. Mongo only pawn in game of life. Nevertheless it struck me as ONE MORE THING to obsess over. Can't get enough of those.

Grinding a Blend:
Separation, nuances, high notes, low notes, etc.:
Even though it's not quite broken in, I think the Ceado is somewhat better than the Cimbali across the board with the possible exception of low notes which the Cimbali does extremely well. Compared to the other Titans, the Robur does better highs and similar separation; the Compak has a similar balance but slightly less sparkle, and the Mahlkonig ain't that great with blends. However, I can't discount the possibility that or the degree to which my enthusiasm over the new purchase is skewing my judgment.

Grinding an SO:
Haven't tried it yet.

BDL

DAY 3

With the hopper load going from about 300g to 150g, the "double shot" dose timer is delivering 19g +/- 0.5g reliably. The "single shot" button is delivering 14g +/- 0.5g.

14g appears to be adequate for clearing out stale grinds. Noticeable staling occurs after no more than 10min. The time could be less, but we had overnight guests and shots were pulled as needed this morning, rather than in the interests of satisfying H-Bers' prurience. Tomorrow is another day.

Distribution straight from the spout is not good enough for reliable espresso porn pours. In terms of grinder vs grinder comparisons, the Ceado is not nearly as good in this respect as the dosered K-10s, nor as good as either the K-30 or Robur walk-ups. Reliably good pours need at least careful finger leveling to fill in a void which tends to form in the back-left quadrant of the basket.

By the end of this morning's "session," I'd returned to the old PITA double slap shot, double tamp thing I'd used with the Cimbali. More trouble, but not much better than the finger level.

Same beans and same impressions as yesterday. The tendency is to think "thus shall it ever be." But, third day confidence is false confidence.

Next hopper load (probably Wednesday) will be an SO.

BDL

DAY 5

Brief Excursion Into the Distant Past:
Yesterday, I switched from a blend to an SO, Finca Cañada Fria, which made an excellent brew using several different methods, but which I'd never tried as espresso.

All the mouthfeel stuff was the same as for a blend. Flavor notes, on the other hand... Not much in the way of nuance and a lingering bitterness. My initial analysis was that it either wasn't a particularly good SO espresso, or the grinder was doing something awful.

Time Marches On:
A day later... well... ummm... Apparently you have to dial in ALL the variables. Who knew?

Brewed cooler, it's an outstanding cup. Good nuance including stone fruits at the top and lots of chocolate at the bottom, excellent separation, good sweetness, with only a bitter-sweet chocolate bitterness at the back end. Mouth-feel is still incredible; and likely a signature attribute of the grinder -- but with only two coffees down and both of those home roasts, Need input.

Dose Consistency:
Settling down? Maybe. In any case, yesterday and today the Ceado doses more consistently than it had on Days 1 - 3. Starting with 340g in the hopper, and including 3 x 15g "clear out" pulses: Of the last 10 shots, 8 were within 0.2g of the 19g target; 1 was off by +0.7g; and 1 was off by -0.5g.

Over Enthusiasm:
Check. My objectivity was completely shot by this morning's coffee.

Conclusions:
The Ceado is a very different beast from the Cimbali. Otherwise, no conclusions yet -- not even of the preliminary persuasion.

Gonna pull another shot,
BDL

Well, I need up sending back the E-92 due to some small manufacturer imperfections. Nothing that affects performance but if I am going to buy a new grinder, I want it to be scuff and blemish free. In that same period, I was offered a deal on a HG-One and I went for it since I really do like the idea of single dosing. I tend to get bored with the same coffee from day to day so I spend most of my time switching and the Pharos has allowed me to to this with easy while the Ceado best performs for sticking with the same coffee. This would be the same issue with many of the titan conicals since the cleanup and retention is just part of the design.

I wish my machine was up and running and I could have provided a single dosing point of view but circumstances didn't allow it.

If I decide to go electric, this grinder is on my short list.

Jeremy (scareyourpassenger), I feel your pain and wish you the best with your grinder alternatives. You don't know what you're missing.

BDL