Comments on Decent Espresso DE1+ Review - Page 8

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r7
Posts: 231
Joined: 8 years ago

#71: Post by r7 »

bbrockva,

GAC said it better than I could have. I have found no need or interest to chase any difference in mouthfeel with the DE. Having too much fun experimenting with subtleties based on pressure and flow profiles. With the DE you can achieve repeatable consistency or endless exploration as desired.

bbrockva
Posts: 2
Joined: 4 years ago

#72: Post by bbrockva »

GAC and r7 - The feedback here is great. Thank you. I'll most likely be getting a DE1+ in the next couple of months. It sounds like an amazing machine. May I ask which water/filters you use and how often to descale, and which descaling method you use? (I can also wait and check it out later on the owners forum.)

GAC
Posts: 33
Joined: 7 years ago

#73: Post by GAC »

Water filters: It really depends on where you live. I live in tropical rainforest and our water is very soft with low mineralisation. Others have a very different experience. On my old HX machine it never needed descaling even after a decade! (Yes, I did check regularly :) ). I use a dual undersink filters mainly for sediment and residual chlorine. On the owners forum there is lots of information from users of special recipes for water to rainwater from the tank. I have DE1+ machine #29 and have never had to descale it (yet!)

User avatar
RapidCoffee (original poster)
Team HB
Posts: 4986
Joined: 18 years ago

#74: Post by RapidCoffee (original poster) »

@bbrockva
I recommend you start with bottled water, unless you're sure your tap water is soft. Prevention is better than cure!
John

r7
Posts: 231
Joined: 8 years ago

#75: Post by r7 »

We have very soft high quality snow melt to surface water here in the PNW so my only filter is a carbon block for dechlor and polishing. Descaling here is rarely ever needed.

Mountain
Posts: 79
Joined: 5 years ago

#76: Post by Mountain »

In case anyone is reading through this thread and wondering about whether to actually buy one of these machines, let me give you a 4+ month new owner perspective. This machine is not for people that want to set it up once and forget about it and do the same thing everyday and not think about how the machine works. It is not for someone who never wants to fiddle around with their machine. I would go so far as to say it is not for the incurious. If technology and computers easily frustrate you, this is probably not for you. If you don't want your puck prep challenged, you don't want this.

But, if you are fascinated by extracting ground coffee into small cups then you want this. If you want access to the most knowledgeable group of coffee enthusiasts on the planet, you want a Decent. If you are not intimidated by new technology you want this. If you want to be able to mimic almost every espresso machine in the world to a point, you want this. I say to a point because you could mimic all the main characteristic of a pull (preinfusion time, water temps, flow rates, pressures, etc) which the Decent will do, and there are still slight differences in head space and baskets and other things that can change the result. If you are willing to watch the machine you bought evolve with new updates, like a Tesla, you want this. If you are willing to evolve your barista skills then you want this.

I think you get the gist of what I'm saying. If still in doubt, go read the Home-Barista review again with my insights in mind. Make your decision.

In my case, I am in my 60's but come from a tech background. I am not a programmer or an engineer. But, I am willing to figure out how to make computers and tech do what they are supposed to do. For me, the frustration level of owning the DE1Pro has been pretty low. I have had no insurmountable problems. The most major thing I had to do was learn about Android tablets and how to clear bluetooth cache to fix a connection issue between the tablet and machine. So, not so much. But, for some people that might be more than they are willing to do. For me, that was a "peanuts" issue in the grand scheme. Also, in this very short time span my barista skill level made logarithmic gains. And, from participation in the Decent Basecamp forum, my coffee knowledge has expanded the same because of the very high knowledge and skill of people participating there.

gunda
Posts: 108
Joined: 5 years ago

#77: Post by gunda »

I mostly agree with Michael's mini-review, except
Mountain wrote:This machine is not for people that want to set it up once and forget about it and do the same thing everyday and not think about how the machine works.
Nowadays I mostly do just set it and forget. In some sense it would be a waste, and in that sense I agree with Michael, but it can be done. Sometimes I play a bit, but it's not obligatory. For me the attractions were: small footprint; fast warm-up; precise control. Perhaps also the ability to flow profile.

RyanP
Posts: 871
Joined: 8 years ago

#78: Post by RyanP »

gunda wrote: Nowadays I mostly do just set it and forget. In some sense it would be a waste, and in that sense I agree with Michael, but it can be done. Sometimes I play a bit, but it's not obligatory. For me the attractions were: small footprint; fast warm-up; precise control. Perhaps also the ability to flow profile.
That's also what ended up happening for me after 9 months or so of ownership. I found a profile that works best for me and I used it consistently and repeatedly day after day, and it isn't even a complex profile. No slayer type preinfusion, no blooming, nothing fancy. Just a 3 bar hold for 10-12 seconds followed by a declining profile for extraction. Essentially, the Londinium R. I would occasionally go back to try out a slayer profile or a flat pressure profile, but in the end asked myself, why? I could make some really good espresso with them, but was it better? I don't think so, and it was less consistent [for me]. The ability to be able to try out a different profile when you want to is nice, but jumping between complex profiles becomes a headache, as well as a substantial waste of coffee. What I ended up finding works best is you find a profile that works well for you, that produces consistent results, and if you DO make any tweaks it's to the parameters within that profile. Perhaps you change the length of PI or have the decline end at a different pressure, but in the end you're making small changes within the same profile. I ended up replacing my DE1 with an LR and I haven't looked back. I found that I missed having a lever in the house and the automated computer format just isn't my thing. I also learned through spending a fair bit of time with a few different types of profiles using different flow and pressure profiles on the DE1 that you don't need complex flow profiles to make great consistent espresso with light nordic roasts. Furthermore, having more ability to mess with the variables isn't always better. It can be crazy making if you aren't methodical in how you go about changing the parameters. What the DE1 also confirmed for me is that most important beyond anything else is just being as consistent as possible with dose and prep. Next most important is having a great grinder. This isn't an anti-DE1 post, though. It's a sweet machine in what it's capable of doing and as far as I can tell it does what it's supposed to very well. I don't think it's a necessary machine for most home baristas, but where I do think it fills a need is for those who love data and value having a visual representation and history of what's happening at the puck with each extraction. It's an undeniably cool feature of the DE1.

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