Curious about this machine as well. Being app driven (like the Prima One) has me nervous, but on paper this looks like a great, well made machine.

I upgraded from a Silvia to a Verve about 8 months ago and overall it's been a pretty good experience. When i first received the machine the steam boiler was set to about 1.2 bars of pressure which in my opinion was quite low. Luckily it's quite easy to get to the steam boiler pressure stat to increase the pressure. I have mine set to 1.5ish bars. Looks like you could set it up to 2 but that's pretty close to the marked max on the gauge.

The machine doesn't really use an "app" it's more of a WiFi hotspot that brings you to a splash page (more like a website) and that's where you can modify things such as brew temp and pre infusion times. Since it's not an app i don't think you'll have compatibility problems in the future.

the machine doesn't do volumetric shots and as far as i understand it is no a commercially rated machine.

I only have a few complaints about the machine that all boil down to small details which take away from the experience but are easily fixable if they bother you too much.

1. The drip tray tends to rattle and make noise while brewing. This is because the drip tray and the machine are metal so it doesn't take much vibration to cause noise as the drip tray rattles against the machine. This can be fixed by adding some material of your choice between the two.
2. The cup rack scratches the top of the machine because it's yet another metal resting on metal situation. Why the legs on the cup rack don't have rubber feet is beyond me. This also happens with the metal grate on the drip tray.

WhoreHey6867 wrote: The machine doesn't really use an "app" it's more of a WiFi hotspot that brings you to a splash page (more like a website) and that's where you can modify things such as brew temp and pre infusion times. Since it's not an app i don't think you'll have compatibility problems in the future.

Thanks for the advice mate. That would be my only real concern about any future compatibility or upgrade concerns; I know Elektra got taken over by a much bigger company and would hate to see corporate cost cutting affecting their machines down the track.

According to Elektra, that's the reason why they went with wifi based html page(think of it as hotel wifi login page) instead of App based approach. This way they don't have to constantly update the App to be compatible with newer devices.

What is the warmup time? I heard because you have to manually initiate the warmup putting it on a smart switch is a no go.

If you had to do it all over again, would you get it again?

One of the feature of the "app" is a timer/night mode,
the grouphead boiler heats up pretty fast due tot eh size steam boiler longer of course,
I never timed the ne we been using for a while now (almost 1 year) but I will say 10 and 20 minutes,
portafilter of course needs some "cheatings" when that short time.

KenDigg wrote:Thanks for the advice mate. That would be my only real concern about any future compatibility or upgrade concerns; I know Elektra got taken over by a much bigger company and would hate to see corporate cost cutting affecting their machines down the track.

The Verve was designed, completed from the ex-owner engineering dept, before Carimali started to over managing, which by the way so far the day to day operations are still in the "good old Elektra" way some what.
The good news about a bigger company is having more $$$$ to invest in the future of products

I've owned the machine for about a year and I've changed out the heating element in the steam boiler and I'm current about to change out the group boiler because there seems to be a slight leak. I've had great support from the dealer I purchased the machine from. In general I love the machine, however I would be hard pressed to make the same choice again.

On another note there is now a "verve mini" wonder the capabilities/if they addressed any issues I've had.

WhoreHey6867 wrote: On another note there is now a "verve mini" wonder the capabilities/if they addressed any issues I've had.

Knobs instead of joysticks for steam. Nooooooooo!