Bought this for the girlfriend for cooking, but I use it sometimes for coffee, too. Salter makes many models of digital scales. This is an especially good one because it weighs in one gram increments (many only weigh in two-gram increments) and it can weigh objects up to three kilograms, which is very high for this type of scale. Most scales I saw would either weigh in small increments or would weigh large items, but not both. In US measurement mode, it weighs items from one-tenth of an ounce to 6 pounds, ten ounces (in one-tenth of an ounce increments).
Unlike some units, a switch at the bottom sets which system of measurement it uses as its default when it first turns on. You can change to the other system by pressing a button. This "default switch" is very handy--another scale I owned required me to press a button every time I turned it on.
Pressing the g/oz button toggles between grams, grams/kilograms, ounces, and ounces/pounds.
While I'm on the subject of buttons, many other scales of this type use small, hard-to-press buttons that are little more than raised dimples in plastic. These buttons are big and rubber, and are easy to press.
The unit is a nice size (six inches square, about 1 1/2 inches tall, or 16 x 16 x 4 cm). It has rubber bars on top so that objects will be less likely to slip off. Some other scales have flat sides that allow you to store them on edge when not in use, but this one doesn't. It looks decent on the counter, but I don't particularly care for the silver finish. It's evenly applied, and it's not coming off, but I prefer my appliances to be black or white or metal.
It has a "tare" function--most small digital scales have this--that allows you to re-zero the scale regardless of what is on it at the time. This is very handy for adding successive ingredients to a big bowl or for eliminating the weight of the container from your measurement.
The "hold" function is something that few scales of this type have. I don't use it much, but it's a good idea. In case you are weighing something that is large and obscures the display, you can press the "hold" button before removing the object from the scale. After you've removed it, you can still read the weight on the display. Ordinarily, the display returns to zero as soon as you remove the item.
Speaking of the display, it's angled for easy reading, and the numbers are reasonably tall (1 cm). The scale turns itself off after a minute or so to save its battery (a nine-volt).
I believe this scale has been discontinued, but it's still available online as of this writing (September, 2002) from several sources. Highly recommended. It was cheaper than comparable scales, too! |
