Small, simple, relatively fast, one of the few that will brew only a couple o' cups of coffee.
Negative Product Points
A mess to clean up, hot plate ruins the coffee in short amt of time, too many parts, and the parts are all joined together in one clumsy, flimsy tower-like structure.
Detailed Commentary
Ok, here's the thing with this Melitta. I've owned 2 of them, one my mom gave me when I was a teenager, and another my girlfriend gave me recently, a good 15 years later.
Yes the machine works. It has a very simple design, one switch. The water comes out and hits a type of strainer that is attached to the lid of the top filter basket that takes the water to the edges of the basket so it completely soaks all the grounds. Fine.
But compared to "modern" coffee makers it is very primitive. The glass carafe is still baked on a hot plate. The #2 filters it uses are actually too large for the tiny amount of coffee it makes. They are V-shaped but still if you only have a couple of tablespoons in there, the water runs through very quickly and makes a sour cup.
Also, for the overall "simplicity" of the brewer it has way too many parts, and most of these come off and have to be cleaned. In addition to the maker itself it has a carafe, a carafe lid / attachment that holds the filter basket to the carafe, the filter basket itself, and the aforementioned top to the filter basket. So when your coffee is done you have to grasp the carafe by the handle and slide it clumsily out with all these plastic parts sitting atop it, wobbling unsteadily, and hot coffee and used grounds sloshing around inside.
And then you either have to uncouple the hot filter basket from the carafe, with the grounds inside, dripping everywhere, or try to pour the coffee from the carafe with everything still attached. DON'T attempt the latter.
And then when you're done with all this you have to either hand wash all the parts or stick them in the washing machine. And they're small and light enough that they inevitably get hit by the spray and fall to the bottom of the machine.
It's really a clunky design. I'm not sure why Melitta couldn't have attached the filter basket to the machine rather than the carafe.
To me, when you want just a couple of cups of coffee, you want to keep things simple. This does a small number of cups, sure, but the hassles of the design of the machine make me not want to use it.
