Intuita Automatic Espresso Machine

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Intuita Automatic Espresso Machine
Price: $249.99
Shipping Options:: $5 Standard
Shipping Estimates: Ships in 1-2 business days (Monday, May 25 to Tuesday, May 26) + transit
Condition: Factory Reconditioned

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Previous Similar Sales (May not be exact model)
5/13/2015 - $249.99 (Woot-off)
4/22/2015 - $249.99 - Click To See Discussion (10 comments)

Check out the product page and check out these reviews over at SeattleCoffeeGear.com

Comments from a previous offer

If I didn’t already have a spare machine I’d be buying a spare.

Will it be the best espresso you ever had? Of course not - but it wil be pretty awesome.

I travel a bit for a living - and when I do I cannot wait to get home to my Saeco (and my dog)

I had an issue with my spare - it arrived with a cracked water reserviour. Seattle Coffee shipped me a replacement immediately.

This machine probably has the same guts as the Saeco full-automatic that I have (also from Woot), since Saeco is a Philips company. If so, that would make this a pretty good deal. I paid about $500 for my Saeco last year and I’m very happy with it.

So tempted, but a 6 month warranty on something like this just doesn’t cut it for me.

Darn, I just bought an unused Mr. Coffee pump machine at Goodwill for $6.99, or I’d jump all over this.

Seriously, I have very hard water so I don’t invest in expensive pump machines. I find these “unwanted wedding gift” pump machines all the time. I also have a Macap burr grinder, so I’m set.

[So this brand may have the insides of a Saeco, which may be owned by Philips, which has Haier make stuff in China, which is probably where this Mr.Coffee machine comes from. I love all the choices we think we have.]

You can purchase a year of coverage from SquareTrade. The info is at the top of the features unless you’re on a mobile device that doesn’t support Flash.

And you don’t filter your drinking water?
While I do do it - I never have to descale my coffee maker (or iron) - 'cause the filter saves the day.

+1. We’ve had the Phillips Saeco now for over two years and filtered it every time we fill it, no issues with scaling and we are on city water.

Unless you are drinking dishwater you will save money and enjoy good coffee with this machine. The brew group is tried and true. Very easy to maintain and not ugly

Wish I had the counter space for this. It appears to be a good deal.

I bought one of these in a previous Woot! sale (for about $50 more, IIRC), and I’ve been nothing but happy with it.

The espresso it produces is excellent, with a nice, thick crema. And it’s consistent, which is something I can’t say about the shots I used to pull with a manual machine. Cleaning is relatively fuss-free; like the description says, the whole brew group comes out for cleaning. I usually give it a quick rinse every weekend, let it air dry, and pop it back in.

In general, it’s an amazingly convenient way to get a surprisingly good espresso. In fact, it’s so convenient, that my wife and I have started using it to pull a long espresso instead of bothering with our Keurig machine. You read that right, we find making coffee with the Intuita is more convenient than our Keurig.

A few notes (not problems, just things to be aware of):

  • the water reservoir isn’t terribly smart, and on multiple occasions I’ve ended up ruining a shot because it ran out of water halfway through. Refill the reservoir every time you turn it on, and you’ll be fine.
  • the machine primes the water lines every time you turn it on, and purges them every time you turn it off. This causes the drip tray to fill far quicker than you may be used to with other automatic machines, where the drip tray is mostly there to catch accidental overflow. Set this machine up relatively near a sink, unless you like the excitement of walking across the kitchen while delicately balancing a shallow tray of coffee water.
  • The machine will warn you when it needs to be descaled, but you have to use Philips’ own decalcifier solution for that (about $10 for a single-use bottle on Amazon). The decalcifying process is also sort of messy and time-consuming, but doesn’t require constant attention (you can easily do it while performing other chores around the house). We use our machine daily and multiple times on weekends, and we have to go through the decalcifying process once every few months. And no, using filtered water does not prevent you from having to do this.
  • The power button blinks when the machine is turned off. I have no idea why Philips thought that was a good idea.
  • You can’t use pre-ground coffee in this machine, it’s whole-bean or nothing. There’s actually a place for a pass-through that would allow for pre-ground coffee to be used, but apparently that’s a feature only found on some other model.
  • It has a panarello wand. This is great if you have no idea how to steam milk, because short of scalding the milk, there’s practically no way to mess it up. But you also can’t do anything to make it better. A newbie and a trained barista will get the same somewhat-better-than-mediocre result. You’ll still be making a pretty good latte or cappuccino, but you won’t be making latte art with this machine.

TL;DR, this is a great automatic espresso machine, especially at this price. If your love of espresso-based beverages is outweighed only by your love of convenience, you want this thing.

@didymos - I hope you are wrong about the ground coffee aspect… The specs page says it supports Ground coffee.
Supported coffee types: Ground coffee, Whole coffee beans
Now before anyone flames me for ground coffee - it’s just for the rare decaf need. Otherwise it’s whole bean Sumatra from my i-Roast.
If this machine is similar in quality to my Odea Giro Plus, I’ll be a happy camper.