This Diamond is the Icing on the Cake (FF65)

Member Name: shroud

Product:	FF65
Date:	02/04/07 (125 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: frost free, roomy, adjustable shelves, quick chill compartment, fast freeze, excellent customer serv

Disadvantages: no seperate temp control for fridge and freezer

When we realised we had to move from our rented house (it was being sold under us), we not only had to find a house, but furniture and appliances, as our rented house came furnished. One of the biggest gripes I have had since coming to the UK has been about fridge and freezer sizes (honestly, I don't gripe about much else except the motorways but I digress). I knew from looking at houses that I would be lucky to be able to fit an American sized side by side fridge in any kitchen we could buy (or to afford to buy said side by side LOL), but I knew how much space I DID want it to have. I wanted at least as much space as the smaller American fridge freezers of the 70's, and by golly gosh it had to be frost free or I was not playing along!

I viewed many, but prices seemed horrendous, until someone pointed this little number out to me. Oh, I fell in love!

This little beauty was not only under £300 new, but spacious on the interior. Sleek white exterior with easy to grip handles, and exterior temperature controls located at the top of the over the upper door. Next to the very discreet temperature control is a warning light, which gives you ample warning if the fridge freezer is not getting sufficiently cold. Also along that area is a fast freeze button that you can push to help speed up the freezing of foods, which is vary useful you are bringing in melting ice cream.

The fridge part is on the top half of the machine, and features two wide and deep coated wire shelves that can be adjusted in height, as well as two clear plastic bin type compartments intended for "fresh" foods. There is a glass shelf over the bins making for a convenient third shelf. Under these bins is a tray with a flip top lid. The tray has ridges on the tray, to help hold bottles in place the purpose of this section is to allow quick cooling, making it ideal to place too hot foods for a minute or two to rapidly cool to edible temperature (a boon with small children) or to chill a few bottles of wine while you prepare dinner.

The refrigerator door is another fine example of how well thought out this appliance is. There is a large lower shelf with deep sides. This is large enough to hold a 6 pint container of milk, as well as bottles of ketchup, lemon juice, and a carton of orange juice and be able to move things about. Fantastic! There are also 3 heavy duty acrylic half sized shelf compartments that you can adjust up and down to maximise space according to your needs. They are large enough to hold a few small bottles of whatever, or a large tub of butter, or a 6 pack of eggs, etc. each. I have to say they are quite generous, I have put a 1 litre Tupperware round jug in one and still had room for my 6 pints of milk below without bumping when I removed anything. None of the plastic bits are flimsy, and the wire shelves are very robust in construction.

The lower freezer compartment is quire roomy. There is a wire upper shelf and two larger clear fronted drawer style wire shelves above a 4th white plastic fronted styled drawer. this bottom compartment is where you place the foods you wish to be fast frozen. It is the coldest part of the freezer by design. the shelves are very roomy. I buy all my food monthly, and i can fit all my frozen meat and vegetables in the freezer without any trouble. Admittedly, I do not do this, as I I put the meals for a fortnight in there instead, including baked ahead pies and cakes for pudding, and home-made ice cream with the rest in my upright freezer along with the sliced bread for toast, all the milk for an entire month, and any yummy junk food I want hidden for myself. I am able to fit the fortnight's meals all in, and have plenty of room left over, making this an excellent choice for larger families as well as "average" sized families.

Being frost free, it has the bonus of never needing defrosting! So if you see frost inside, best call the engineer. This has not happened, but a couple months after buying this, we were incredibly unlucky and the PCB board blew (computer thingy in it). We were told this is rare, but happens, and a call to Hotpoint saw an engineer come out quickly (within 24 hours), the new part arrive the next day once he diagnosed the problem, and it has worked properly ever since. I cannot fault the machine or the service. The machine's warning light came on, and even though the PCB was dead, it duly kept chugging away so that I was able to shift my chilled food to the freezer's upper shelves and have fridge type temps while the lower two shelves kept my frozen foods frozen. What a machine! My repair was of course covered under warranty, and the repair itself has a 12 month warranty, but a query to Hotpoint abut what a call out and repair would cost otherwise informed me it would be as low as a £90 call out fee, including all parts and labour, if it was repairable. If not, Hotpoint would offer me a trade in value.

So Hotpoint get kudos from me for their wonderful customer service and the extremely well thought out design of this family refrigerator. Who needs a gigantic side by side! I don't...this one gives me loads of room!

Summary: Well designed spacious frost free family fridge. I bought at auction for £90

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