Quiet Washer Dryer with 7kg drum (AEG L16830)

Member Name: ahenry

Product:	AEG L16830
Date:	27/08/06 (2976 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Quiet Washer Dryer with 7kg drum

Disadvantages: Quickest cycle takes an hour

I got an AEG L16830 delivered earlier this morning.

It comes in a big, white, box with a few buttons and one knob. Styling-wise, you know it is a washing machine!

There are about 10 programs - a reasonable balance between functionality and simplicity.

Its very quiet, has good ratings for economy and performance. The cycles are not particularly quick. A normal wash takes ~ 2 hours, or 1 hour if you use the time saver button. There is a countdown timer that shows how long is left to run. This is reasoably accurate for a real wash. On the first run with an empty load, it skipped through some bits more quickly than the original quoted time. The drum takes 7kg of washing and it takes 3.5kg for drying.

The dryer is OK. If you have the space, having a seperate dryer works better, and will be more reliable but I don't. I think having a bigger drum should help the performance of the dryer.

The best feature is the door lock. When the final spin has finished, the drum is stationary for about a second before you can open the door. When the wash cycle is running, you can pause the cycle and open the door so long as the drum doesn't have enough water to flood out. Its almost like having a top loader. With my old washer, the door wouldn't open for 3-4 minutes after the end of the fast bit of the spin and you had to drain it mid-cycle if you wanted to add something. Its nice to be treated as an adult.

I paid £465 at www.dixons.co.uk including delivery and disposal of my old machine. To get this price took a combination of 5% cash back from Egg, a £10 discount voucher from Pricerunner and 2% from a click through site. A couple of days later, and I could have used another £20 voucher from Dixons.

The warranty is only 1 year. John Lewis used to sell them and then you would have got a 2 year guarantee. They seem to be out of stock now - presumably as their own brand washer dryer is pretty close competition (although that only has a 6kg drum).

AEG is the top-end brand from Electrolux. In general each range has the same design, with a few extra features added on and faster spin speeds to differentiate the models. The build quality is not to the level of a Miele, but their washer-dryer is £400 more and it only has a 5kg drum. LG and Daewoo have washer dryers with 8kg and 10kg drums, but I decided to go for a company I had heard of as a washing machine manufacturer. AEG have done reasonably well in the Which? Magazine reliability surveys in recent years.

Summary: Quiet, competent and nice to use

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