Hello all coffee aficionados returning to coffee scene after a 10+yr lull. My budget is upto $3000 for espresso machine (I had rancilio silvia long back) and upto $1000 for grinder(had gaggia). Looking at dual boiler. I want to invest into quality coffee for home use (dont want to keep upgrading). Reading so many articles and opinions from people and i am confused. I see some good deals on clive open box items. Btw, I am slowly trying to understand different group heads and looks like e61 requires atleast 20min of wait. sometimes this might be a problem when I am spending so much money. Would love to get opinions on which machines have lower latency in starting up and can go on and on for straight 6-8 back 2 back pulls. Same goes with burr grinder. Would be nice to have programmable one which can produce 1 or 2 shots worth of coffee. On a side note, laspaziale (lucca or other) seems to be an option but I dont see many home baristas mentioning that. Then Lucca x58, QM M58 and lelit bianca caught my eye too. Flow control, PID, prefusion seems to be good options too. Anyway, appreciate your responses and am not sticking to only x/M58 or laspaziale or lelit. Thanks

> @"live4kapi"#p69870 requires atleast 20min of wait. sometimes this might be a problem when I am spending so much money. I use a wifi plug linked to google home. Makes the machine available whenever i get to it. Comes on in the morning on a routine and i turn it on whenever im 20 mins from home. I wouldn't go to e61 on that budget id stretch it a bit. Acs evo lever mk2 is the best ive had. but Sticking to your original statement you seem to have narrowed it down to requiring a Decent DE1 Who is clive? Not seen him on here 😎☕🤫

Where you are based globally will make a massive difference in what you can buy

I am based in USA. Clive is a well known reseller of equipment and a coffee shop out of portland

Kinda limited to the usual suspects Lelit, ECM, profitec The Bianca is the best bang for buck. The ECM better build Flow control isn't the best all end all . You could look at a lever from profitec but it's not got the bells and whistles of the acs stuff.

In the USA you can buy a Decent DE1 Pro plus Mazzer Philos for very close to your budget. I believe most coffee enthusiasts would agree these are "endgame". Good luck; have fun.

> @"BrendaninBrooklyn"#p69919 I believe most coffee enthusiasts would agree these are “endgame”. Do you mean owners? I am a coffee enthusiast and I would have neither on my bench!

Most would; not all. Guess you are part of "not-most"

@"BrendaninBrooklyn"#p69924 If you have not owned one how can you possibly know they are end game? For some like myself, I have no wish to need a degree in science to make a coffee. What seems to be the most used profile for Decent i wonder?

@"dfk41"#p69925 No science degree required for mazzer philos 😎

@"dfk41"#p69925 Because I can read, I can ask, I can try units belonging to others, and I can reason Decent first: plenty of owners in walking distance and I know three. Additionally, there is a roughly two hundred page Decent thread at H-B, and of course right here we have Jake and others. Note, I did not say this machine is the sole choice, but for what the OP has stated it is really a no-brainer. I do not own one only because I am really enjoying levers. If that ever changes a Decent will replace them and this is something I've mentioned to both Jake and Dave in the past. Read the HB thread; you may learn something. Philos: Jim Schulman's reviews of machines from Mazzer, Zerno, and Option O and the follow-on discussion threads are evidence enough, however again there is a smaller but lucid and enthusiastic thread right here. You should read it. As to why the Philos, I''d say it has none of the potential mild downsides I perceive with Option O and Zerno, but my perception might not be shared by all. However in the USA Option O 64 is $1,600; the Zerno is$ 1,500, and the Mazzer is $1,000. Assuming one found them all equal in all other regards, price alone makes the Philos a clear recommendation. By the way I've never flown a plane but I know enough to travel by jet not biplane, and I've never owned a Ferrari but I've had a few wonderful rides in one. I've never had cancer but if diagnosed I'd know which medical facility to go to. Data, experience, induction, deduction; the Western thought-model since Descartes. It works.

New espresso machine / grinder purchase, budget $4000

JimmyP

BrendaninBrooklyn Disagree. I find the notion of “endgame” really irritating. Why would you want to limit yourself and not try new gear? 🤔

BrendaninBrooklyn

JimmyP Because coffee is the focus not gear collection

Cuprajake

JimmyP depends what you drink

If it’s med + then a lever profile benefits that type of coffee as you don’t want to extract too much.

If you’re in to lighter stuff then you need to use different profiles and tools to extract them

The machine is just one of many tools to do so, you can manipulate taste in so many ways from a bit of filter paper costing pennies to a three figure grinder.

What’s apparent is the decent will show you flaws on crap beans, something I’ve had a glut of recently.

Synic in me thinks the quality of greens has gone down

JimmyP

Cuprajake Can you expand? What does Decent do that my Flair can’t provide? Interested in the specifics 🤔

JimmyP

BrendaninBrooklyn “Endgame” implies you’ve nowhere to go. I prefer to keep moving 😉👍

BrendaninBrooklyn

JimmyP You could read the H-B thread and Discord; lots of info there

profesor_historia

JimmyP well, it’s supposed to do a lot more no?? Thinking of the price difference….

BrendaninBrooklyn

JimmyP My wife and I also – by drinking our way through the Coffee Atlas. Have fun polishing your gear.

Cuprajake

No.

As I simply don’t have the energy or cares to debate it.

JimmyP

Cuprajake Weird. Plenty of comments and yet you don’t want to engage with the interesting stuff? 🤷‍♂️

JimmyP

BrendaninBrooklyn Looking for real-life experience here, rather than secondhand knowledge 🙂👍

BrendaninBrooklyn

[unknown] you haven’t. you find yourself far more interesting than I do.

BrendaninBrooklyn

@“JimmyP”#p69963guess you don’t read much.

Cuprajake

It’s not interesting to me, I don’t care about the flair or comparing it to any other machine

There’s plenty of resources, go have a look

Reality is you were on my ignore list with your first few posts

I have not time for people in general these days.

I’m almost ready to delete my accounts.

BrendaninBrooklyn

[unknown] I clear junk mail as it arrives

Cuprajake

[unknown] why join a forum and then be a dick to the members?

JammyDodger

So - ignoring the shitposter, how can we best help @live4kapi? As others have mentioned it kind of depends what you drink and your ethos for making coffee. I love my Decent, and agree with Jake it’s a very fun machine which opens lots of doors. It’s not the only way to make delicious coffee though by any means. Did you have any thoughts of what you wanted to get out of a specific machine? Do you like lighter or darker roasts? Do any particular machines call to you due to their sexy chrome-ness or other design choices? Do you need a machine that heats up quickly or is small enough to fit under cabinetry for example?

Adrianmsmith

@live4kapi I would recommend the philos or Duo from what you said about grinder. I own both so 1st hand recommend.

Machine wise you sound like a fit for the Decent.

I wanted some analogue and tactile feel to my home life. Work is far too digital!!

Obviously i love the evo leva mk2

Once i would have recommended synchronika but now id say stear clear of e61. Too much maintenance and greasing required.

If the digital fit appeals to you i would imagine you would love the decent. Ive had a few coffees from one but never owned.

Apart from my mind set i have the “ youre not having one of those, they’re ugly” to contend with from my finance manager ☕🤭 no comments from Dave about my stuff and mods please!!

Cuprajake

@JimmyP

Esp for you, this shows the multitude of different profiles, notice how the temperature changes, you can also edit every profile, should you wish

Not only that you can use this website for free

https://visualizer.coffee/

On there you can search for grinders, coffee, any key word. Find someone who has made a coffee and use Thier exact profile by downloading and adding it to your decent.

@dfk41

If you watch you will see a profile called Emma, thats the wife’s profile, the niche zero is set to 20, she adds 17g of beans, presses her profile and the start button, super simply and as repeatable as the Evo ever was,

I’m terms of the machines the decent just edges out the evo1 and that’s purely out of the fact you can play around a bit more, the evo2 I had wasn’t as good as the evo1 imo, and of recent times I can’t hand on heart recommend the new Evo and I simply have no confidence in it, it’s such a shame.

Touch wood the decent has just worked. I do expect down line that something will break, but I’m confident in the decent community, and back up

HarveyMushman

If fast start up times are important, I’d throw a used Linea Mini in as an option. Obviously there’s no flow profiling at all, so you’d need to be content with that. What it lacks in flow control though it makes up for in warmup time, steam power and temperature stability. Needless to say bulletproof construction and probably the biggest global service/parts network of any manufacturer.

People love to hate on it but it’s a stellar machine. There’s talk of the newer machines (Micra/Mini R) being slightly lesser build quality although I can’t vouch for that as I’ve not seen one in person.

Due to the (sort of) integrated group it’s ready to brew (at proper temp, not just the ‘ready light’) with steam in under 10 minutes from cold.

Had mine almost two years and it’s one of the best things I’ve purchased.

I’d also recommend the Philos as a grinder but already plenty of good suggestions in this thread.

As for 6-8 pulls, if you’ve ever been to a coffee festival (or seen a coffee stall/popup) you’ll see the Mini has no problem doing that as it’s literally designed for it. I remember when they came out and AllPress used a handful of them all weekend at the LCF. Probably pulled more shots in the weekend than I will do in 5 years without faltering.

It’s a proper commercial machine sized for the home, and I’d go out on a limb and say there’s not a single other machine like that on the market.

live4kapi

Thanks everyone. very long thread indeed :D I looked at decent on many forums and for my taste its too digital and ofcourse beyond my budget. bianca seems to be a very good contender here sans e61 and requires atleast 15-20min heatup time?

Philos seems to be the go to grinder as many have attested to it. Quick question, can I get good espresso as well as filter kapi grind?

HarveyMushman

live4kapi Philos seems to be the go to grinder as many have attested to it. Quick question, can I get good espresso as well as filter kapi grind?

Yep, and back-to-back too.

I grind 2 cups of filter and multiple espressos every day, often two or three different coffees each day. No purging required and the stepped dial makes it simple to switch back and forth.

The only issue is that I’m not sure it’s available outside of Europe yet, and if it is, the current pricing is a ‘launch price’ and it’ll go up in price at some point. By how much, nobody knows.

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