MuddyOne - all good. No, I wasn’t saying anything other than “remove variables, keep it to the known standard and go from there”. I am only saying what I said because I had a Pro-700 in the past. 😊👍 - but back then they were only half as fancy (no flow control, no express warm up). So try my advice, see if it helps. If it doesn’t, then you can go back to exploring alternatives.
As for the airscape - I personally don’t rate them. But that’s my own experience of keeping 500g in there and then using it at a later date. I’m sure others will have different experiences… but I’m not them, so I can only report mine. 😊. For me, I found keeping the beans in a vacuum sealed bag is 100000% better than in an airscape - again, in my experience. For short term usage (one week) I pre-dose my beans into smaller containers which are air tight. I think an air scape is good for that… but then again I bet any sealed jar, or a coffee bag, would do the trick. Just keep it away from sunlight and in a dark, cool place.
As for a VST - I use it daily and I have been doing so since 2012 or thereabouts. I like it. The reason I suggested you use a bottomless portafilter is so that you can at least see if you prep is good and you are not getting channeling - which is important if you are using a VST basket, as they are harder to master than a standard basket. For me, the reason why I switched to VST back in the day was because I was ending up with a lot of fines in the cup. Changing to a VST (maybe due to the smaller holes) solved that.