[thechao]

I have a service tech for appliances. I just ask him what I should buy. He usually has suggestions from all the cost-ranges. Sometimes, I buy used through him (built-in fridge); sometimes I buy new. Since I had the opportunity to buy a bunch of equipment this year (a huge power surge from my HVAC fried appliances, and bad luck):

Built in fridge: GE monogram;

Dish washer: anything that is quiet (below 42 dB);

Dryer: anything with turn-timers; and,

HVAC: American Standard.

[ethbr0]

So much this. Find someone who does a lot of residential repairs of X. Ask a few of them for recommendations, specifically on what not to buy.

As the Farmer's Insurance jingle goes, "They know a thing, because they've seen a thing."

Every service tech I've ever asked has immediately had a "Never buy {popular brand}, because they all {have shoddy part | catastrophic design error}."

And it's night and day between what service techs all know vs what even the most detailed internet sleuthing would give you, because they actually see a representative sample size.

[danachow]

The flip side of this - is that service techs are by their nature biased to failures. They don't come out to the machines that are working. This is an issue for top-selling items where they may see a lot of service calls but the overall rate is lower than something they see less frequently. In my experience I have known few technicians that have the statistical smarts to account for this.

[watersb]

Clothes washer: Staber

My repair guy would bring other techs over to my house to see our Staber washing machine. Nothing else comes close.

https://www.staber.com

[zerkten]

I can't believe I've never heard of this brand. How do they compare to Maytag and Speed Queen of new and old?

[watersb]

They are meant to be user-serviceable, with common hand tools. You can take it apart and put it back together.

It's a cage-like drum that rotates on horizontal axis, much like any front-loader. But it's a top loader; the cage has a door that you open to load or unload. The drum is supported like a wheel, both front and back of the washer.

A neighbor told us that this style is seen in Germany, but I'd never seen a setup like this. It's very simple and quite durable.

I don't have any connection to Staber. Just after ten years of in home daycare, 200 miles from anything resembling a city, I was quite thrilled to finally be able to check off the clothes washer as a problem solved.