[kiwijamo]

It depends on the cycle for some. Mine one doesn't do a prewash for the 45mins QUICK cycle. But the ECO cycle does follow the normal prewash-then-wash process as described in the video. Hence I normally use the ECO cycle and put the correct amount of powder in both components. However in a hurry I sometimes just use the QUICK cycle and only use the main component as I know there is no point in adding more. The manual explained all this.

[Spare_account]

I'm fascinated at the number of people on an ostensibly techincal website who don't learn how their equipment works. You've summed up in a few sentences exactly how mine works, but there are dozens of commenters in this thread who appear to be unaware of the basic funcationality of their dishwasher.

All I would add to what you've said is that when my Bosch does include a pre-wash in a cycle, it checks how dirty the water is and only drains the pre-wash water if is dirty. If the dishes haven't caused the water to become dirty, it keeps the same water for the main wash cycle.

Also, I want to expand upon my first paragraph a little: I'm not having a dig at anyone who doesn't understand their dishwasher. I am just venting/observing that the world is filled with all kinds of different people and reminding myself that I shouldn't make assumptions about people as often as I do.

I've had this realisation many times, but it doesn't hurt to have it again. Communicating with people is lot quicker and easier when I remember that.

[WorldMaker]

Yeah, I think there's some interesting related trends involved to. I still feel inclined with every new appliance to read the full manual, but I know not everyone has that kind of time or attention, especially if "I can just watch a YouTube video of it" is an option.

On the other side, you see appliance companies responding to that and shrinking their manuals of useful content because they assume you might just go watch YouTube videos instead. Some of the better ones might even include a QR code or 3 to officially produced YouTube videos, though so far that still seems rare.

Even in this video is the surprise reveal that something that used to be very common in manuals, full cycle timing diagrams, was "hidden" on a data sheet attached inside the door itself. Admittedly, it's great in that case to know that should that model be taken to repair that a repair shop might find that data sheet easily without having to search manufacturers' websites, but on the other hand some of those diagrams would be quite useful to me if I was the user of that machine.

[tguvot]

sometimes even the company that made equipment doesn't know how it works.

my dishwasher after few months suddenly instead of filling water and starting wash cycle initiated some kind of fill & drain cycle that went for a while without going into wash mode.

i called in service. they replaced pump, solenoid. talked with manufacturer directly, swapped a couple of main boards. it made dishwasher snap out of it.

few months later it started again. this time i allowed it to do whatever it was doing. after 15 minutes it started to wash.

over the time i noticed that dishwasher does this water cycling every few months and adds extra time to estimated program duration.

about once a year after asking a few questions if sprayer hands/filters/etc are clean, it will add 2 hours to wash cycle.

none of it described in manual, manufacturer service personal and "Factory support" that service talk to know about it (maybe they do by now. they didn't few years ago)