Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

This review is for the DCC-3400 machine with a thermal carafe. This machine makes great tasting coffee, has simple intuitive operation, does not take up much space on the counter, and is *really* good looking. I recently purchased this to replace a similar Cuisinart model that I had for over 12 years. And the previous one was still working fine - it had just gotten dingy after daily use for so many years. I prefer using a thermal carafe because I usually stretch a pot of coffee over several hours, and coffee gets a burnt taste when heated for that long with a heating plate. The primary advantage of the thermal carafe (besides looking really nice) is that it keeps the coffee hot through insulation of the carafe, and not by continuously heating the carafe. So there are three things you need to know (1) the plate that it sits on does not heat up, (2) coffee in the carafe is going to lose heat over the course of a day; that is physics and it's unavoidable. However, it loses heat at a very slow rate. The coffee remains hot for several hours throughout the morning after it has been brewed, and even by the afternoon I would call it very warm - that's 9-10 hours after it was brewed and would be burnt coffee sludge if it were directly heated for that long, and (3) the lid is designed to maintain a seal that reduces the rate of heat loss, but you don't have to twist or open anything to pour a cup. For this reason, the coffee pours more slowly than if the spout were just open. But honestly, the difference is along the lines of taking 4 seconds to fill a cup instead of 2 seconds. I don't understand the claims in other reviews about spilling when pouring, unless they are turning the carafe upside down to try to make it pour faster. The spout pours just fine and I've noticed that this model actually pours a little faster than the previous one I had. If the spout were more open, the carafe would lose heat more quickly. The only way to seal it further would be to design a lid that needs to be twisted open when you want to pour (like a thermos), and it would still lose heat at a faster rate every time you open it. I feel that the design of this carafe strikes the right balance between the seal needed to retain heat and ease of pouring. Another bonus is that the carafe does not need to sit in the coffee maker to stay warm - when serving coffee to a group I can keep the pot right on the table or wherever is most convenient. A thermal carafe may not fit the bill for everyone, but if you need a pot of coffee to stay hot for several hours without eventually tasting burnt, I highly recommend this machine.