Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I am a home cook and have been cooking food sous vide, but the standard external sealers always pull moisture/liquids up and out of the bag which is very frustrating. The VP210 chamber allows you to seal bags with none to alot of liquid. However, there is a learning curve, and I had to call technical support a couple of times to get the machine set up correctly, but once it is set up, it works great. I am able to seal meats and liquids in the machine without a problem. The first machine that I received was dented on a back corner and the cover of the machine was set too low so it was impossible to plug it in. Amazon overnighted a replacement (thank you, I needed it for thanksgiving). Then I needed to speak to technical support a couple of times to help set up the machine settings. I had to increase the the seal time of the machine up to 1.4 or 1.5... technical support said not to raise it above 1.5, but the setting as set by the factory was too short, so when the bag was sealing, air was getting back into the bag. I raised the vacuum time in the chamber to 60 seconds due to the initial trouble I was having of the bags not holding the vacuum, but can probably lower the time now back to 40 seconds since the seal time is set to a longer time. This is a basic chamber sealer for a very reasonable price compared to other units on the market, but you have to play around with the time you set the machine to vacuum. You cannot choose to set it to specific vacuum percentages, you have to experiment with the time to get the effect you want on a particular type of food. Most foods will seal within 40 seconds. Researching the machine online, I read that this is dry rocker piston instead of the more expensive rotary oil motor. The dry rocker piston machine will tend to clog after sealing bags with alot of moisture in them (items like fish), but supposedly will still last 10 time longer than the typical countertop external strip sealing machine. The rotary oil motor machine will last 10 times longer than the dry rocker piston machine. However, I am using this on a home basis, not a commercial setting, so the representative said that the dry rocker piston would be fine. There is a newer, smaller lighter-weight vp112 vacmaster sealer, which uses the same motor in the vp210, has a port for external vacuum sealing of bottles with the attachments commonly found on other brands like foodsaver, and is light weight because the cover is a foldable plastic without the heavier lid closing mechanism found on the vp210. Its also cheaper by a couple of hundred dollars. I opted to go with the vp210 because the chamber is slightly bigger and the bottom is flat. The bottom of the the vp112 is slightly curved, like a bathtub, so only the middle of the chamber has the full depth. Note: I purchased the rolls of vacmaster bags with the vacstrip (amazon listed them as being purchased by others with this machine), which I found out from the company are not meant to be used with chamber vac machines (the bags were not sealing with a vacuum). When using the pre-made bags that come with the machine (25 bags each of 3 different sizes are included with the machine for a total of 75 bags) the sealer works as intended. I was told by the company to purchase the 3 mil premade pouches.