This Waring Blender is very powerful! It's loud and spins very fast. Which makes it blend in a fraction of the time of others. It makes my old Kitchen-Aid seem like a childs toy in comparison.

It's much more obviously commercial through heft, simplicity of design and function and servicability.

It has only 2 speeds. Professional chefs say that's all you need. it has a simple toggle switch, no multiple speed electronic gimmics. Just very functional.

I originally really wanted a glass container. It provided some heft to my old Kitchen-Aid and I thought that it was a sign of higher quality.
For a commercial application you would prefer the unbreakable quality of the polycarbon plastic as well as the lack of weight. It's light as a feather.

I was also concerned that the blade being permenantly mounted inside the container would be hard to clean. (actually you can take it apart with a deep socket and extension, not for cleaning but blade replacement). My Kitchen Aids came apart for cleaning and I could put it in the dishwasher. I find the cleaning instruction are easy with the Waring, actually simple to clean you should just do it right away once your done mixing. Less time to clean and assemble.

What I see now with comparing this to the kitchen-Aid besides what I've already mentioned, is that the Kitchen-Aid looks simple through it's visual design. It's over designed through what appear to be valuable features which only make it more complicated. You have to do more work from cleaning, assembling and servicing.
The Waring on the other hand is bare bones functional. It was designed to blend and be easily serviced and quickly cleaned.

32 of 32 found the following review helpful:

Daily user - fruit smoothies for breakfast  Jul 15, 2005
By Peter
Over the past 3 years, we have owned a 'commercial quality' KitchenAid with a stainless steel pitcher and a high end Oster unit.

Neither blended milk, frozen fruit, soy powder, and cottage cheese properly. The Kitchen Aid always left a blob of non-blended material plus chunks of fruit in the bottom.

We purchased the Waring Mega-Mix 5 months ago after reading the reviews on Amazon.com. We use it at least once daily.

Pluses:

1. Blends frozen or fresh fruit amazingly quickly and completely.

2. Mixes powders, fluids, and solids completely and efficiently.

3. Incredibly powerful motor

4. Polycarbonade pitcher is light weight and seems very strong.

5. High quality construction and commercial look to it.

Minuses:

1. Initially offered us a 'burnt' odor for the first 3 weeks of use (Amazon reviews warned of this)

2. Very noisy! I have adopted a one hand over one ear and the opposite shoulder plastered against the other ear stance while keeping the other hand on the lid.

3. Does not crush ice for drinks as well as other reviewers indicated.

Overview: Not perfect, but far better than anything else that we have used!

46 of 53 found the following review helpful:

Rock Crusher  May 08, 2004
By B. Elwood
Several facts:

- 1 HP motor (on low setting this thing will crush rocks)
- All parts are serviceable / replaceable (just like any good industrial piece of equipment)
- Will pulverize ice drinks (margaritas) in about three seconds
- Made in USA!

I got lucky and found as an out-of-box special at my local Fry's electronics store for $99.90 - stole it. This is last blender I will own in my lifetime, what is that worth?

Yes you could spend less, and get an average household blender. But how often can you afford the best? Can you afford the best car in world, the best house???

18 of 19 found the following review helpful:

Finally, a REAL blender.  Feb 12, 2005
By Bud
This is my fourth blender in about as many years. I blend infrequently, but I want good results. I mostly blend frozen drinks and soups. 4 years ago, I had some little wussy thing that I gave to Goodwill. It worked, but never really ground ice up to a smooth consistency--more snow-cone like. I decided it was time for a top-of-the-line KitchenAid. It was the worst blender I've ever owned. It's large clover-leaf shape meant 70% of what I was blending got stuck to the sides, and the remaining in the center got pulverized. You could never get an even blending even if you opened the top and kept pushing things around with a spoon every few seconds. Then I found out it was rated last in Consumer Reports. No surprise to me. Next was a top of the line Cuisinart. It did a fairly good job of mixing, but the glass jar was heavy, and all it took was one accidental tap on the sink while washing the slippery thing to crack the thin glass screw mounting on the bottom which cracked its way up the side. The replacement jar cost me $50. The blender maybe lasted 15 to 20 uses. The blender base/motor was very lightweight, and I don't think it had a beefy motor that could dissipate heat. One day, I was blending soup, and that was all she wrote. It over heated, and smoke began pouring out of it. I think the heat then killed the bearings, and half the windings were fried. It would work after I put it outside to cool-off (and aired out the kitchen), but it made horrible noise and died.

Fed up, I decided to look at REAL blenders, i.e., commercial blenders. This lead me to the Waring Commercial website. This blender is not actually not from Waring Commercial and is not part of their commercial line. It is, however, a home version and all the parts interchange with its commercial blender counterparts. I talked to Waring, and they said it has the same guts as their commercial blenders but is marketed to homes with a pretty box, manual, etc. Although, the home version doesn't support additional accessories and replacement parts, I was told that the commercial ones could be used. Anyway, this is a REAL blender. Its blends thoroughly and to a smooth texture. It is noisy, but I don't care. I actually rarely even use high. It blends soups and ice drinks without effort. Yes, you have to hold it on the blender and keep your hand on the lid, but it's not like I'm going to fill it with ice, flip it on and walk away. This is an awesome product. I also love it because the jar is plastic. It is not heavy, and can be banged around without fear of slipping and dropping it. The plastic jar is designed for using and not displaying. Now, I only have to get one of the 1/2 gallon commercial food blending jars, and I'll have reached blending nirvana.

45 of 53 found the following review helpful:

plastic carafe will not hold up  Jun 25, 2005
By Robyn G. Walton
I purchased this blender several months ago and the power of the motor is great. But if you make smoothies and crush a lot of ice, the plastic carafe will absolutely not hold up to that use. Mine now leaks all over the base unit even though I've always washed it by hand and followed the manual's instructions. The Waring website says this product is sold with a glass carafe, but they don't sell the glass carafe as a replacement part - only the plastic.

If you think you're going to crush ice or use the power of the motor, you're going to have big problems with the plastic carafe. (And the replacement plastic carafe is $50!!)

At this point, I think I'm going to have to throw out the blender!

See all 43 customer reviews on Amazon.com