"Old adage -- 'you get what you pay for' -- comes into play on this microwave. I'll start with the positives: it is small and the perfect size for a small apartment or dorm room. This microwave is VERY small both inside and out. It's a decent looking piece of equipment. Has all the quick, one-touch buttons (popcorn, beverage, potato, for example.) Another important feature included is power levels. This has all 10 power levels. It has a rotating, removable rotating glass turntable, as well. The negative: it lacks sufficient power. And isn't that the most important thing about a microwave? It is for me. The first thing I cooked with new Danby was a basic frozen dinner. Followed the directions on the frozen dinner exactly. Microwaved on high for four minutes. Stirred food. Microwaved again on high for 2.5-3.5 minutes, as instructed. I chose the maximum of 3.5 minutes. The bell alerted me it was finished cooking; sadly, dinner was absolutely cold. I put it back into microwave for another minute...still not hot. Again, back into new Danby for another 90 seconds and finally, it was close to the correct temperature (still a bit on the 'lukewarm' side.). A small frozen dinner took an extra 2.5 minutes to cook -- that is 2.5 minutes longer than recommended cook time on the package. This particular frozen dinner is one I cooked frequently in my old microwave. In my old (now dead) microwave, that dinner was fully cooked -- three minutes and 15 seconds faster -- than in the Danby. The second item I cooked was popcorn. Guess what? The interior of the microwave is too small to allow a regular bag of microwave popcorn to turn properly on spinning wheel. Luckily, it did not burn the popcorn however, the Danby did leave me with half a bag of unpopped kernels. While the microwave looks quite nice, as soon as you touch it, you'll realize, it is a very cheaply made appliance. The high end microwave I replaced lasted over 10 years. My old microwave (that I miss so very much) cost five times what this Danby cost. It's my fault for buying the most inexpensive microwave I could find. I wrongly assumed that even a cheap microwave would cook the basics. This simply doesn't. I would not recommend this product to anyone except possibly a student who needs something tiny for a dorm room. If I had a chance to re-buy a microwave, I'd bite the bullet and buy something more expensive, more powerful, larger, etc. $60 lesson learned. I will probably buy another microwave and donate this to Goodwill. UPDATE: After dealing with this 'nightmare microwave' for nearly a month, I bought one that actually works (Panasonic.) I would steer clear of the Danby brand. I have nothing good to say about it. Learned my lesson. If you buy something that is cheap, it will work like something cheap."
Danby Designer 0.7 cu.ft. Countertop Microwave, Black/Stainless Steel (Compare Deals from $63.20)
"This is a brand I hadn't heard of before. I chose it because it was the cheapest one at this size. It is the smallest size I could use. It fits my dinner size plates in it. There are a couple of downsides and a couple of positives. Big downside is how the door isn't easy to open. It takes two hands, no one hand about it. Maybe if it were against a wall and person applied a great deal of pressure, but I have tried and failed to open with one hand. It'd actually scoot back ( mine isn't against a wall) and door fails to open. I need to put one hand on top of microwave while other hand is pushing the open button. Also adds time in 30 second increments, this could be good or bad. It's easy to add on time this way. The popcorn button does not have the right timing for microwave popcorn, just an fyi, this isn't uncommon with even the best brands. The microwave being black, isn't hard to keep clean, the glass turner easily comes out and goes back in for cleaning too. It does cook with a good deal of power, which I'd say is good as any of the more well known brands. It beeps when done, kinda loud and slightly annoying, but I've heard worse ones. So overall it is a completely neutral rating I'm giving this microwave. I'd recommend if you can afford a beer one, go for it, but if money is tight, or you like to spend as little as possible for a functional albeit quirky microwave, get this one. oh yeah, it boils water in less than 2 minutes (2 cups in a glass container)."
"It's OK. It does the job. It looks fairly attractive. I'm giving it points off for a few reasons. The first is that the removable rotating assembly that sits under the glass plate stopped rotating properly and made horrible grating/friction noises. I took out the assembly to see if I could make the little plastic wheels rotate better but I haven't found a way yet. In the mean time it still works, but the glass rotating plate is a little tipsy because the assembly isn't there to hold it at level. Secondly, I do find the push buttons take a bit more force than I'd like to use - I've taken to press them with my fingernails instead of my fingers since that does the trick without fail. Unfortunately this technique is detrimental to the keypad which is really just a large sticker. They do give you a single back-up sticker to apply after the first sticker isn't presentable anymore. However, I've only had the microwave for a couple of months and the display looks older than that. Last of all, the cooking power is a little lower and less even than I had expected - OK, but not great. I didn't take a star off for this but in case you're like me and delivery is an issue, I'll recount my delivery experience: Amazon sent this through USPS. I have Prime so I knew when it was coming and made a point of staying home from work to accept delivery. USPS never attempted delivery, instead they just left the delivery notice - what a pain!"
"EDIT: Received second microwave. While it didn't look like it was quite as big of a gap, I could still easily slide a fairly thick envelope right through where door connected to microwave. That, for me, isn't acceptable. I researched microwaves for about a week until I chose Danby. I won't try for the third times a charm. I'm done. To get TWO in a row where I found the gap unsatisfactory, just makes me wonder how many are out there that people don't realize are not sealed properly. I had friends check theirs and they couldn't fit an envelope through into the inside of their microwave. It slide RIGHT through, I didn't have to force it. SO PLEASE, check your microwave,and if you have one that is sealed, hopefully it will work for you. It worked for me except for that unacceptable flaw. Worked fine, but after about a week of using it, I noticed just some drops of condensation on the OUTSIDE of the microwave. I have a very small kitchen and the microwave is inches from where I stand to get ready to get the food out. The hinge side of the door where the seam is I looked closely at when it WASN'T on and saw that the reason there was some droplets of condensation on the microwave on the outside was the door wasn't FLUSH with microwave, allowing microwaves and condensation to escape. Needless to say, this was EXTREMELY upsetting! I was just glad I hadn't had it long or used it more than maybe seven times, but it is still very upsetting knowing I was standing NEXT to it at times when it was on. SO PLEASE, if you get this microwave, take a GOOD look at the seam where the door connects to the microwave box part. Amazon is great about standing behind anything one purchases through them and I DID like the microwave except for this BIG flaw and they said they would get another out to me and I should have it within a couple business days. I will edit this and change my review if the new one comes without this flaw."
"I had a Samsung microwave that finally gave up the ghost after about 10 years. Needing to replace it quickly,and wanting to keep the cost under $100, I bought a Hamilton Beach microwave at Walmart, one a little less powerful than the Samsung. The paint started degrading inside the unit after less than a year. A little research uncovered the fact that peeling paint seemed to be a current problem in microwaves. Like others, I wondered whether this made it unsafe to use. The spectrum of arcing was a real fear. The consensus seemed to be that the paint problem could be fixed by re-painting, but first the area(s) would have to be sanded absolutely smooth. Reluctantly, I ordered what was marketed as special paint for the microwave cavity, though I had doubts about how well or how long this fix would last. But before I could get started on the sanding, the Hamilton Beach quit working. Fortunately, I had the loan of a dorm-size microwave while I debated what to buy next. I'm in a rural area, so traveling around to various appliance stores was not time I wanted to invest. In any event, the only countertop models these places appeared to stock were the convection combos, a feature I didn't want to pay for. I had a better than average chance of finding something on Amazon--Prime two-day free shipping can't be beat. After numerous internet searches to try and find a moderately-priced unit that had a good durability record, I came across the Danby with the unusual feature of a stainless steel interior and exterior. I should mention that on Amazon, the listing includes different sizes and finishes, but the only one with the stainless interior is the 1.1 cubic foot, 1000 watt model. This is the one I ordered. I felt an enormous sense of relief that I would no longer be faced with the interior paint problem. It is attractive and clean-looking. I did notice that the Danby had considerable condensation after use, and that it held onto odors more than others. These characteristics seem to be decreasing with continued use, and in any event are easily dealt with. The one drawback for me was the push button door release, as I had always made sure to purchase models with door handles. And in fact, when I unpackaged the unit, I did notice that the push button looked slightly crooked. It has stuck in the pushed-in position a few times, but always has released when I've pushed it again. I'm hoping for the best on this issue. The interior dimensions are about 13 x 8, and the turntable is about 13 inches in diameter."
"Bought this for personal use when I moved into a new apartment in a new city. Wanted something small enough to fit into a small kitchen yet large and powerful enough to deal with refridgerated leftovers without having to wait forever. The turntable works fine; it will come loose from the central turning gear if you jolt it but this is true of almost any microwave with a removable glass turntable. Has one button instant-high preset cooks up to 6 minutes, with longer cooking times if desired that can be input through the keypad. I can cook an egg in a bowl in 1 minute, where the yolk will still have that slightly 'runny' consistency associated with Eggs Benedict. After about 1.5 minutes (depending on whether you are cooking 1 or 2 eggs) the yolks will be cooked thoroughly solid. A great alternative to frying an egg to 'spice' up leftovers, since there is no added oil. As some other reviewers have mentioned, the unit is fairly light and can move on the countertop when trying to open the door. In my view, this is not a big issue- I'd actually be more concerned if the unit was made excessively heavy since that would inevitably add to the cost (and back pains) during house moves. I give it 4 stars instead of 5 because it relies on a pull-to-open action, which plays to the weakness of the lightness, rather than a 'push-button-to-open' system, which would have been more ideal with minimal additional engineering needed. Subjective? Perhaps. But I bought this unit knowing that it would have this shortcoming and while I don't regret my purchase, I still wish that such a sensible function was present."
"Our previous microwave (Nostalgia Electronics RMO-400) was 800 watts. When it finally kicked the bucket after 3 years, we started looking for a replacement. We have limited space in our kitchen- and microwave placement is further limited by the lack of outlets in our older home. We need a microwave that will fit in a smaller space (11 inches in height). This was the best rated of those we could find that would fit. I was hesitant at the lower wattage, but we don't do much cooking in the microwave. We reheat coffee and tea daily, make popcorn several times a week, and reheat leftovers periodically. A little extra time wouldn't bother me. Surely 100 watts wouldn't really make that much of a difference, anyway. Oh, how wrong I was. This microwave takes twice as long to heat pretty much everything. Coffee or tea? 1 minute in our old microwave. 90 seconds to 2 minutes in this one. Plate of food? 3 minutes in our old microwave. 5 minutes in this one. Honestly, if it were just reheating beverages and food, the time different wouldn't bother me. But then I tried to make popcorn. I could air pop a fairly large bowl of popcorn in our old microwave in less than 4 minutes. But in this microwave, it barely started popping by 4 minutes. And popcorn just isn't meant to be in a microwave that long. After 4 and a half minutes, it started to burn, even though most of the popcorn was still unpopped. So then I tried popping two smaller batches. After 4 minutes, the half-batches were still only about 75% popped. That's a lot of waste, especially when it would now take a combined 8 minutes to pop a bowl of popcorn. One last con: our largest dinner plates don't fit through the opening. If I tip them slightly, I can at least get them past the door, and then they actually do fit IN the microwave. For me personally, that wasn't a deal breaker, but figured I'd mention it. But the popcorn was a deal breaker, so back it goes for a refund."
Danby Designer 0.7 cu.ft. Countertop Microwave, Black/Stainless Steel (Compare Deals from $63.20)
