Espresso Series 1

Man I have been seeing a flood of posts about how Fellow products just break or do not work. Grinders spilling, groupheads not producing water or water not being the right temp as advertised. I was considering buying the ES1 because its a beautiful looking machine but all of these reviews give me pa

Love mine, but I did get the extended warranty (new product, not sure how it will hold up). Some small(ish) known issues though... Volumetric mode is set badly out of the box and needs adjustment if you want to use it (I don't, so it's just off anyway), there's a fair amount of water waste at startu

I think the Fellow ES1 or Meraki are good starter options in that price point with relatively low heat up times. Breville bambino is a good starter option to learn too. If you go that route you can buy a much nicer grinder like a Timemore 078s, or Niche Zero

I deleted my other thread, on my own volition. This is on my own after reflecting about the issues I was having with the firmware, and felt I was a little harsh on the title of the thread saying there was a degradation in performance, which really wasn't the case, just a glitch in the firmware, and

Really consider that if you are a Fellow fan? And you lived through the Aiden firmware updates? Then you will probably find some of the updates to be exciting as they rollout. That said? If you just want “that cup of espresso” experience? And don’t mind a low end machine needing to warm up for a bit

Lots of different ways you can go. For a traditional flat pressure shot, no milk drinks, I would go with a Rancilio Silvia and find one with a PID already installed to avoid temp surfing. If you want a little more room for experimentation, Quick Mill Pop Up or Lucca Tempo (same thing) offers flow co

So the temperature sensor on the wand is definitely something I haven't seen before: I would be concerned with accidentally touching the sensor against hot metal, stopping flow of steam. Auto-purging of steam wand when it's in down position is not necessarily something I would want. Pre-infusion / p

Despite not being a historic fan of Fellow I have to say the ES1 is a good middleground. Jet-assisted boiler means much faster initial heatup time, and you get all the bells and whistles you’d want in a higher end machine. I had a Bambino forever before this and felt like I’d hit the end of what the

Full disclosure I own the Fellow Series 1 and am probably a bit biased. Out of the three you listed, it’s the only one with any form of pressure profiling if that is something you think you’d like to experiment with. Usually this is a feature only found in significantly more expensive machines. As a

Appartamento (HX machine) has the best build quality. Super easy to service yourself if you have basic plumbing and electronics skills. Mara X (HX machine) has better control over brew temperature than Appartamento. In a smaller case than Appartamento which means it takes up less room on your counte