Baratza Sette 30 Conical Burr Grinder

TL;DR: Grinder is fantastic from a functional perspective. The internal design is great, using simple but high quality components that are assembled with care. Best product support in the space. Highly recommend.Got the grinder 5 years ago and until recently it's worked with no issues whatsoever. A few months back it stopped turning on for some reason (think it might've been due to an electrical surge during a storm). I finally got around to engaging support and have been very happy with how it's gone so far. I chose to take apart the unit on my own, just to see if there was any component that was obviously fried like a blown fuse or a warped capacitor, to narrow down what the issue was. I unfortunately wasn't able to identify the issue, but the internals are incredibly well put together.The solders are clean, many times there will be giant blobs of excess solder all over, the solders in this are done so well that you have to actually look closely to see what is soldered. The adhesive used is also near perfectly applied. There was a small line from drip on one of the components but it was barely noticeable and was easily taken off that piece. The grinder's burr still looks pristine, even after 5 years of near daily use; same goes for the rest of the grinder.I rarely if ever see a device like this put together so well. Digital components are used sparingly, just the power board and the display so very little that can go wrong with it and since it's a relatively simple machine it's easy to service yourself if you want and replacement parts are priced in a sane way. Many companies will jack up the price of components so it's not ever worth repairing, forcing you to buy a replacement or to spend an equivalent amount on repairs.One thing I think speaks to the longevity Baratza expects from their grinders is when I was discussing the issue with the support tech, he mentioned "given the age of the unit I wouldn't expect any problems with the motor or burr grinder itself". After over five years they don't expect any issues. I don't know if that or the fact they allocate skilled personnel to continue servicing things domestically, no cost cutting by offshoring or "near shoring" taken, no scripted "run doc" that limits their ability to provide support. No corners cut, a well thought out grinder made of simple, yet high quality components with one of the design pillars being serviceability. A very rare thing in modern manufacturing. They offered to send parts out for free for me to replace but I opted to just send it to because the price was more than fair given the amount of time I'd save. All told the repair came to under 50 dollars including shipping. I don't know how they come out ahead with that pricing (would expect the combined cost of shipping, labor time and parts to be well over that) but I'm all for it. Only other standard household brand that comes to mind for similar reasons is Speed Queen for laundry appliances, although they're primarily focused on commercial with consumer facing business being supplemental rather than core.As for the actual function of the device and quality of the grind, I have no complaints. Burr grinders produce a consistent grind by design, it's why they're used over a bladed grinder. I've never had clogging issues with beans that are dark and oily, or similar common problems grinders can present. I flip around on brewing method quite a bit so I've used it for doing fine grinds for espresso, medium for pour over, coarse for french press, etc. I haven't found any size that cause it to choke it up, produce inconsistent grain sizes or any other issues that plague other grinders. I've never done Turkish style brewing which supposedly needs a grind finer than espresso so that might cause issue, but I highly doubt it. It performs consistently and has a simple but elegant mechanical design that does wonders for reliability. If you want to avoid issues, simply don't be an idiot like me and instead use a surge protector. Attached pics of the components since I don't have any other use for them and might interest some to see vs. more common review images.If you're concerned about the price, keep in mind the above that this is made to last a long time (decade+) and is actually serviceable. Most if not all the other brands will require you to replace it within that time span which will probably end up costing more than the higher one time cost. I'd guess that the Fellow Ode is the closest comparison and you're only able to replace the burrs in that, anything else and an entire replacement unit is needed.

For starters, we are typical coffee drinkers, but by no means experts. We have owned a few much cheaper grinders(blade) and the sette 30 is miles ahead of them. As burr grinders are so expensive, I see the sette 30 as an excellent affordable entry into this market for average home use.The good:-affordable-good, consistent grind quality-I think it looks nice-grinds fast-simple design that is easy to repairThe not as good:-it is on the noisier side-not super easy to clean, but not overly difficult(I think this is typical for this type of grinder)-entry level build quality(more on this below)The great:-Baratza is an excellent company to deal withBuild quality:I personally think the build quality is acceptable for the price. Baratza clearly focused their efforts on producing the best quality grinds at an affordable price and that meant lower quality components that do not directly affect the grind quality. The component that most complain about is the plastic gears. I agree that plastic gears are maybe not the best choice for a grinder that will be used in a professional setting for many years, but that is not the application that this grinder was designed for. We got 4 years out of ours, with 3-4 grinds a day, before the gears finally threw in the towel. My brother has one as well that is about 3 years old and has had no issues under the same conditions. I contacted baratza(through email) and they got back to me within a few minutes. After a few questions they asked me to send some pictures of the gears, which I did, and the same day a new gearbox was on the way FREE OF CHARGE. I couldn’t believe that they would stand behind their products like that this far out of warranty.Overall:It is a good grinder for the price and If I was in the market for a better one it would be a higher end baratza because they truly are an excellent company to deal with.

Upgraded from a Baratza Encore to this grinder. Grind performance is very good; aesthetically a very pleasant grinder. Noticeably louder than the already pretty loud Encore, which I don't love. Timer resolution down to the 0.01 in the 0-10 seconds range feels completely unnecessary.

Very easy to adjust the grind settings so coffee beans are ground to the size that suits your preference from very fine, expresso, to coarse, French press. Straight through grind design of the conical burr helps prevent ground coffee plugging the burr grinders. The ground coffee falls directly into the grounds bin. The device arms can easily be changed to accommodate a porta filter. Very fast grinder with a strong motor that grinds coffee very even every time. With the unique straight through design the conical burr remains stationary with the outer burr spinning. The 30 is louder than most grinders with the noise being irrelevant because of the short grinding times of less than 10 seconds. The grinder is very easy to disassemble to clean. I have found with the straight through design grinding 3 scoops of minute rice really cleans the burr mechanism. (With minute rice being a food product you don't have to worry about contaminating the unit.) All in all the Sette 30 is an excellent coffee grinder a step above your basic grinders and on par with more expensive ones.