I have a Kenmore Advantium (made by GE, don't know if they still make it) and I can use the timer no matter what else is happening. The problem you describe seems really odd to me.

Well I don't know about the advantium, but if I had it to do over again I would not get the Miele speedoven. It is so difficult to clean when I have used it as an oven that it is now just a very expensive microwave. My setup was speedoven, wall oven and warming drawer in a stack. Due to my height or rather lack thereof :) I risk burning my arms when using the speedoven as an oven as well. Mind you I do like the features of the oven but am not using them much for the above reasons. I know that you have purchased a range and so the situation is different, but there are only 2 of us as well and I entertain a fair amount. If I had it to do over I would go with 2 ovens and a regular microwave.

I wondered about the same thing before I got the 240V Advantium. But after using it for almost a year now, I think the 950W is enough. One of the things I noticed about the oven is that it has a very good sensor in it. I can just select the reheat plate of food feature, for example, and the MW will just stop on its own. It has been very accurate each time. It does the same for popcorn. There are also some items that required more MW wattage for the browning plate or packaging to work, like frozen burritos, pizzas, pockets, pasty and the like. These items come out better in the speedoven without the browning material. I don't miss the extra wattage.

Did you ever get one? I can recommend my installer (who I think has NYC in his service area). Mine is inside my second floor apartment and has caused no issues. I have a large kitchen and a two oven aga; I did keep my conventional range too but only use it very rarely. It is handy to have for large or complicated meals and for cakes which need a longer bake at a moderate temperature. The Aga does make the kitchen extremely hot in summer; I plan to shut it off for June-August moving forward. It uses a fairly significant amount of gas too, costs me about $50 monthly to run it. As a cooking tool it is fabulous! Excellent breads and incredible roast meats or veg. I don't understand the 'moist heat' comment but think she means that the radiant heat keeps the foods moist inside; my sense is that the ovens sear the outside of foods very quickly so the insides remain moist. There is also (I think) less air exchange in the ovens so vapors from cooking linger which may also help prevent drying out of food. Basic things like rice or potatoes (boiled, baked, or roasted) are so easy and almost impossible to screw up. Brings large pots of water to the boil incredibly fast (admittedly, it can only do this once and then needs time to recover). The ovens are small but can be filled right up; you cook stuff right on the floors and can pile pots on top of each other. The Aga cookware slides on the tracks on the sides of the ovens so you don't need to use shelves; I keep one shelf on the bottom of my simmering oven but otherwise don't use racks at all for the most part. It is also lovely for keeping dry towels and dish rags and keeping the kitchen warm and drying shoes and damp coats etc. The three oven adds a useful addition of 50% capacity over my two oven, plus a more moderate temperature for baking. I have heard that the baking oven tends to approach roasting oven temperatures when cooking a large meal but using the cold shelf and the large roasting tin helps to create a cooler micro-climate within the oven for things that need less intense heat. If you have a good air conditioning system, you might be fine with just the three oven to run year-round. If you throw a lot of large dinner parties or think you might want to shut it off in summer, I would only install if you have space for a small conventional range or cooktop/wall-oven combo elsewhere in the kitchen. A couple of burners (electric or gas) would be useful. The extra cooking facilities are not required but are likely helpful. Here is a link that might be useful: my Aga