I've been looking at the same thing. The dropin cooktop has the controls on the cooking surface and thus you lose some cooking area (on the 36" version you only get 5 burners, not six). The cooktop has the controls on the front and slides in. The cooktop is really just the top five or so inches of a Bluestar range while the dropin is a different design. If you have a dropin already I'm guessing (hoping) that the Bluestar dropin will be an easy replacement (can someone correct me if I'm wrong on this).

a "cooktop" is a drop-in with controls on the top
a "rangetop" is the one with controls on the front

Thanks olchik!

At the moment, the Bluestar drop in is not available yet. I've been waiting two months for ours.

The Blue Star drop-in cooktop is definitely available now... I received mine (36") on February 27th. I haven't opened the box yet, but from what I hear it is pretty close to the rangetop. The main differences, I think, are the five vs six burners and that (according to guadalupe on another thread) it requires a wok ring.

I plan to post a full review once I get my cooktop up and running.

From the pictures of the BlueStar drop-in cooktop there appears to be a cast iron ring around hole of each burner. Does this serve as a wok ring if the grate is removed? If not, does anyone know if BlueStar plans to make a special wok grate for the burners that will keep the wok as low to the flame as the removable grate in the BlueStar rangetop?

jacobsmishpacha, you recieved yours??? Argh! I've been waiting forever and the appliance shop just called the other day and said it would be a couple weeks more.

I guess I'll need to have another chat with them.

Hmmm. I had originally ordered mine locally, and it seemed that the store had so little experience with Blue Star that they couldn't keep me informed (I waited a couple of months too- I ordered it originally in November).

So, I cancelled the order in January (I don't like to keep open charges for more then 60 days, as you lose most of your consumer protection), and placed on order with Trevor at Eurostoves.com. He seemed very informed, and it was through him that I received my cooktop so quickly.

I hope that you get your's soon! They are definitely shipping!

jacobsmishpacha, I am planning on ordering the drop in cooktop - is it true that you need a separate wok ring? One of the appeals of the BS for me was the fact that I could just remove the grate and put my wok there directly.

Eliz

This is the quote from guadalupe regarding the drop in cooktop:

"Seen it at an apartment in NYC, works fantastic, but unlike the pro style cook top you must use a wok ring with the unit. They may have not shipped it with your unit, but if you call they will send you at no charge. I must say I was really impressed."

I personally haven't opened mine up yet, but I will let you know more when I do. I am a bit disappointed to hear it needs a wok ring, but I think I will still be happy with it.

The appliance shop talked to the rep, and it still seems to be a couple weeks away. I'm waiting for a 30", so maybe there is a back log of orders. I'm hoping it will show up in the next week.

I'll also be a bit disappointed if it requires a wok ring.

For what it's worth, I just received an answer today from my local supplier. They were told that the cooktop has not been UL approved yet, but that they expect that to happen this week. They were also told that no cooktops have been shipped for residential use yet. This is pretty interesting since jacobsmishpacha had one delivered already!

I am supposed to get more information tomorrow. I asked about the burner locations, since the picture of the 36" cooktop on BlueStar's website has both 22K burners in the front, but the specifications on their website have one of the 22K burners in the middle back instead. I'm guessing the specs are correct and the picture is old, but I'll see if they can clarify that. Eurostoves does have a picture of one with the grate off of the burner...it's hard to tell if the ring around the hole can serve as a wok ring or not...probably not if others were already told that it needs a ring.

They also said the cooktop is a special order item (no returns). Is that what other people have heard?

One of the attractions of the BlueStar was that you could put the wok right down in the well. I too was interested in the the drop in cooktop. If it needs a wok ring, I might favor the cooktop with the controls on the front--assuming it can be be retrofitted.

Who has tried the drop-in BlueStar cooktop? Do the knobs (or the area around the knobs) get too hot to handle when there are larger pans on the 22K burners? It seems like there isn't that much space between the controls and the burners on the 36" drop-in cooktop.

Just got the word from BlueStar. The configuration of the burners is wrong on the Website

Quote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
The configuration on a 36" unit under current UL testing is as follows;

Rear L-R : simmer  15K  simmer

Front L-R : 22K - controls - 22K

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

So it looks like this is the only configuration available right now for the 36" drop-in cooktop. (It was the one that jacobsmishpacha received). There are two simmer burners...there are not two "large" burners together anywhere to use a double burner griddle.

Hmmm...By the wording of the response I'm wondering if there will be more configurations approved later. I may wait on my order for a few months. I don't really need to have two simmer burners (although the BlueStar simmer burners are almost as may BTUs as the biggest burner on my existing cooktop).

I haven't checked the Bluestar website for a while, but now I noticed two things.
1) Their splash screen on the top of their home page is announcing that the drop-in cooktops are now shipping
2) Their specs state for the 36" that the back burners are 8.5K, 8.5K and a simmer burner.

The burner sizes are a suprise to me. What do the 8.5 K burners look like? Do they have holes in the star part of the burner? I thought the simmer burner was rated near 10K, even though it had flames only in the inner circle of the burner...so it surprises me that the other two are potentially lower in BTU than the simmer burner.
For those that have received one, what type of performance have the 8.5K burners given? Do they get hot enough and is the heat even enough to use a two burner griddle/grill across the burners?