I personally believe the cutlery tray is brilliant. To answer your questions.

1. The cutlery tray is very thin and the upper rack is adjustable, so it does not block it for me.

2. The cutlery tray is quick to load. It may be a little slower than just dropping the silverware into a basket, but well worth it. I personally don't find it any more time consuming.

3. You probably wouldn't take the trays out to unload them. The one on the left is narrower than the silverware, and if you were to pick it up, the silverware would fall off. Although, I haven't removed them to put silverware away, so others would answer that better. Now my drawer is not adjacent either, so I just grab all the forks in one hand and all the spoons and knives in the other and carry them over. It's a breeze.

I love the cultery tray! I pretty much "assigned" sections of the tray to be used for the different flatware pieces during the first few loads we ran and now just automatically place things in their designated sections. I'll occasionally move stuff forward or back if I need space for a serving piece or something, but that's just about the only time it takes me any longer to load.

To unload, I just grab a handful of forks, spoons, whatever, and drop them in the cutlery drawer right next to the DW.

The only thing I don't like, is the fact that stuff flips over/pops out of their slots if we open/close the cutlery tray with any degree of force. Don't know if it's inherent to the design of the rray, or the shape/curvature of our flatware. That is annoying. I try to remember to open and close that tray a little less forcefully for awhile, 'til I forget again!

I don't like the cutlery tray - I love it! Primary reasons, the extra space on the bottom rack, the feeling that the cultery is perfectly spaced and will get thorough cleaning. Ok, it tends to make you a little anal, but doesn't everyone already have their peculiarities when it comes to loading the DW?

Mine is an older model which has one big tray. Yes, it's easy to lift out, but I've never done it. Like cat mom, I just scoop out the knives and big spoons, then the forks and little spoons, whatever.

LOVE the cutlery tray!!! I'm convinced that our cutlery is a lot cleaner these days. I was concerned that loading it would take a lot of time & effort, but it doesn't.

There are 3 washer arms in the DW, so the cutlery doesn't block anything else. Bulky items immediately below could block the cutlery tray, but we haven't noticed any bad effects.

We store our cutlery in an island top drawer across from our DW--very convenient. For a far away location, I'd carry a storage tray or basket from the drawer to the DW for loading.

I have the Miele Slimline (18 inch), and I'm loving the tray. Husband thinks it's a little tedious, but I feel like I'm giving my flatware a little TLC with very little effort. Everything comes out clean and sparkly!

Another enthusiastic "yes" vote for the cutlery tray. Like cat_mom, I now automatically put the same kind of flatware in the same general location in the tray without even thinking about it. It doesn't really take any extra time at all and when the dishes are clean it's super easy to just grab all of the forks or spoons or whatever and put them away.

I can't ever imagine buying a dishwasher that didn't have the cutlery tray in the future.

I absolutely love the cutlery tray! While it may take a few more seconds to fit each piece in, unloading clean-every-time silverware is so worth it and easier to sort back into the drawers.

Thanks all! 100% enthusiasm, pretty impressive.

I love it too! It really doesn't take a lot of extra time to load it and the benefit is that unloading is a breeze. My flatware seems much cleaner. My only issue is my husband has been hard to train on the loading end of it.

I have to agree w/ alexamd re: DH and training--mine always messes up my "system!" LOL!

I love it but also admit I am a little anal. My wife who is not as anal also likes it but has trouble loading it properly (to my way of thinking). She did see what I was talking about when I showed how easy it is to unload if you load it with everything grouped. Loading this way does not take any longer.

She did make one comment that it seems like loading this dishwasher is actually faster than the old one. She is not sure why just seems that way. I believe it is the better use of space makes it quicker and easier.

As already mentioned here the cutlery does seem to clean better.

We've had our Miele dishwasher for 6 years now and still DH doesn't load the silverware the way I've shown him for so many years.
Whenever I use (load and unload) my D's DW,(she doesn't have a Miele)I am reminded how much I love my cutlery tray.

I was leary of the silverware rack as I purchased it. It was installed just before my family arrived for Christmas. My sister upon first loading it said this is a pain in the ass to load....then she unloaded it....and said wow, love the unloading = makes up for the loading. By the end of the weekend she was begging her husband for a new DW, one with a silverware rack. I overheard her logic to him and chuckled:

1.) There's way more room with the basket gone on the bottom rack
2.) Unloading clean silverware is a breeze and you never worry about touching the eating end. You just grab the whole group of spoons by the handles and drop them in the drawer.
3.) They seem to always get clean because they are always separated - where in the basket they can end up jammed in.

As for me! I too LOVE IT! Won't go back to the basket in the lower part.