After a lot of research, reading everything I could get my hands on here on the forum and elsewhere, changing my mind a dozen or more times, I finally bought the GE Cafe dual fuel range and refrigerator at the end of 2009. I had used an all electric range for over 40 years so buying a range with a gas cooktop was a huge leap of faith for me. I was so sure I would NEVER buy or use gas but I have to say that I am absolutely crazy for the Cafe dual fuel! I love everything about it--the powerful front burners, the small back burner for simmering or small pots, the center griddle, the convection oven, the lower warming drawer that can also bake up to 450 degrees, the big beefy professional looking knobs. It is only 36 inches wide but looks so much bigger. There was a bit of a learning curve for me in using gas for the first time in my life but once mastered no problem. I like the Cafe refrigerator as well because of the clean uncluttered front--didn't want water or ice in the door--wouldn't use it. My only whine is that you must open both doors to access the full width bottom drawer. There is only two of us so size isn't a problem but for a larger family, it might be. It can be overwhelming with so many brands and features but do your homework and I think you'll feel more confident in your final choice.

We had a bad experience. Our dishwasher was broken on arrival. It didn't work right out of the box. It smelled like mold. Repairing it was a nightmare. It took over a month. Here are some warnings/things I wish I had known based on our experience: 1. You may not be able to return your dishwasher due to it being defective or non-operational. If your dishwasher is—like ours was—defective right out of the box, the procedure for resolving that issue is for GE to send out technicians to repair it, often using parts that themselves are not new and may require weeks to arrive. You can only return your faulty dishwasher AFTER the technician declares it unserviceable. How many months of hand-washing your dishes will that take? 2. Cafe’s return policy ONLY applies to dishwashers purchased directly on their website. If you buy it through a designer for a discount, you may be (like we were) completely ineligible for a return. If you do buy it from the website, you are given a 7-day return policy (in which you need to pay for return shipping) or 30 days in which you can return it for store credit minus a 25% restocking and pickup fee. And after 30 days, your dishwasher is unreturnable and unreplaceable. In the event your dishwasher is defective, it could take you (as it took us) 2-4 WEEKS to get a technician to even look at your dishwasher. This means that, BY THE TIME A TECHNICIAN ARRIVES TO TELL YOU YOUR DISHWASHER IS DEFECTIVE, IT MAY ALREADY BE TOO LATE TO RETURN IT. Catch-22. 3. Service quality is disappointing. Cafe uses subcontractors to deal with service calls. If your dishwasher breaks down or is defective, this means that you may be dealing with a company that is slow, unreliable in showing up for appointments, and may have technicians who are not knowledgeable. As was the case with our technician (from RR appliance in Miami), they may have NEVER EVEN SEEN a Cafe dishwasher before. And these are technicians who were scheduled through Cafe’s own customer service department. 4. Cafe ONLY stands by its product for 1 year after purchase. After that, your warranty expires. Given that there seems to be quality control issues, if you aspire to have a working dishwasher for, say 6 years, you will probably want to price into your purchase the cost of an extended warranty. At the time of this review, the cost for a 5-year warranty from Assurant (…it starts after your factory warranty expires) is $457.75. 5. And…while we are on the topic of extra costs, it may be helpful to price in the cost to you of a dishwasher that is non-operational because you are waiting for a technician to arrive or for parts to get shipped in. In our case, we had to hand wash dishes for over a month before we were able to successfully run a single load in our brand-new, right-out-of-the-box dishwasher. That is 1/12 OF THE ENTIRE WARRANTEE LIFE of the product that we spent hand washing dishes because Cafe/GE doesn’t have the infrastructure it needs to provide fast, efficient service for its products. On the plus side, it is a beautiful-looking dishwasher. And if you (like we did) got it with the matching fridge, range, and microwave, you are pretty much stuck with it.

I don't know how much difference there is between models of KitchenAid refrigerators. We have a 42" french door side by side - it is a huge piece of junk! It has the poorest interior design you can imagine, and really no way to re-arrange it. The interior parts feel cheap, and do not operate or fit well. Almost 10K, and it's awful! Totally on me - I had had a new Whirlpool a few years earlier (different house) that I loved. I thought KA was a step up, so I didn't research or study it like I should have. Just want to warn others to look closely!

Have you received your appliances yet? I have been waiting 5 months but am nervous as I saw a post of someone waiting 15 months! Not sure if this is the same with other companies as my KitchenAid fridge has been delayed too.