I have a Miele Excella not the FP dish drawers. However, I rented a home with the FP drawers over the summer and every time I loaded or unloaded it I asked myself why anyone would buy the drawers. The drawer configuration was so limiting. Now admittedly I haven't looked at the drawers in the store and perhaps they have different sizes, but I would not buy them based on my experience at the rental.

I can fit so much in the Miele and the option to adjust the configuration is great. The excella has a split cutlery tray that can be removed if your items on the top rack are too tall, ( I don't think the Optima has this feature). The top rack easily adjusts up and down to make room on the bottom or top racks. The way the sprayers are set up you can load it to the max and still expect things to get clean. Honestly, the only items that consistently are not perfectly clean are cake pans. For some reason there is always a crumb or two left no matter how I place them. It does an awesome job on dirty pots and pans, even on the regular cycle.

I just don't know how you would load the drawers to be able to fit the larger items. With the drawers we were always running a load, with dirty dishes waiting in the sink. Take your pots and pans to the store and load the drawers yourself to see if they would work.

I'll be interested to see what others on the board think. I will say there is a learning curve on loading the Miele. At first I couldn't figure out how to maximize the space, but now I rarely have a dirty dish left over. If you entertain that much, perhaps you should consider a second dishwasher.

I'll be interested to see what others on the board think. I will say there is a learning curve on loading the Miele. At first I couldn't figure out how to maximize the space, but now I rarely have a dirty dish left over. If you entertain that much, perhaps you should consider a second dishwasher.
I think you will find that theres a learning curve with the FP dishdrawers as well. After we purchased the unit we had to learn how to "load " dishes and such and now find that we actually have about 1.5 times more space than a conventional dishwasher. We appreciate not bending over loading and being able to wash one drawer while loading dirty dishes in the other- our sink is virtually empty all the time

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take a look at the abysmal reliability of the FP drawers on CU -- save yourself the headache and go Miele

If you are doing a lot of entertaining, I'd get the Miele (really the best DW manufacturer IMHO), and then also get one dishdrawer that would handle just the glasses and/or the overflow from a party. But I agree that F&P doesn't get good marks in reliability. There are other dish drawer manufacturers; do a search on this forum.

There are only two drawer dishwasher manufacturers for all the brands sold in the U.S. far as I'm aware. F&P under their own label and DCS, and the first models that KitchenAid sold. Whirlpool manufactures a different design, units sold as Kenmore, current KitchenAid models, and Maytag.

F&P units are not so bad as they're made out to be. Perhaps people aren't aware that F&P has been producing them since 1997. I don't think they'd last 12+ years on the market if it was a bad product. Mine is 6 years 1 month old, never any repairs needed, and I have no complaints about the performance. It's very true that they don't fit everyone's "dishwasher lifestyle" but they can work very well when the shoe fits.

Love my F&P dishwasher drawers! There is a learning curve to figuring out the best way to load them, but once you do, they hold a ton. They don't have as many cleaning modes as the Miele that I looked at when I was shopping, but I haven't regretted my choice. I don't ever want to go back to a traditional dishwasher. The drawers are so much more ergonomic and I adore having two dishwashers.

Once again CR's guage is off kilter.

They overwhelming majority of DD problems stem from improper installation and/or operator error. Now some may find fault that machines should be intuative to install and operate , but that's a separate arguement entirely.

Yes it's a bit wonky to load, but the access can be phenomenal for those with bad backs (single drw. models)

They are also great for bar ware and glasses.

We installed the Miele Optima and one FP drawer in our new build. Both are wonderful. The Miele is next to our farmhouse sink and carries the main burden of dishes as well as pots and pans. Last week I put in a pan DH used to cook sausage. It had baked on grease and meat scraps but came out perfectly clean on the pots and pans cycle. I've never had any dishwasher before that could such a good job. The FP drawer is next to my prep sink and everything I use in prep goes in there so I never have anything messy sitting on my island (which faces the great room and will eventually have bar stools around it). This one also does a great job of cleaning but nothing really dirty with baked on food has gone into it yet. It is, however, a great convenience to have it for when just the two of us are at home and for the overflow when everyone in the family is home visiting or we have guests for dinner. Both machines do require a bit of getting used to for loading but I think that is true for every dishwasher. HTH.