Keurig 2.0 K550 Cup or Carafe Brewing Machine Review – #HelloKeurig

 

The first thing I do in the morning after I’ve gotten my kiddos ready for school and hubby off to work is make breakfast and have a cup of coffee.  I have enjoyed Keurig ever since I first discovered it 4 years ago.  It’s great to be able to brew a single cup of coffee.  One thing I did miss was being able to brew a carafe of coffee when people came for a visit.  No more is that an issue.  Thanks to Influenster my family got to try a the K550 Cup or Carafe Brewing system of the Keurig 2.0 line.

The stylish K550 comes with an 80 ounce water reservoir, a digital touch screen control and a thermal carafe for brewing 4 cups of coffee at one shot.  The footprint of the machine is the same as my old Keurig machine.  Another nice feature of the machine is that the reservoir cover hinges so I don’t have to remove the top completely to refill it.  Also, the portion which holds the K-Cup and K-Carafe cups hinges only as high as the old machine so I didn’t have to worry about not having enough under cabinet room.

The reservoir is back lit and you can change the color of the light to your liking to red, green, blue or white.  The digital touchscreen can also be customized with different colors or texture backgrounds. There is an on/off timer for the unit, a nightlight function and an auto off function.  There is even a brew timer for the K-Carafe.  There were a few things with the timers and nightlights that I noticed did not work flawlessly.  If the auto off function was on then the nightlight function wouldn’t work.  This was also the case if you set an on/off time for the unit.  The machine would turn on automatically to brew the K-Carafe cup at your specified time, but I noticed that the clock on the unit DID NOT work when the machine itself was off.  This was a disappointment since our old Keurig had a clock display that worked whether the unit was on or off.  We determined for the reservoir back light, nightlight and digital clock to display the unit had to be on 24/7.

We discovered that the K550 is a very polite machine.  When the reservoir runs low on water the digital display lets us know by showing “More Water Please”.  If the filter cartridge needs replacing the unit lets you now with a cordial little message and the ability to ignore it temporarily.  Even if you don’t have the reminder turned on there is a useful calendar on the top of the filter holder that is easily read from the top of the unit.

The most disappointing development of the the Keurig 2.0 line is that the My KCup is no longer compatible with the machine.  Also, no non-Keurig cups are compatible with the unit.  I used to be able to run hot water for tea or hot chocolate with just the push of a button, now I have to press and hold the button for the full cycle in order for it to work.  It’s annoying and inconvenient in comparison to my previous experience.  In addition, though the cycle is supposed to produce 6 ounces of hot water it is not consistent.  Two out of three times it produces less than 6 ounces.  I created a K-hack to get around the having to press and hold the button to get just a cup of hot water.  I cut the bottom out of a used K-cup and pulled the filter and coffee out of the bottom.  The used cup was washed out and the filter carefully pulled out without disturbing the aluminum cover.  This fools the unit into believing there is a genuine K-cup and allows me to run any of the K-cup only cycles.

My husband noticed that the air push that forces the excess water out of the K-cup is inadequate compared to older units.  The K-cups drip a lot longer and come out more wet than what we are used to. The machine is super noisy too compared to older units.  The pump seems to work a lot harder and less consistently.

The K550 is available on the Keurig website for $179.

PROS:

• 80 ounce water reservoir
• Strength selector – slightly slows the brewing process to produce a bolder cup of coffee no matter the K-Cup used
• Ability to brew K-Cups and K-Carafe (4 to 6 cups)
• Hot Water on Demand
• Very stylish and surprisingly compact design
• Back lit reservoir
• Digital touchscreen controls

CONS:

• Accepts ONLY Keurig certified K-cups (the unit reads the lids)
• Hot Water On Demand cycle is not consistent and requires the “Keurig” button to be pressed the whole time
• Auto Off, On/Off Timers and Nightlight functions cannot be used simultaneously.
• Digital clock does not display if the unit is off.
• The air push cycle is inadequate compared to older units.

The Verdict
If I were looking to purchase a new Keurig machine I would seek out a unit from the original line before I would opt to purchase from the Keurig 2.0 line.  The carafe function is nice, but it’s something I would very, very rarely use.  The loss of being able to use the My KCup was a HUGE downfall. There are coffees that I like that I can only get locally and not in K-cups.  Now with the K550 I can’t brew them like I used to be able to with the K65 Signature and the B65 Platinum.  I really hope Keurig comes out with a My KCup 2.0. I prefer functionality over fluff.