I’ve been having exactly the same thoughts. Also a James Hoffman recommendation seems to be one of the key indicators of whether people want full price s/h.duncs500 wrote: Tue Sep 09, 2025 6:43 pmI'm in the middle of exactly the same thought process, but I think I'll probably land on the Baratza. I've been scouring the web to try and get a bargain DF54 but, not for the first time, I'm finding that coffee people tend to think that their equipment does not depreciate as they want practically the same money for the used stuff and are unwilling to negotiate (presumably they sell it, so they just be right I suppose!).Jobbo wrote: Tue Sep 09, 2025 9:49 am I think I'd get bored pretty quickly with a manual grinder. And in the £250 grinders video he does say the Baratza's downside is that it's noisy and he wouldn't want it in his home for that reason. So I'd be tempted to spend £240 on the DF54, though apparently that's a bit messy :laugh: Get out the Timculator and check out his sub-£500 grinder video...
Yes yes, I know it's probably not gonna taste much different but £160 isn't the end of the world for a present for one's self.![]()
The thing is, there are probably loads of really good grinders that are barely different in terms of their output and we’d all likely be very happy with a lot of them. But we all deify JH’s picks because we basically all don’t have a clue.
It’s like chocolate. I’ve done blind taste tests with a range of 70% dark chocolates between cheap Tesco and £30 a bar stuff. Most people prefer the cheap Tesco stuff. So either you need to be schooled on what ‘good’ is, otherwise we’re all just cosplaying at having sophisticated tastes