Nespresso C520 Gran Maestria Espresso Maker, Titanium Review

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List Price: $699.00
Sale Price: $639.16
Today's Bonus: 9% Off

I purchased the Gran Maestria on April 20th and the first one would not work... I received a loaner (the Pixie) after waiting a week and received another Gran Maestria in about 3 weeks... it worked but had several unaccepted scratches on it and I sent it back for another one. I was told that it was at the discretion of the company to send me a refurbished unit. I received another unscratched unit and had it for 3 days and the unit made a loud pop and smoke came out of it and now it does not work. I have purchased over a hundred dollars in coffee and will try this experiment one more time before asking for my money back... the service people were very nice and apologized for my inconvenience but I want a machine that works...

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I like the Nespresso System you have to join the "club" and the coffee is not the cheapest but it is great quality and the customer service is outstanding. I have had a couple of sleeves of coffee capsules come bent Nespresso exchanged them for free and had them to my door the next day.

The machine itself is great. It is made aluminum much higher quality that the more plastic Nespresso models. I like the fact hat you can easily change the volume of hot water going into your shot on the fly with other machines you can program to a volume, but that is about it. Having the frother right there is nice, the cup warmer is a bit of a gimmick but impresses friends and family. The machine is made in Switzerland and the fit and finish are first class. It is rock solid and after using it every day for the last 4 months I have yet to have any issues.

Overall you get what you pay for and this is a nice, no mess, quality machine. Just know what you are getting into with the Nespresso coffee universe...

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I'm back from a recent trip to Italy where I drank cappuccinos nearly all day long. I have a Starbucks Barista, but it takes too long to make cappuccinos and clean up. The Nespresso machines make nice drinks that are quick and easy.

I read a lot about the Maestria (and other Nespresso machines) being DOA. Well, mine was too. It made all the right noises, just didn't pump water. I figured the pump wasn't primed so I ran the descaling procedure a couple times and pumped a lot of water through the cup heater. Then I put it on the regular, espresso-making cycle and hit the luongo button several times. Each time the pump sounded a little different until finally the water made it out of the nozzle. So if your Maestria makes a pump sound but doesn't pump water, don't get upset, just be a little patient and do what I did.

It takes only 30 seconds for the machine to come up to temperature (lights on front stop blinking) after the power is turned on. That's how long it takes me to get a cup ready. After that, you can make espressos one after another without delay. This machine would work well for entertaining a lot of people. The temperature of the espressos and cappiccinos it makes is good. If you want a really, really hot temperature you might be disappointed. Yesterday I want to a Nespresso outlet in Costa Mesa California. The espresso I had there was much hotter (too hot in my opinion). The people working said the machines are used constantly and are hotter than normal home use.

The cup heater on the left side of the machine shoots a stream of hot water inside an inverted cup. The water drains into the drip tray. It has limited usefulness since it only works on very small cups. It's OK for espresso cups, but won't work with most cappuccino cups. The problem is that 3 switches on the Nespresso need to be pressed at the same time by the rim of the cup. But only the smallest diameter cups will press the switches. If the cup diameter is more than about 2.25 inches, it won't press all 3 switches. I've been warming my cups by filling them with a luongo shot of hot water. That way both the cup and the machine gets pre heated and primed. I wish they would have left off the cup warmer and made the footprint smaller.

The Aeroccino 4 froths the milk really well. You fill the cup up to the "Max" mark (which is a little difficult to see in poor light) and press the "on" button. There are 4 settings, cold frothed milk, warm milk, warm milk with loose froth (perfect for lattes), and warm milk with dense froth (perfect for cappuccinos). There is a circular wire wisk inside the Aeroccino 4 that sticks to the bottom on a small post by a magnet. It's really easy to remove and install. The wisk is spun quickly with a magnet under the cup. The milk doesn't burn since the inside of the cup has a non-stick coating. It's really easy to clean too. It's dishwasher safe, but it's just as easy to wipe out with a sponge. Advantages the Aeroccino 4 has over a steam wand are: 1. you can make cold frothed mild for cold drinks, 2. it is much quieter. Advantages of the steam wand are: 1. you can make much more frothed milk if you are making many drinks at once (the Aeroccino 4 is only good for about 2 drinks per batch), 2. you can make frothed milk much hotter).

The Aeroccino 4 is really quick and nearly silent too. It takes only about 90 seconds to make enough frothed milk for one or two lattes or cappuccinos. I found the temperature to be fine, but if you want really hot drinks you might be disappointed.

I really wanted to get the Maestria (not Gran), but I found a new Gran Maestria in Titanium color (a medium gray color) from a liquidator for half price. It was probably a return or store model. The box was a bit thrashed, but all the parts were present and accounted for.

I was surprised how small the unit looked on my kitchen counter. It's low enough to fit easily under my wall cabinets (which are 18.5 inches high) even with enough room to lift the capsule lever. He lever requires about 17.5 inches to open fully. The footprint is a bit big, so measure first if you're space limited. The footprint of the Maestria would be much smaller.

The construction and build quality is extremely nice. Most of the machine is cast aluminum with a nice paint job. The rocker-type power switch on the back and the two dials on the front have a silky smooth feel and look great. The grates that the cup rests on are chrome plated steel, not plastic like most. The machine rests on 3 small, rubber feet. When the pump is on, there is some noise, but not overly loud or obnoxious and the machine does not vibrate or walk around on the counter.

The two knobs on the front of the machine control the volume of each shot. The one on the left goes from 0.8oz 2oz and the one of the right from 2.35oz 5oz. I was skeptical how accurate these were, and I had read that the shot size wasn't consistent. So I tested the accuracy and consistency. After a lot of testingI found the shot sizes to be extremely consistent (within 1ml, or 0.03oz), and the volume was within 10% of the volumes stated on the Nespresso operator's manual for each setting.

The water tank is large enough that you don't have to fill it often. I suspect the Maestria with the steam wand uses more water. The tank is easy to remove and install. The used capsule holder and drip tray are also nicely sized for daily use without the need for constant emptying.

It looks like there is a cable routing feature to shorten the length of the power cable, but I can't figure out how it works. The cable is too thick to route around the tortuous path. So I coiled the cable up behind the machine and used cable ties.

Overall a really nice machine. I hope that helps.

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I purchased this for my wife's birthday. She looks just like the woman on the Nespresso commercial, right...

The delivery from Amazon was fantastic, as usual, with Prime...

She unpacked the box, read the instructions, then filled the water reservoir. Unfortunately, when she tried to do the initial pump prime, nothing happened. She called the Nespresso help line. They were very helpful, but to make a long story short, her new machine is being shipped back to their repair center for repair.

We're both disappointed. Nespresso can redeem themselves with a quick turnaround, but if she has to wait weeks for a functioning machine... Well, we'll see.

I'm happy to report that we received the packing crate for the product return the next day. Packing the machine was easy. We dropped the package at the UPS store down the street that afternoon. The repaired machine was back at our home within 3 business days in perfect working condition.

The quality of the coffees that we've made have been excellent and have exceeded our expectations. I changed my rating to 4 stars, not 5, reflecting our initial DOA experience.

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We really wanted this espresso maker to work. We had tried a Nespresso machine in our hotel room last year and loved the taste and convenience. Unfortunately, this machine was a problem right out of the box. We read all the directions, prepped the unit and pushed the button. There was a hum and then it stopped. No water came out. We tried several more times. Back to the directions. We tried the so-called descaling process and found that the cup warmer worked but still no water for espresso. We tried a couple more times. No water, no espresso.

After about an hour of reading and rereading directions, I called the Nespresso club hotline. As soon as I explained the problem, the woman knew exactly what was wrong--the pump was too tight. She said that this was a fairly common problem with this particular model. The only way to fix it was to send it back to the factory, a process that would take at least three to four weeks when factoring in shipping time back and forth.

I asked her why Nespresso had not tested this machine at the factory before sending it out for sale. Since the machine does not work at all, the problem would have been evident as soon as it was turned on. I was told that the problem does not affect every espresso maker so the company has decided to allow customers to discover which ones are faulty on their own, and then deal with it only when the customers call to complain. In other words, Nespresso wants to save itself time and money by not checking the machines it sells, but thinks nothing of wasting the time and money of customers who trust that they are buying working machines. This is completely unacceptable for any company selling a product to the public, let alone one charging $700 for an espresso machine.

I understand that there may be occasionally a lemon or two, but this problem with the pump is common enough that Nespresso is aware of it and still takes no action to rectify the problem or warn customers. We would never have bought this machine if we had known about this issue. Our free time is scarce and we wasted a good bit of it this morning trying to get this machine to work. After calling Nespresso, I then had to call Amazon to arrange for a return and repack the machine in the box.

I told an Amazon representative about our experience and suggested that Amazon either stop carrying this product or put a note explaining this problem on its website so customers can decide whether to take their chances.

As for us, we will not be buying from Nespresso again even though we do like the coffee. There are too many other companies out there that respect their customers for us to waste any more money, time, or energy on Nespresso.