Kenmore Elite 30 in. Slide-In Induction Range Review

The Good:

Purchased this range for a 2009 complete kitchen remodel. I love the fact that it's a slide-in; it really looks spiffy. Induction cooktop is GREAT. The burners provide excellent, immediate and fine-tuned control at all temperature ranges. (After a lifetime of dealing with radiant electric cooktops, this is heaven-sent.) Oven is fantastic and huge with a nice big picture-window. Overall I'm satisfied with this purchase - however, keep reading to see what I'd change.

The Bad:

The blue LED clock started to break when we'd had the range just a couple of weeks. One by one, the bars started to go out, and then one of the dots (within the colon that separates minutes from hours) disappeared - ridiculous... I of course called Kenmore to have someone come out and repair it, under warranty. I hope this is just one thing and the rest of the range is more reliable. (I mean, they haven't mastered quality-control on.... a digital clock...? Really?)

Only a couple of other things I'd change:

1) The slide-in range doesn't slide in quite far enough (in my opinion). This isn't something that the homeowner can control, really, because there's a cut-out on the plastic control-panel for the countertop overhang, and once you push it in as far as that cut-out allows you to, that's it. I really wish I could have the whole range pushed in about an inch farther, to have a more integrated look in my kitchen. I have a regular countertop depth and a regular overhang - a very plain-vanilla kitchen design - and I had the new countertop custom-installed with the range when it was newly purchased - so trust me, there's nothing "odd" about this particular setup that would cause this to happen - it's just a quirk of how the range is made, and probably (now that I look at it) due to the angle of the control-panel. Just know in advance that your range will stick out a good two inches from your base-cabinets/drawers.

2) Would be nice if there were an overall uber-lock-out button on the control panel. As it is, there's a cooktop lock-out button and a separate oven-lock button (although the oven-lock button seems to actually lock the oven door as opposed to prevent it turning on?) - but the thing is, all the buttons are mixed together on the panel; and more often than not, I want to disable the entire control panel so that it doesn't blip & beep while I'm cleaning it. Also, if I'm concerned about the kids pushing buttons willy-nilly, then I'm concerned about them pushing ALL of the buttons, not just cooktop OR oven. (Do product designers think about this?)