GE's Artistry Series range offers high-end design at a low price

Hey I'm CNet's Ryan Crist, here with an electric range from the GE Artistry series of appliances. Now this is a $600 range that's designed to look like it costs a little bit more. You can see the retro design, the analog clock up here, the stainless steel accent, the nice knobs in the front. I think it's a very good looking stove. And this is one that I've been eager to test out for that reason. Now the [UNKNOWN] range comes in white and black models like the one you see here, and also in gas and electric, and usually with a gas stove you're gonna pay a little more than you would for the electric model, but that's not the case here. Both the gas and the electric and both colors of each cost $600, so it's a nice value either way. Now one retro design element that the electric model seen here- [MUSIC] Doesn't go for is the old coil design that you see in most cheap electric stoves. So, you get a smooth cooktop, it's easy to clean, easy to work with. You get four burners of different sizes. You get a power burner that's gonna bring it up to a boil a little faster with some extra wattage. That's a nice feature, this is a nice cooktop. I like that quite a bit. I also like that the oven has a nice roomy five cubic foot capacity, and also this nice stainless steel handle. It's very sturdy. It feels. Durable and well built. I like that. What I don't like however are these knobs. They look okay from a distance, but once you get your hands on them they rattle around a little bit too much for my liking. And you can also feel that they're made out of plastic, not steel. They're a little flimsy feeling. Almost like a toy [MUSIC] Now, that might seem like a pretty specific quibble. But it does play into exactly what this oven is trying to offer. It's passing up all the usual features that you pay for. And instead, giving you some extra design oomph for your money. That means that you don't get a timer on the clock. You don't get a self clean feature. You don't get any presets. There's really nothing to this oven, except the design. And so the design's gotta be pretty good. I think GE's done a good job, except for those knobs. If they had gotten those knobs right, been a little more. Sturdy, made them out of actual steel, this would have been a much better scoring oven. All in all, though, I think GE hit the retro appeal out of the park, here. And if you like the way this oven looks, it performed just fine. So I think you'll be happy with it, at that low price of $600. Thanks for watching. Be sure to check out my full review of this oven at cnet.com, along with the rest of my appliance reviews. For CNet, I'm [UNKNOWN]. [MUSIC]