Hey, I'm CNet's Ry Crist and I'm standing here beside Whirlpool's Gold Series 6.2 cubic feet freestanding electric range with fast pre-heat, model WFE720H0AS.
Let's call it the Whirlpool from now on.
Like I said, this is a free standing electric range.
That you can slide into your kitchen or where ever you want.
And, it's got four main burner's, and one keep warm burner on this smooth top cooking surface.
Now, the feature's this thing has, are kind of minimal, it's got a triple ring burner here, that you can.
Expand to how big you want it to be, kinda nice for flexible cooking depending on the size of your pot.
It also has this rapid boil burner here on the front right that'll boil water a little faster using a little extra wattage.
When I tested it out the rapid preheat decreased the preheat time by about 20 percent and that's not bad but it's still not as good as the fast preheat mode on this Electrolux model that decreases preheating time by about 33 percent.
As for the oven, you're looking at a 6.2 cubic foot convection oven.
So it's got that fan in the back that circulates the hot air throughout the oven for more even and slightly faster cooking in some cases.
And that's about as far as this oven will take you in terms of features.
It's got a recessed baking element which is nice.
It hides the coils.
You won't drop food on it.
And you can put water over the top that for an easy self clean cycle.
They call that AquaLift.
but again, not terribly uncommon in ovens at this price range.
Still, the lack of flashy, exciting features aside, this Whirlpool gets the little things right, and it cooks well.
In our tests, it never disappointed us.
We cooked the usual roast chicken test and biscuits and I also made a lot of sweet stuff, some cookies and brownies, and with all of it the Whirlpool did a nice job.
Now let's talk about some of these small little things that I like a lot.
First off, the knobs.
A lot of ovens right now are kind of going all in when it comes to touch controls.
They've got multiple buttons for each buttons for each burner, and it makes for a cluttered display, and not a very practical one.
Whirlpool has resisted that temptation with this oven, and I'm really glad they did it, cause for me, knobs just make a lot more sense when it comes to how you control your burners.
Another thing I like is that you've got this hot surface light.
This comes on once the burners get hot.
But it stays on even after you turn them off.
Because the burners don't instantly get cold.
That's great, because it's not always obvious when the burners are hot, after you've turned the stove off.
And that can help keep you from burning yourself.
I like that, it's a good little feature.
This Whirlpool Gold Series free standing range, retails for $1249.
And that's a little on the expensive side.
But not quite as expensive as a comparable model from Kitchen-Aid.
And it's also $300 less than that Electrolux model.
For its solid performance in the kitchen, and it's keen attention to detail, I think this is a pretty good oven.
And if you find it on sale, maybe consider it for your kitchen.
For C Net, I'm Ry Crist.
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