Review on Black Oster Electric Wine Opener by Scott Tompkins

Third edit. I lowered my rating to 3 stars as the device died a few years ago. I think I killed it trying to remove bits of cork stuck in it. This device requires either prolonged immersion in the cork to avoid breaking fragile corks, or an easy way to open the device to remove bits of cork. to the review. I downgraded my rating from 5 to 4 stars. I still love this opener. But every now and then it pops a real cork, mostly with very good or old wines, especially when you really don't feel like it. I finally understand why he's doing this. The screw itself goes into a little over half of the cork, so if it hasn't tightened dead center or the cork is a little brittle from age, it will tear it. Tonight he broke the top half of the cork, so I figured I'd take the torn piece out of the opener, put a screw in it, and pull out the rest. Well, the screw just doesn't go that deep, and I think that's why it sometimes pops out of the plugs. It seems this could easily be fixed if Oster wanted to. It's also a very fast corkscrew, so it has quite a high gear. From time to time, even when it's almost fully charged, it messes up and just stalls. Then you have to step back and try again, and sometimes that's why the cork pops out. So Oster should build a two-speed automatic that downshifts when driving in tight traffic. Or they could build the smallest "CVT" in the world. I think I'm joking about these suggestions, but that's it. In any case, I am still satisfied with the device for the money and would buy it again. ==================== - Original entry below. about two years ago. I was tired of changing/charging batteries so figured it should be rechargeable. I researched some of them and saw so many good reviews for this device that I decided to take it. It's much faster than my old battery powered device. Another thing that REALLY impressed me is that I don't have to hold the bottle. This opener seems to grab the bottle when it's uncorked to keep it from spinning in my hands. My battery operated opener required a very firm grip on the bottle and sometimes the bottle would spin in my hands when a little wet. I've only had the Oster for about four days, so I can't comment on how reliable it is. But so far I am very happy with the purchase. I have opened both real and artificial corks. But the litmus test would be Kendall Jackson's Chardonnay, whose fake cork almost always stuck in my old bottle opener. If Kendall gets stuck, I'll have to downgrade my rating from five to four stars. =========== 1. Rating update below. I wrote the above review of this cork after owning it for about four days. I love it and still give five stars. But one thing I didn't understand from the user manual is that it doesn't ask you to turn off the charging station after the device is fully charged. All they tell you is to return it to base after use. This means you can leave it connected to the network. They say it will open x # bottles before it needs to be charged, but that's not the same as telling us to unplug the device after it's fully charged. I was wondering about the usual rules for rechargeable batteries in the sense that it's not good to recharge after each use of a product. To get the best battery life, you should train your battery storage by almost depleting it and then recharging it. So I wrote to product support and they said exactly that. Disconnect the base after the device is fully charged and simply use the base as a rest for the device after each use. I read a number of reviews on this site saying they liked the device, but after a while it opened fewer and fewer bottles before needing a charge. I suspect most of these people are constantly charging their devices through no fault of their own as the manual isn't clear on this. I'd rather spend the extra five dollars and put the power switch on a stand than cycle it off and on again. But that's not a big problem either. I still love this device. It is very fast and requires little physical strength to use. Great design. I still haven't tried the endurance test, this is the artificial cork by Kendall Jackson. This thing was always stuck in my battery. Maybe I'll have a bottle this weekend. :-)