****** - Verified Buyer
4.5
I had done copious research prior to making this purchase. I had wanted the 300-sheet capacity model, but I could not readily find one at the time. I purchased a returned, 150-sheet capacity model. It came directly from the North American headquarters from Dahle, located in New Hampshire, arriving in a day. Instructions were useless. However, it was easy to figure out. At first, the shredder did nothing when I simply powered on and placed a stack of sheets inside. Pressing the forward button solved that. It can be tripped up by envelopes or by papers with frayed edges. Overall, it is extremely reliable. In the first days of ownership, I needed to clear a backlog. I shredded a set of 3,000 pages, and then a set of 2,000 pages. at P-4 size, that filled 2.5 lawn-care bags, or 75 gallons. The shredder did not overheat (sometimes, in the case of a rare paper-jam, it will say it is overheated; take paper out, turn off, turn back on, press forward to clear paper remnants, then reload). Shredding 3,000 pages took approximately 15 minutes of my own time, due to the abiltiy to load and walk away. This shredder will pay for itself in a year based on the opportunity cost of my billable hours (I am a trial lawyer). If I get five years out of it, which seems likely based on the build quality, I'll be very pleased and order another one to replace it. Any time beyond that will be gravy. I had budgeted $1,500 for a much larger shredder, but this thing is a little champ. Each day, I load it and forget it. And when I'm done with a trial, it just chomps up the trial binder, so they're no longer floating about my office. Same thing with large sets of medical records. What a great machine, with the German engineering and very good build quality showing through. Plus, with a smaller size, the bin is easy to tip into a bag. The bin holds about two stacks worth, or 300 pages worth of shreds. All in all, I could hardly be more pleased. Very high-impact, bang-for-buck, quality shredder, that has already met and exceeded expectations. [For background, my prior shredders include, inter alia: a gigantic, straight-cut, industrial shredder from the eighties (straight-cut fills bags too quickly, and a single, plastic gear proved to be an Achilles heel; and, a 24-sheet Amazon Basics shredder that had been impressive, but that used a lot of electricity, and that I had to stand there and feed, losing time).] The shredder says it does not need to be oiled. I'll probably oil the blades periodically. Noise is medium-level. Another reviewer had stated he could do phone-calls in the same room. That is probably true of a large room, but not a small one. At this size and price, I would not consider that a demerit. I would order this auto-feed shredder over many, very expensive, commercial shredder models that are not auto-feed. It will undoubtedly pay for itself over time.
