Who wants ice-cold drink in less than 10 minutes?

If you find yourself answering to this question you must also know about ice makers that are revolutionizing the house parties. Gone are the days when people had to depend on their good old freezer which took a minimum of 3 hour to freeze ice.

And either you pack it as much as you could to get the maximum amount of ice or you went to supermarket to but bags full of ice to stock them in freezer for the planned party. In both the instances you run the risk of going short of ice, sometimes sooner than later.

The solution to the problem came in the form of ice makers designed for home use. And some like Della are capable of produce ice in 6 minutes!

So, if you are also thinking of buying a ice maker for home, this buying guide is just for you.

Ice Maker

Types of Ice Makers

Like with most of the kitchen appliance that tend to be bigger in size, ice makers also come in two types:

1. Portable or Counter-top Ice Makers

As the name explains, these can kept anywhere near a electricity supply socket, plugged in and they start giving you ice within minutes of pushing the Start button. Of course you need to fill in water as well. (How else were you planning to get your ice otherwise?).

Often the size of a small microwave, these do not require any kind of water line connectivity or drainage system since these are portable. This means you need to fill it up time and again depending upon the rate of consumption of the ice it makes. It can produce 26 lbs approx. in a go and store around 12 lbs. However, that is subject to vary depending on the brand and model you choose.

These machines though have some disadvantage, if you really want to call them ‘disadvantage’:

  • Ice thus produced is opaque, and
  • Being in bullet shape these tend to melt quickly.

2. Under counter Ice Makers

In this case also, the name is self-explanatory, though not fully. You get that it is to be installed under the counter (usually between the two cabinets) but there are other things that you need to know.

Under the counter Ice Maker requires an expert to install which is an additional cost after having spent much more (than its portable brother!) on purchasing it. It needs a permanent water supply and a drainage system, so essentially you save yourself some quick exercising gestures (manual work of filling water to get the ice, that is), which is again unlike the portable ice makers.

Moreover, if you invest more to get this machine, you must know that it also produces more ice than the Portable Ice Maker and also holds more. It produces somewhere close to 60 lbs of ice in one go. While Portable version is not really good at keeping the frozen ice frozen for long, you can trust under counter ice maker with this task.

If you have an outdoor bar or a boat, you can definitely splurge with this one installation.

What’s more, you get crystal clear ice, worthy of show-off!

Features to Base Your Purchase Decision On

1. The feature that gets all the lime light is the ice making capacity of course. The maximum amount of ice that get made and how quickly depends on what size of ice you pick and how much you need, though the maxim um amount is 26-28 lbs of ice.

2. Ice getting melt quickly in the ice maker is an issue. So you would want to use an ice maker that does it slowest which means its insulation should be better than others.

3. The one that holds larger amount of ice after making is the one to be chosen because you would want to keep most of your frozen ice until its time of use.

4. The noise produced by the ice maker can be quite disturbing, which is why this is another feature on which the buying decision is often based.

5. How light weight and easy-to-carry our ice maker is can also be one criterion before purchasing. You would want it to move around the house after all!

6. How soon you get your ice made is often the single most asked feature. Even if it’s really quick by the standards of freezers, you might want to pick the one which is the fastest among the available choices.

7. The right size of the ice that gets frozen depends on its own setting. “Large” of one can be “Medium” of another machine.

Difference Between a Commercial Ice Machine and Portable Ice Makers

The amount of ice needed in a commercial set up and in home is drastically different. In a busy work set up one might need ice more than 250 lbs, even in not-so-rush hours.

So the machines that make such amounts of ice differ in build, set up, noise level, installation, storage capacity, ice shape and size, rate of ice production, electricity consumption and many others.

Knowing this is useful if you are using under counter ice maker that produces 60 lbs for your small food joint and would want to upgrade at some point of time.

Final Words

We hope that this blog gives you enough insight on purchasing the best ice maker for your home among the available choices in the market. We hope you make the right decision and make your house parties come alive without having to worry about running short of ice!