This coffee maker delivers for a convenient one cup coffee maker but I don't use it as instructed.
In order to get the full coffee flavor I:
1) run 1/2 cup water through just the filter holder and paper filter into the cup to rinse the paper taste out and heat up the cup and while this is happening grind your coffee: 2 slightly heaping coffee measures, that is 4 Tablespoons or 28 gr.; start with this and adjust to taste.
2) put 1 1/2 cups (400 ml.) fresh cold water into tank (watch out for steam vent behind water door when you add cold water to just used heating element!)
Put coffee into now wet filter which easily swings out to the front to be filled ( I put my machine sideways so that it swings out to the front) I use only fresh ground coffee on the drip grind setting. I heap it into a little mountain which seems to get the hot water to penetrate all the grounds.
Empty hot water out of cup or mug and place under filter assembly.
4)Press start button and let it run for a few seconds, turn it off, wait 30 seconds, turn it on again for 30 seconds, then off again 30 seconds, then on again and let it run to the end, whereupon it beeps. This allows the coffee to become saturated slowly in order to extract the full flavor.
Unfortunately the hot water comes out of the brew-head too quickly for the coffee to get saturated if you just turn it on and let it run. When I first used it I just put the coffee in the filter and turned it on: the resulting coffee was disappointingly weak. Even tho' I need to start it and stop it I still find it more convenient than my espresso machine first thing in the morning: I heat up my milk while it's brewing. I couldn't believe the difference in taste when I did it this way, thanks to information on the web! I think there is another machine out there for a lot of money which does this "drip and pause" automatically. I can't remember what it's called. Or you can always do it manually but I find this KA makes the process much easier.
Also, someone wrote that the hot water will not brew if the brew basket is in the open position and that you can't turn it off once the water starts flowing (on another vendor's site), both of which are not true. I can fill up the tank, swing the brew-basket out of the way and dispense hot water into anything I want, tea bags, my Melitta coffee maker, etc., and when I have enough hit the power button again; it stops almost immediately.
It is so tall that you can fit just about any arrangement under the shower head. Also the brew-basket keeps any coffee from hitting the housing under it where the water comes out so it will not affect the flavor of hot water for tea, just take out the filter holder. Also the brew-basket is deep enough that the grounds do not get on the brew-head even with a substantial amount of grounds in the filter.
It is tall and slim so the footprint is not so large. I find the tank fill-hole plenty large so I don't need to take the tank off; I just use a little measuring cup with a spout. Mine is not under a cabinet so I can also easily take the tank off if I wish. The thermal cup that comes with it loses heat pretty quickly but that's not a concern for me as I drink my coffee at home before I go and always find it tastes better in a heated mug anyway. I use it like a carafe sometimes as it pours nicely.
I hope this review is helpful for other coffee enthusiasts.