Oster 6330 Inspire 4-Slice Toaster, Brushed Stainless Steel

I bought this toaster about 6 months ago from Amazon without reading the reviews. Shortly before it got here I noticed the review section and read all the horrible reviews for this toaster and became really concerned that the toaster wouldn't work properly. It came about six months ago, I've used it pretty much every day since then and it works just fine. No weird, uneven toast. No sticky handle. None of the scary stuff in the other reviews. Its pretty, and it works. Its a toaster.

I bought this toaster with high expectations since it has two long, wide slots big enough for four slices of bread, a beautiful brushed steel exterior, and a nice array of features such as a bagel toaster, frozen bread setting, lift for painless removal of bread, and cancel buttons. (The bagel setting "adjusts for the thickness of the bread" and it not a one-sided toasting feature.) The Oster would have been perfect for my needs - if only it toasted well.

When I first got it, I plopped a couple of frozen bagels into it - and within minutes I had to cancel the process when smoke rose from the toaster. I tried with new bagels, at a much lower setting. I had to pop up the bagels again before I set off the smoke detectors. I gave up when the bagels were still burning at 2 1/3 out of 6. Plus, the bagels didn't go all the way into the slots; the top inch wasn't even toasted despite the charred remainder. At that point, I figured it wasn't worth trying more, especially...Read more

It is so unfortunate that we are all victims of the quality issues that come with globalization. I have read the complaints about uneven toasting. And they are correct. It does toast unevenly, that is due to poor quality management at the factory where the Chinese slave labors are working. But do not fear!! You can actually fix this problem yourself with some very careful operations using a very thin straight edge screw driver or an exacto-knife!! What happens is the elements need to be separated slightly from the metal sides in order to heat. You will notice the portions of element wires that are in direct contact with the sides do not light up when you power your toaster (push the knob down) What needs to be done is this: Unplug the toaster, note which elements did not have separation from the metal side plates, gently pry that portion away from the side wall giving it just a very small gap. Do this to all portions of the element wires that are not gapped away from the side walls,...Read more