Oster Retractable Cord Toaster

Ugg...this toaster replaced my awesome, expensive chrome toaster, which randomly stopped holding down the toast. After some quick scanning of the aisle at Target, I bought this mainly on the basis of low price ($17), and the retractable cord. Now I just can't wait to replace this janky thing.

Pros: Retractable cord is well-placed, and seems to have a nicely built mechanism. Bagel setting actually allows some toasting of the outside of the bagel, which is good. Price is reasonable and fair (if the cons weren't there).

Cons: Toast comes out blackened and burned on the bottom, but warm and barely toasted at the top. No amount of playing with the settings will alleviate this, even on the lowest setting. Mini bagels are especially ruined in this toaster. I have worked around this problem by hovering over the toaster waiting, but that's not exactly an awesome activity. The reason I bought a new one was to stop having to do this, so it kind of wastes my $$...Read more

I'll add my "Ugh" to the other reviewer, but not for identical reasons. Like the other reviewer, I had an excellent toaster which died and so I looked for a simple, straight-forward replacement. While Oster is a good brand company from which I have gotten other worthy products, this it not one of them.

Because this toaster apparently tries to be all things to all people, it has heat elements set back about an inch on each side to accommodate bagels and other wide food products. And the mechanism which lowers the bread also clamps and centers bread in each slot as it is lowered.

Often, unless overridden, the clamping mechanism tightens before the bread is fully lowered resulting in the top half not as done as the lower half. Worse yet, because the elements are about a half mile from normal bread slices, it takes forever to cook them and they come out more dried than toasted. And despite the extended wait, the cooked slices are barely warm enough to melt...Read more

Bought one of these at a 'big box' store.
I've actually (sort of) owned two of these.
I should have shopped a little more diligently as first box that I purchased had obviously been opened and retaped shut. Got the toaster home, plugged it in, and sure enough, the toaster refused to work...(the 'handle' that you push the toast down into the toaster with would not stay down)
Now it becomes obvious that the box I had taken from the store was somebody elses 'return'.
(I hold the 'big box' store partially to blame for letting this defective toaster get re-stocked, but my story doesn't end there...)

I exchanged the first toaster for an identical model second toaster and brought that second toaster home.
The toaster seemed to only be able to toast (or scorch?) the bottom half of whatever was put in it for the first six months that we owned it, but we 'bumped along' with it anyway.

Last week, I attempted to toast a bagle, and only one...Read more