Costco refrigerator review


 
Timothy F. Lewis said:
One of the biggest reasons I opted for NO ice maker! The other was I don’t care for the city water taste. A 7# bag of commercial ice once a week or so allows just a little more freezer room. Houses in 1935 weren’t built for the modern mammoth appliances available now so, when you get a unit that will “fit“ the spot available, you have to be a Marine! (I wasn’t) Adapt, overcome, improvise! One reason I am very much blessed to have a longtime buddy that’s a cabinetmaker! When he needs jewelry, I’m there!
Click to expand...
Just me the thought of having no ice maker in my house would be absurd which my wife would let me know. Our city water is good but even so my refrig has a charcoal filter which basically gets changed out every 6 mos or so. That filter at Amazon for a 3 pack is 30 bucks so your buying a 7lb bag of ice every week or more so your most likely spending somewhere $100 bucks or higher on ice per year times 10 years is over 1000 bucks. Not to mention you need to go and get it once a week or more.
 
Funny…I just did a full defrost of my Frigidaire due to the fact the ice maker was not working. I don’t have a door water/ice combo, just the ice maker. I also used the opportunity to do a full clean of the fridge! Wow, what a nice feeling. Got rid of so much stuff in fridge and freezer!
Anyway, ice maker was kind of limping along so I ordered a new filter which just arrived today. Hopefully that will improve the ice situation. It’s installed and I don’t believe it had ever been changed. If this doesn’t work I am not sure what to try next.
 
There is a few YouTube vids on the Samsung issue. Re, in door ice dispensers it's a wide spread knowledge that putting a freezing unit inside the part that is fridge only causes issues. As for ice makers, our Wirlpool bottom freeer with ice maker is trouble free, and I love the ice as I feed the ice maker with my RO System. And since it's in the freezer it's not an issue. So far knock wood our new Samsung freezer is trouble free and works flawlessly, and VERY quietly. Now honestly I would have bought another brand, but it presented itself at a great deal at a good time through Sam's.
 
I talked to the local appliance repair guy. His bread & butter re: refrigerators are any through door ice & water dispensers. He wouldn't have one for himself. We did buy a Bosch, and would have cheerfully bought it through the repair shop, except Bosch wouldn't allow him to sell anything in that line. BTW, we did get the flush door handle option, nothing protruding from the front. I don't miss handles, not one little bit.
 
There are many brands out there with icemaker/water dispenser issues where the line freezes although I think a lot of those problems have been solved in the newer models. I had a problem with my GE counter depth side by side which did not show up for a few years and then just stopped dispensing water line was frozen. The fix was after alot of searching was to take the top of a foam cooler and tape it inside the freezer behind the dispenser for water and ice as it was lack of insulation behind that unit that was the problem. Been 5 years never had an issue again.

Samsung had a bad rap in refrigerators but they were not the only ones and I believe they have had a much better rating the last few years. So hopefully Andy will be fine.
 
We had an older Samsung side by side with the ice maker in the freezer. Worked well for many years so when we wanted a new unit, I bought the French 4-door Samsung with the ice maker built into the refrigerator section. Big mistake. Those units only last about 5-6 months before they fail. I had mine replaced 4 times courtesy of Samsung but when it failed again, I had to pay the $500 labor charge. Six months layer it failed again and I opted to replace the whole refrigerator. I bought an LG with 2 doors and a slide out bottom freezer with the ice maker built in the freezer where it belongs. Great refrigerator, makes more ice and a lot cheaper. Think twice about the fancy Samsungs. Mine is doing great ice free duty in the basement.
 
Andy Kaminski said:
Our old refrigerator took a turn for the worse a couple weeks ago.
It started freezing everything and it was ridiculously small so we got a new one.
We were always over stuffing and loosing things in that little fridge when we had guests.
We even joked that it was an “I love Lucy” refrigerator.

It was so small that I had to remodel the cabinets quite a bit to get a standard sized unit to fit.
Talk about a pain in the tail, nothing (and I mean nothing) was fun about that but I did my best to make it look like it wasn’t hacked up.

So we were in Costco and liked their fancy big Samsung unit but wanted a stainless one.
It also had this big old computer screen that we didn’t think we had any use for so we went to Home Depot to look at what they had or could order.
I really don’t have much to say about Home Depot but they wanted $4,500 for the one Costco had for $2,500 and continused to tell us that we were getting a good deal.
I still can’t figure that one out but I smiled anyways and thanked them.

Anyhow, we liked the fancy big one in Costco so we ordered it in Stainless for $2,399 plus tax it was right close to $2,600 out the door.
The price included free delivery with set up and haul away. Home Depot wanted extra for those items.
It also showed up on time 2 days after I ordered it.

This fridge is really nice and I’m very satisfied that we got this smart unit with the computer.
The computer does a bunch of cool items.
I like the shopping list function probably the most.
I dig the calendar for scheduling events ranks up there.
I can ask it to turn on one of my playlists while I’m cooking or hanging out and it even has a (pinchy yet ok) sound system .
This fridge just has a wad of functions like autofill water pitcher, voice commands and one side of the bottom can either be a fridg or I can lower the temp to make it into a freezer.

It’s been a couple weeks and I still haven’t learned everything thing it can do but so far i am digging this and the pricing.
Click to expand...
Dang Andy, sounds like you got a pretty good deal.

Think I'll wait another year or so when they come out with a model that washes the dishes and puts the leftovers away:)
 
LG likely holds the reputation for being the least reliable refrigerators.
There were class action lawsuits settled as a result of their linear compressor design which failed at a very high rate.
We experienced it as the sidexside in the house we bought in 2020 was an LG. It died in November 2022...less than 2 years old.
Replaced it with a Whirlpool sidexside...same model as we have in our beach house.
Got it from Costco. It's been fine so far. Icemaker was acting up, called Costco and service guy replaced the Icemaker. So far, so good. Costco Extends rhe manufacturers warranty an extra year...something to consider.
 
Andy Kaminski said:
and one side of the bottom can either be a fridg or I can lower the temp to make it into a freezer.
Click to expand...
I like those double doors on the bottom.
We've had our Samsung for almost a year. French door, dark SS exterior. Ice in the bottom bin in freezer.
We also have that auto fill filtered water pitcher. Perfect for the coffee maker.
 
Its such a personal decision I have a side by side not going to give up just walking up to the fridge getting a glass of water, or cubed ice or crushed ice without having to go below to get the ice, I understand some models you can do that on the French door models. The door capacity on the side by sides are generally larger, I get the the French door models might have more interior fridge space but the tradeoff is the freezer on a side by side is larger. I like having the baskets in the freezer on the side by side to organize stuff instead of just dumping a bunch of stuff in the bottom draw. Also that freezer door does not need as much room to open then a drawer sliding out and in my kitchen setup that is important to me as I have to have a counter depth refrigerator anyway.

The icemaker in a side by side is generally larger holding more ice than a French door although I will be honest that is not so important since the kids are gone but still when I load a cooler my GE has a pretty large ice capacity.

To each his own.
 
Ed P said:
I have a Samsung French Door fridge, and right after the warranty period, the evaporator coil started freezing up, requiring me to take it apart and manually defrost it every few months. I've tried several things, but nothing I do fixes it for any length of time. I will not buy another one. We went shopping and couldn't find anything we liked so we're sitting tight for the moment. The fridge works great, when it works.

View attachment 82058
Click to expand...
Change out the thermistor on that evap and put a new cover on it. tomorrows my last day as a Sears service tec, will miss working but I will learn to like it , hopefully put my last LG compressor in this afternoon, have replaced close to 400 in the last 4 years if I aint mistaken
 
Also that thermistor needs to be on the left side of the tube, looks like its on the right side, they have a service flash about changing the position , Andy I cant see manufactures name but looks like a Samsung, I recommend anybody buying a new appliance to buy the 5 year extended warranty.
 
Also clean or replace the drain tubes, they are bad about stopping up or making water slow to drain and the fan picks the moisture up and brings it to the fan area. I can get you the drain tube kit number easy and the most common defrost sensor.
 
MikeCantell said:
Change out the thermistor on that evap and put a new cover on it. tomorrows my last day as a Sears service tec, will miss working but I will learn to like it , hopefully put my last LG compressor in this afternoon, have replaced close to 400 in the last 4 years if I aint mistaken
Click to expand...
The thermistor was the first thing I changed when it first started acting up. The cover gets frozen to the aluminum sheet behind the coil and tears up the styrofoam when removed, so I replaced the cover a year ago. I now use a garment steamer to get it apart and then defrost it.
 
MikeCantell said:
Also clean or replace the drain tubes, they are bad about stopping up or making water slow to drain and the fan picks the moisture up and brings it to the fan area. I can get you the drain tube kit number easy and the most common defrost sensor.
Click to expand...
Did that, too. There's a guy on YT that supposedly has a fix and I bought the kit and installed it, same thing. No change. Again, please notice that the lower part of the evap is fine, it's the upper part where there is no heating element that freezes up solid. The ice will build up until it hits the circulating fan and then it makes a helluva racket and the fridge starts warming up. I blow it all out with the compressed air so I know the drain tube is wide open.

But thanks for your input, Mike!


EDIT: Wrong video linked. This is the correct video showing the installation of the defrost kit that didn't work for me.
 
Last edited:
MikeCantell said:
Also that thermistor needs to be on the left side of the tube, looks like its on the right side, they have a service flash about changing the position , Andy I cant see manufactures name but looks like a Samsung, I recommend anybody buying a new appliance to buy the 5 year extended warranty.
Click to expand...
I've had it on the left...no change. I guess I should look on the bright side of things...my fridge gets cleaned out every few months.

1700188380012.png1700188291028.png

As you can see, the heating element/defrost/drain is all working fine. Even adding those heating wires didn't help. I'd pay to have a repair guy come out and fix it but they will only give me a 30-day warranty.

1700189514655.png
 
Last edited:
its showing a incomplete defrost, when you installed drain kit did you put the foam strips on the back of the evap? I see the updated drain probe which is good.
 
Last edited:
Would love to see more of this info. I have a fear it will not be long before we're in the market for a fridge. My upstairs unit is in the 20+ yo range. Very long for a more modern fridge. Whirlpool or Amana (can't remember which although no real differences). 25' bottom drawer pull out freezer. Although (knock wood) it's running fine, I know because it's not the old type "freon" it's gotta be on borrowed time since our last 2 only lasted about 8 years before the compressors began making horrid noises and then basically quit working. Though both of those were Frigiddaire made and my luck with anything from that brand has been horrid the last 4 attempts. (3 fridges and one dishwasher). We also have an LG stove and well I cannot describe how I feel about that piece of trash in polite company.
So believe me I am doing research and Ed P et al I REALLY want to see how things are playing out. Because I literally know the way our last 2 fridges quit it wasn't "grandual". They had massive coronaries and were DOA :D
So, a good part of me is quietly thinking maybe to replace this one BEFORE it bites me in my back side. And my back is against the wall. Also another reason is Communist Edison has a program that if you have a working fridge and have them take it to recycle in favor of newer more efficient models, they give you $50 to haul it away. If not working, they won't take it and then it costs ME at LEAST that much if not more to unload it.
So my eyes are all over this
 
When we bought our Bosch, delivery & haul away was "free." Yeah, I know..... it's bundled in with the price. The crew was pretty good.

Getting back to our Samsung experiences.... IMO, major design issues in both the through door ice maker as well as the refrigerator compartment cooling coils. Samsung's authorized repair shop never really managed to fix either problem and it devolved down to "customer damage" claimed by Samsung, they washed their hands of us.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

 

Back
Top