Customer Reviews

Fellowes FS5+ Strip Cut Shredder with Basket (30575)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I've owned this paper shredder for about 6 months now and I just love it. It will shread 4-5 pages at a time and it doesn't jam. Works great and is easy to clean. Can't go wrong.

Like another customer commented, this machine did an okay job while it worked, but after about nine months of light usage, it died. The first thing to go out was the trigger that turns the shredder on when paper is first inserted. That broke about three months after we got it. There's sort of a manual over-ride switch on it, though, so you could keep it on if you were going to shred a lot of documents. We would have to use this switch to turn it on to shred even one document after the trigger broke. I would see about having it fixed, but it was really loud when it was working, anyway, so I think we're going to spend more money next time to get a better model. I have to admit that it was pretty quick, though, and it didn't have a problem cutting through two or three pages at a time.

I bought this shredder a couple of years ago for home use -- shredding all those credit card offers and other financial papers the experts tell us never to throw out whole. I've been very pleased with its performance, with no complaints there. I like the compact size of the unit -- very unobtrusive. This littler shredder is a great value, and seems to have held up quite well.

I had this shredder for about 8-9 months before it finally died on me. It does a decent job at shredding five or fewer sheets of paper into 1/4" strips, however; the actual shredding mechanism is not very durable. There are thin metallic disks with serated edges that cut the paper and if one gets out of whack, you are left with an un-shredded area that is (potentially) easily readable.

For about the same price at a warehouse club, I bought a Royal (model 3500, I think) seven sheet, cross-cut shredder that has impressed me from day one. The mechanism is much more heavy duty. This shredder weighs more than the Fellowes and flipping it over shows why. The "teeth" of the Royal shredder are much more substantial and look to be built to last a lot longer than the Fellowes. Another notable difference is in the actual shredding.

For those not familiar, cross-cutting not only cuts the paper into vertical strips, but then cuts the vertical strips into smaller pieces. While the Fellowes FS5 will cut a sheet into around 35 strips, the Royal cuts it into litterally THOUSANDS. You can see how this would improve the "security" and finality of your shredding.

The Royal shredder will also devour your old credit cards - a VERY satisfying experience :-D It sounds wierd, but once you start shredding, you will start searching for things to shred... credit cards applications... old bank statements... cats...