Customer Reviews

Fellowes Powershred MS-450Cs Safe Sense 7-sheet Confetti Cut Shredder

5 star:		(59)
4 star:		(27)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

This shredder is simply amazing! Although it is only rated at a modest 7 sheets, which it will digest quite easily, it is still an impressive machine. I was particularly interested in it because of the MicroShred feature. Most standard cross-cut shredders cut pieces a little too large for my preference. This thing reduces paper to tiny particles - and I do mean tiny! They are about 1/6 the size of a typical cross-cut shredder! I've never seen anything quite like it - they look like small gravel in the basket. Putting 7 sheets of 20-lb paper thru it was no effort at all for this machine. It's also extremely quiet -- it hums rather than growls.

The CD and credit card shredder is a separate, strip-cut slot which can also devour thick pieces of unopened junk mail without missing a beat. The CD shreds drop into a small tray which sits on top of the paper basket. If you need high sheet capacity, consider its big brother the MS-460Cs, which cuts 10 sheets but carries a much higher price tag. But for a typical home or small office, this machine has plenty of capacity.

If it shredded any finer I'd call it powder. I never expected such a high degree of security from a home shredder. Fellowes calls the MS-450Cs output "confetti"; I think it's more like sawdust! Like me, if you're sick of screening each page to tear the corner with the staple off before you feed it in, then this is the shredder for you. The MS-450Cs puts a smile on my face each time it quietly - very quietly - munches on small staples. A small price to pay for personal peace-of-mind.

It's a great shredder if all you have is a few pieces of paper to shred.
But if you have lot's of items to shred this puppy won't get the job done. The machine will only shred for 5 minutes before it heats up and stops working. They don't tell you until you read the manual that it won't run longer than 5 min. It does do a great job of pulvorising documents and is really quiet, but if you need to shred a lot of documents you'll be shredding for quite some time. Better off getting one of those shredders that cuts you documents in bigger stips.

But I have to say it is cool to see it shred paper into bits LOL

My recomendation is to try one out at a store before you make your decision.

It's called a Confetti Cut shredder but it's more like a micro cut. Really fine pieces, almost to a dust. My only objection is that some of the important parts are made of flimsy plastic. I had to send the first one back because of broken parts. Other than that this is an excellent shredder. I would recommend but be careful sliding the trash can back after cleaning.

I usually don't waste my time writing reviews, but I felt the need to for this shredder. I am the type to research the heck out of things before buying and after having several shredders die on me (ranging from $40-$100) I decided I needed to up the ante. I read mannnny reviews on mannnny sites and settled one this one-Glad I did.
This shredder is AWESOME. I have had it for about 3 months and love it. This is not a shredder-it's a paper annihilator!!!...the paper comes out in squares less than 1/8" by 1/8" -TINY.
I use it mainly for junk mail, bank statements etc. and it easily handles multiple and thick papers.
It's REALLY quiet too and does not need to be emptied often. Keep a check on the shred level, once it's about 3/4 full in the front window, shake the bin a little before opening and all the "dust" settles, push down to compress and you have another week or so before you need to empty. Shake the bin before emptying and you have no shred mess.

My beloved 450cs has finally given up the ghost, a little over two years from the time I bought it (of course it exceeded the excess warranty I purchased from Staples). It appears to be so well jammed up that the mechanism does not move when paper is inserted into it, though the detector still detects paper so that the engine activates. I have used it in a semi-commercial way, for large scale shredding of a lot of stuff in the basement. Often these days, after a half hour or so, the engine overheats and the machine needs to rest. Unlike some, it has a red indicator light that indicates that it is overheated, and if I let it rest for 5-10 minutes or so, I can resume. I am not happy to have to put this to rest, as I wanted more years out of it. Still, I am considering buying another, as it is the best shredder I have ever owned, except for my Fellowes strip cut shredder that I use in my office. And which, of course, they don't make anymore.

I felt like I was overpaying for this when I bought it (not here, for $200), but it even feels like a value at that price. My only complaint about the machine is that it does not live up to its advertised billing of a 7-sheet capacity. I think I can get seven sheets shredded if they are inserted exactly right, but it often balks. Still, paper tends NOT to jam, the opposite of every shredder I have ever used. The most it would take would be a gentle tug with some pliers and even the overload went right through. Considering I have spent literally hours unplugging some low grade models (the Office Depot Ativa comes to mind) this was really unbelievable. And all of the things that others are saying are true. It is SO QUIET!! I have never used a shredder while my daughter is going to sleep without disturbing her! And the microshredding is very easy to bag for recycling. The childproofing (and adult-proofing) apprears to work really well -- the maching does not work if a finger gets to close to it.

I am favorably impressed and expect this unit to last. It seems well built and fundamentally better than any shredder I've ever used, even at the higher price. I am probably going to buy another one for my office.

I got this shredder for the 2mm x 8mm small particle sizes that it produces when shredding paper. Most other home or small office cross-cut shredders produce particle sizes at least twice that size, where it's still possible for particles of paper to be large enough to read the balance of an account, a phone number, or the full names of individuals. While the typical cross-cut shredders can still protect you fairly well from someone reconstructing a full address with an institution name and account number, I prefer to not even allow little tidbits of information to go through. The 2mm x 8mm particle size of the MS-450cs is probably the largest size that one can consider truly secure for home or business use, at least in my view, if you don't want anybody to even get little tidbits of information. It's probably overkill if you aren't that concerned about it. One usually has to spend many hundreds of dollars to get a paper shredder that produces the particle sizes of the fellowes MS-450cs (or it's big brother, the MS-460cs).

So if high security is your thing, if you don't want to spend hundreds and hundreds of dollars, and if you only need something for moderate usage, then this shredder is one of the few options currently available. It also comes with a bottle of paper shredder oil and some clear trash bags to fit the shredder. I really like the fact that I don't have to remove staples or paper clips too. It feels well built, and the disposal bin is easy to remove and replace. Little particles of paper still get loose on the floor while cleaning out the bin, but that is inevitable when you have particles sizes this small. I would also have liked to have a shredder that could shred a few more sheets of paper in one pass, but I didn't want to spend more money (as for the MS-460cs), and I didn't want a shredder that took up too much space. All in all, the MS-450cs was the right compromise for me, without compromising high security.

This unit is very quiet and worked well for a year or so under light to medium duty. Then I attempted to shred three sheets of paper today and it stopped mid-stream. As I worked with it to get it restarted, it began to shed large pieces of itself (gray plastic) in the basket. Needless to say, it was toast. The cutting blades are steel, housed in plastic. Had the cutting assembly been housed in steel also, it probably would not have failed. Additionally, some types of paper caused the safety device to think someone was touching the unit and caused it to hault operation. That is a real pain to remove the partially shredded paper. I can recommend it if you want to replace it every year or so.

I bought the MS-450Cs because it shreds smaller than anything else you will find at the consumer level. Shreds end up being about 1/2 the size of an unstapled-staple. Or if you are a levenger binder user, about the size of a chad. Really small.

If you've been saving up your shred material for months, be prepared to shred in cycles as this shredder will heat up fairly fast (3-4 minutes continuous use). It has an automatic shut-down feature when it gets hot. The cool down doesn't take that long.

After shredding the material that I had been saving for months, it has never heated up on me again with my everyday junk mail.

I'd buy this again in a heartbeat!!!

4 stars instead of 5 because of the price - but if you want small shreds, you'll have to spend the money

This item is very quiet and shreds paper, credit cards, computer disks, etc. with a cut that nearly pulverizes it. Perfect for small businesses who need to dispose of customer credit card information and in general, feel confident that your data cannot be reconstructed.