Customer Reviews

Steam Fast SF-680 Digital Fabric Steam Press

5 star:		(36)
4 star:		(17)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Well, after two months of waiting, my 680 arrived. It was my Christmas present to myself. What had happened was the manufacturer didn't make enough of them last year. Demand far exceeded (incongruously) supply. That is why amazon, cyebye, smallappliances.com, and others had you on hold. I actually sent Top Innovations a griping email about the delays--this is how I found out what the situation was. By the way, Customer Service at TI is nothing less than outstanding! The first sentence from their department was this: "You are right. We need to do a better job of...." Imagine that. A company that still lives by the age old American adage--'the customer is always right.'
Oh, if you're looking for the best price on the product--it's Cyebye--providing you don't live in NY (otherwise, you'll pay the tax). $219.00. And, that company's Customer Service is also pleasant to deal with. That's why I stuck with them (well, okay... more for the price than anything else).
After tearing into my box like a lil' boy getting a birthday gift (mine is March 8th, case you want to send me something), I couldn't get the machine working fast enough. Design-wise, it's both sleek and very pleasing to the eye. Doesn't weigh too much and is easily portable.
Now the cons.
First thing I noticed was the tremendous jolting upswing the unit has when you elevate the top plate from the ironing board. It jerks the unit UP and BACK! You need to be cognizant of this. If you place this unit on the TI steamer stand, make certain you always keep one foot on the stand's base. Otherwise, the machine will dive backwards. That's how much upward force we're talking about here.
Next is the irritating shutoff safety feature. On "top line" models, these features should not be installed--or, at least have them as a programmable option. If you leave the machine unattended for about 8-10 mins, it will go into "standby" mode. Meaning, the heating temperature that you waited at least 10 minutes for it to build up will vanish. And, reactivation isn't as simple as just using the machine. You either have to turn it off then back on, or, scroll through the power temperature settings. Did I mention this was annoying?
Thirdly, not enough pressing power for thinner garments. I steam pressed two Italian cotton shirts and I was expecting extremely crisp presses. It does that for the sleeves (which is, of course, 2 materials thick), but, you will not get that same effect for the back or front of the shirt. The solution, place a thick towel over the board--place your thin shirt on that. Also note that thinner materials will acquire what I call "hole puffs" in them. The steaming plate has holes from where the steam exudes. Your thinner materials will periodically have those hole indentations on them. Rub them with your finger and they vanish.
This may or may not be a con. But, when it comes to the steam burst operation... it's LOUD. It gurgles and also spews water droplets as well. {Note that the feature advertisement on this site reads, "Dual vaporizing system significantly reduces water droplets". I wonder how TI defines "reduces".) Meaning, KEEP YOUR FACE AWAY FROM THE UNIT when activating the steam burst.
Another con deals with the instructions. Though simply annotated, it always stumps me when the writers/editors decide to use metric measurements (all of a suddenly) when the rest of the manual pertains to non-metric numbers. The section I'm talking about pertains to the steam burst mode. It states to lower the press no lower than 75mm from the board. 75mm? I don't mind the metric system because I'm fluent with it. But most Americans are not. (75mm is about 3 inches, by the way.)
Another con pertains to the display panel. The manual states that when the light deactivates (at the particular heat setting you're at--e.g., cotton, silk, etc.), then the machine is ready for use. Well, I just spent 90 minutes pressing nothing but cotton. And, if I adhered to what it states in the manual, that 90 minutes would have easily evolved into 120 minutes! That cotton indicator light is consistently going on, than it is remaining off. I would almost venture to state that it spends more time on the former rather than the latter.
The final con is the warranty. One measly year! That disappoints me tremendously. When you fork out more than $200 for a machine, 3 year warranty should be the minimum. Especially... ESPECIALLY with a digital product-which is what this is. One year warranty is insulting and doesn't speak well for TI (in my humble opinion).
Other than that... there are indeed ample pros for this machine. Compared to ironing or steaming, this press wins hands down. It's 3-4 times swifter than ironing because of 3 elements: large surface area of the machine, the tremendous heat, and, the steam burst function (remember to keep your face away from the 680 when using steam burst). The machine also appears easy to maintain and clean. The manual states to use distilled water. You probably should do as it states--because I'm certain the heating coil and other components are quite delicate inside. Non-distilled water usually equates to faster corrosion development--depending on your state of residency (drinking water). Florida, which is definitely a "hard water" town, definitely purchase distilled.
If I think of anything else, I'll come back and annotate. In the interim, the machine does what it says it'll do. But, I don't think it's the best one (home user models) out there. I could be wrong. I will keep this model, nonetheless.
Hope this helps....

My wife and I have to wear nicely pressed clothes to work. Trying to iron a week load of clothes took forever; hence, we decided to get the press. Here's the pros and cons:
Pros
1. much faster than the old iron
2. gets the wrinkles out better due to the hotter iron and strong press
3. it's heavy, which I like so it won't move around (could be a con for some folks)
Cons
1. the opening is not that wide so when trying to move the clothes around on the table, you'll have to be very careful to not touch the hot iron - I've touched it several times but fortunately, I haven't been burned
2. you have to carefully lay out the clothes as flat as possible to get the best results. Pants are the easiest to do and those are the real time savers. Womens shirts are hardest because they have cuts that are hard to lay completely flat. If they are not completely flat, you will get a crease. Pleats are a PITA. I still haven't found a way to do those right. I've tried the supplied pillow and that works OK. So if you have lots of pleated pants, then you're gonna be very frustrated. You'll have to bring out your old iron.
3. I think the steamer is just a gimmick. I've used it twice and all it did was wet the garment. Now wetting the garment and then pressing works great but it's easier to just use the supplied water bottle to wet the garment. I've found a trick to get the really bad wrinkles out by wetting the wrinkles and then use the press. The iron is so hot that it completely vaporizes the water along with the wrinkle.

I would recommend this steam press to anyone looking to save time but it won't replace your old iron.

Forget hauling out the ironing board, distilled water and the iron. Plug in the steam press and you are ready to go---that simple. You need not empty the water resevoir when finished! I will say, it does take a little practice at first. After becoming more familiar with the press, things go a lot faster. This is at least twice as fast as the iron. I now press things, like Levis, that I had given up long ago. I cannot say that pressing clothes is my favorite sport, however this has made it a lot more tolerable!

Wow what a difference! Love this product. I'm a single man who never got the hang of regular ironing so I ended up sending most of my laundry to the cleaners. Not anymore....I bought the fabric steam press when the quality of my shirts coming back from the cleaners took a noticable turn for the worse, i.e. odd wrinkle patterns and broken buttons. I thought I would give a steam press a try since I had a read a review on how these types of pressers were definitely a cut above a regular iron. The Steam Fast wasn't my first choice..that was an Elna but I couldn't find a distributor for it and I really didnt want to spend the $800 it would have cost me. The Steam Fast was the right price on Amazon ( $230) so I bought it. I followed the rather sketchy instructions which came with it and lo-and-behold it works great. Shirts take almost no time...I just finished doing 5 shirts (cotton and linen) in less than 20 minutes and they look great. The digital controls are very easy to understand, it heats up quickly, and so far the steam is working great. I even end up doing some laundry I would never think of ironing before like my dish clothes which always come out of the dryer looking like SharPei puppies. I definitely would recommend Steam Fast Fabric Steam Press...I hate to admit it but I sort of enjoy the whole process of ironing now and I'm saving $2+ on each shirt and they look great now.

I originally bought a couple of these for my company (children's formalwear rental) to spiff up clothes before sending them out. They worked so well, I ended up getting one for myself to use at home.

This product is fantastic, and it has almost completely replaced the need to ever get out the iron and ironing board. Dress shirts can be pressed extremely quickly -- I can do a dress shirt (front left, front right, left arm, right arm, back) in under 30 seconds). Slacks are even faster.

I generally don't need steam, except on linen items, but it's always available with the buttons located on either side of the handle (nice, since you don't have to use a particular hand to open and close the presser top). Also ameliorating the need for steam is that I've learned to take things out of the dryer still just slightly damp, press them, and then let them hang dry. Doing it that way has all but eliminated the need to send stuff to the dry cleaners, saving me a TON of money while giving me the same crisp look.

I have worked at a dry cleaners and have used the professional size steam press to press clothing and to steam block sweaters. The surface where the clothes lay on never gets too hot, unless the lower steamer is applied, which this produce does not have. I was surprised at the reviewer who expected the steamer to get too hot to handle?

This smaller version of the dry-cleaners steam press works well. It saves time in pressing, but you need to know the techinques to position the shirts and pants so that you'll get nice creases. Steam comes from the upper lid of the presser. Steam does not come out from the pressing pad.

In order to block sweaters, position the sweater so that it is flat and then lower the pressor lid to 'almost' touching the sweater and let the sweater steam a few seconds. You may want to spray a mist of water onto the sweater before steaming. Next, move sweater around and repeat until entire sweater has been steam blocked.

This is a great appliance, but the instructions are hopeless and it is an appliance that requires some skill to use fully effectively. Had they had a decent DVD with it, I would happily have rated it a 5.

So here is what it does really well and fast (REALLY fast) and for which the supplied instructions (or the little video on the Top Innovations website) are adequate: trousers, T-shirts, and household linens (sheets, napkins etc). Basically anything which you could iron well by folding and smoothing and then plopping a great weight on.

But a lot more effort and skill is required when doing highly tailored shirts (eg brands like Anne Fontaine, Alicia Bell, Pink). Hopefully one day I'll be able to do those without keeping the iron and ironing board on hand. But I suspect that will be only after I can persuade my local cleaner to spend time teaching me.

In the meantime, the most useful instructions I have found for using a steam press are in a little video on the UK Domena site [...] There is also a useful series of pictures on how to do shirts on the UK Singer site [...]

You'll see when watching the Domena video that there is a point to using this unit while sitting in front of it as opposed to standing above it. You are less likely to burn yourself on the upper hotplate while rearranging and smoothing garments on the bottom plate if you are reaching in as opposed to down and around, and likewise, the steam blast that comes out when you press the steam button as you hold the top lid about 3 inches above the bottom plate before pressing something is less likely to hit you if you are in front of it as opposed to above it.

I'm sure it is some sort of cultural difference, but I found all sorts of other useful tips on the various UK sewing sites (which is where the steam presses are usually dealt with). Like using melted ice from the freezer so you get mineral-free water which won't clog up the innards. Happy researching!

Positives-I've had the steam press for about one year now. I use it 5 days a week to iron my dress shirts, and my pants that don't have creases. I love it. I press the front of both long sleeves, and both front panels and I'm done. Heat time takes about 4-5 minutes, pressing a long sleeve shirt takes about 30 seconds to 1 minute; much faster than old fashion ironing. It is powerful enough; plenty hot and steam. Shipping was fast.
Negative-It's not good to press the creases on pants. You have to line up the crease twice, below the knee and above due to the platform being only 25 inches long. If I don't get it just right it will make a new crease. If your pants don't have creases, it's fast. I may buy a pants press in the near future.

in the long run, I can see it being faster than pulling out an iron and board after some practice. A perfectly ironed shirt is not one of my requirements but if it is for you, you might want to stick with a regular iron, it will do a more detailed job especially with the cuffs and collars and a regular iron IS required on badly wrinkled items. These presses are best for slacks or items that are for the most part flat.As far as the units operation, I had no problem what-so-ever, I cleaned an area off my living room table, placed it on the end and sat on the couch and worked on a couple of shirt while watching the TV.I probably didn't use the steam as much as others so I didn't have a problem with the press cooling off or having to wait for the steam light but the steamer does leave a lot to be desired, several times I ended up with wet patches on my shirt because it seems to spit rather than steam. It worked from start to end without having to wait on it. It also heated up pretty quick. After reading some of the reviews others left on the smaller unit I decided to buy it anyways and the larger unit, over all, I'm pleased with it and will continue to use it. I'm now thinking about purchasing the table for it so i can set it up in one of the spare rooms and leaving it for when ever i need a quick press.. Now I can return the borrowed ironing board..I rated this a 4 out of 5 because you still need an iron for badly wrinkled items and because it spits instead of steams!



Hope this helps....

I hate ironing and experimented between this steam press and the DeLonghi steam generator to find an iron that might actually make it easier, faster, or less tedious. Alas, I have not yet hit the lottery. While the steam press did leave my husband's shirts incredibly crisp and looking almost like they were done by the dry cleaner's (there was also a slight crease on one side of the collar, created when I rotated one pressed side of the shirt so that I could press the other side), it did not save me enough time to be worth the effort. It took so much time to perfectly arrange the shirts on the board and spray down any deep creases with a spritzing bottle (not to even mention the fact that I would burn my knuckles putting my hand in there to re-arrange the shirt), it ended up taking only slightly less time to iron the same number of dress shirts as if I were using a regular iron. It was pretty cool though, that the ironing part was a simple push of the press, a count to 3, and voila! Ironed clothes! This thing is also a dream for ironing linen napkins, tablecloths, and flat sheets.

If you're a perfectionist about your dress shirts, but don't have the time, money or desire to take things to the dry cleaners, this might be the product for you. But if you need to press large amounts of items, if you need to iron a variety of different types of garments (i.e. women's clothing or items with intricate designs), then you might be better off getting a steam generator.

If you found this review helpful, please let me know!