This is a very poor product, for two reasons. First, the fabric, a fleece of some sort, comes off all over the place. I found bits and tufts of it on my clothes, on the couch, on the dog, stuck to my fingers, and worst of all, in my teeth, where it's impossible to deal with. I'm no expert on synthetic fleece, but I've had a few things from Patagonia and the like, that didn't perform at all like this throw. Second, the switch is somewhere between a poor design and a dangerous design. You turn it on and change the heat settings by tapping on differnt sections of a lighted disc, basically North, South, East, West. But the force required varies from a very light tap to a pretty stiff one. For this reason, at times the throw will be turned on or the heat level changed simply by a wag of the dog's tail as he passes by. At other times I set it to low and some time later found it on medium or high, with no contact by anyone. This could be a defective switch, of course, but even if it is, I'd never buy this throw again because of the fleece problem. It seems that Sunbeam has been in this market for a long time and has a large share of the market, so they surely have the resources to do a far better job. No more Sunbeams for me.
It's my fault that I didn't look at DealYard's return policy before I bought this, but it basically says you've got to return things in new unopened and and unused condition with all the packaging, papers, etc., just as it was when it arrived. In other words, if you open the package much less try the thing, returns are out of the question. With this in mind, I never could have uncovered the serious flaws with this product and still have been eligible for a return to DealYard. These were only apparent after using the throw for a few days. So I wouldn't buy from DealYard again.
My solution to this was to buy a Biddeford Heated Throw from Amazon where Amazon itself is the seller. The difference is immense: the Biddeford fabric, called "plush", is very soft - snuggly - and doesn't shed at all; unlike the Sunbeam, it's nicely bound at the edges. The switch, which has 10 heat levels rather than 3, operates by a traditional push-click action, and doesn't magically change. The Biddeford has a 10-hour automatic shutoff, which I like far better than 3 hous on the Sunbeam. Finally, if I hadn't liked this throw, or if it didn't work well, Amazon's more reasonable return policy means I'd have a better chance of returning it to Amazon. But that's not going to happen.