Product Review: Panasonic Inverter Microwave Oven

I never knew the value of microwave ovens until my old microwave oven broke. I contemplated living without a microwave oven until boiling water on the stove for hot tea and reheating leftovers in a skillet became more of a challenge than I was willing to continue. After two weeks of “cooking” without a microwave oven, I went in search of a new microwave oven. My search brought me to the discovery of a concept called inverter technology.

With conventional microwave ovens, only one power level is used and the microwave energy is either on or off. For example, let’s say you set your microwave oven at 70% and push the start button. With a conventional microwave oven, the oven cooks the food at full power for 70% of the time and then remains idle for the rest of the time. With an inverter microwave oven, the oven cooks the food at low, medium, and high power levels, delivering more even cooking. With my conventional microwave oven, sometimes I found the food cold in the center and hot around the edges. With my inverter microwave oven, the food is cooked evenly every time.

At Walmart, I purchased the Panasonic Inverter Microwave Oven with the Genius Sensor and 1250 watts. I paid around $155.00 (including tax).

The feature I find most attractive about the inverter microwave oven is the Inverter Turbo Defrost™ feature. It defrosts food using a sequencing system which distributes microwave energy in a new and efficient way. Recently, I placed a whole frozen chicken into the inverter microwave oven; I pressed the Inverter Turbo Defrost™ button and was prompted to enter the weight of the chicken, which I did, of course; I pressed the “Start” button and when the process was completed, I took the chicken out of the oven and found it fully thawed, with no cooked edges (many times, with my conventional oven, I found cooked edges after using the defrost feature).

Another fabulous feature of the Panasonic Inverter Microwave Oven is Sensor Reheat. This feature is used to reheat food without the user having to enter a cooking time. Just cover your food with a lid or vented plastic wrap (to let the steam out); place your food into the inverter oven; push the “Sensor Reheat” button; and then the “Start” button. As soon as the inverter oven senses steam rising from the food, the oven alerts you that your food is warm.

I am very pleased with the Panasonic Inverter Microwave Oven and believe I will never go back to using a conventional microwave oven.

I wrote this original review on July 17, 2012. Today is July 30, 2014. My microwave still looks like new. The exterior finish still looks as sparkly as the day I purchased it. The interior surfaces still look white and clean. I have had other microwave ovens where the interior became bubbly-looking and stained. The experience with this microwave oven is much better. I am still a raving fan of the Panasonic Inverter Microwave Oven.

Possible solution to fixing a microwave oven door that sticks.

Much thanks to a reader who mentioned that the door on his/her microwave oven began to stick after some time. After about a year and a half, I discovered that the door to my microwave began to stick, too. Since the same thing happened to another owner of this microwave, I thought it would be beneficial to share my experience with the same issue.

My husband explained to me that there was nothing wrong with the door. He explained that when the microwave is new, the pins that go into the slots to lock the door are shiny and lubricated. He went on to say that over time, the pins naturally dry out. The pins that go into the locking slots move up and down as they engage with the clip inside the slot that holds the pins tight. The contact with the clip should be smooth. When the contact between the pins and the clips inside the slot is not smooth, it can cause the connection to be a little rough, creating resistance and the inability of the door to close properly.

The only treatment we needed to do in order to get the door to function properly was to lubricate the tip of the pins. We sprayed a small squirt of silicone lubricant on the pins. We opened and shut the door five times to transfer the lubricant to the clips. After doing this, the microwave door began to operate beautifully right away.

I have included pictures so that you can see the pins and where to place the lubricant.

The following video may be helpful if your bad closing inverter microwave oven door needs more attention than just spraying a silicone lubricant.

NOTE: I did NOT take my microwave oven door apart as shown in the video. All I did was spray the lubricant. I would recommend that you try spraying the lubricant first to see if that fixes the problem, then if not, perhaps follow the techniques shown in the video, or hire a professional microwave oven repairman to repair the door for you.