5 stars

I bought this from Target 2 years ago and I have to say, it's by far and away the best mixer I've ever owned. I used to have an Artisan model but the bowl lift is much better. I bought this one because I make cheesecake and with the power this thing has, there's no need to soften the cheese before beating. Expensive, big, heavy, pricey attachments, but worth every single penny I've spent. I've outfitted my mom and 2 friends with this same unit and swear by it's design and workmanship. I had a question about the mixer once and called KitchenAid...surprised again by customer service. Can you believe they didn't try to sell me anything? Well deserved and earned reputation for the company AND the product.

2 stars

If you own a pre-2006 Kitchenaid Professional 600, be aware that it will probably come to a grinding, screeching halt if you make a lot of bread. When it crashes you will be assaulted by one of the most painful and soul-crushing sounds you are likely to hear in a kitchen. Your beautiful mixer is dead. What is worse, Kitchenaid just doesn’t give a damn.

My Professional 600 was a gift from my wife, who thought she was buying her bread-crazy husband the biggest, baddest mixer on the block. It is certainly marketed that way.

"The overachiever of the stand mixer family, it has a Flour Power rating of 14 cups. That means it can mix enough dough for 8 loaves of bread or 13 dozen cookies in a single bowl … Powerfully churns through yeast bread dough and triple batches of cookie dough."

So why did my 8-cup, soft sandwich bread recipe kill it? As it turns out, the Professional 600 mixers made before August of 2006 have a plastic gear housing that is completely inadequate for the size of the motor. Put a strain on the mixing head — bread dough, for instance — and the housing flexes, throwing the whole gear train out of alignment. When that happens every gear strips, locking up the whole assembly and causing an ear splitting shriek that will be etched in your memory forever. It is a horrible sound. Kitchenaid redesigned the gear housing in 2006, replacing it with a metal housing capable of taking the load put out by the motor. They repaired the Professional 600s that died under warranty but didn’t put out a service bulletin or recall notice for the others. We were left on our own. You see, the mixer doesn’t self destruct the first time you use it, the problem is cumulative. The flex gets worse with time until one day the gearbox flexes just far enough to cause a train wreck. It happened often enough that the Kitchenaid engineers built a new gearbox. They just didn’t tell the rest of us. It took an engineer with a dead mixer to find out why the gears stripped the way they did.

My mixer is out of warranty so I wanted to see what my options were. I did a little research and found dozens of other Professional 600 owners who experienced exaclty the symptoms and mixer death. One of them was an engineer who took his mixer apart. It was he who discovered why the gears stripped the way they did. There was a detailed analysis with photos on his website, but it is no longer available. Given that this was a known design flaw — one that Kitchenaid admitted when redesigning the gearbox — I asked them to cover the repair of my mixer. They refused, charging me $150 to replace the gears and gearbox housing. Their customer service representative claimed A) that mixing 8 cups of flour for seven minutes, rather than the recommended five, was responsible for the lockup that killed the mixer, and B) that while the gearbox did indeed crack, the gears stripped first, so the gearbox couldn’t have been the problem. I pointed out that the gearbox flexes, causing the gears to strip before the housing cracks but she didn’t want to hear it. The problem was obviously my fault, and her tone suggested that I was probably lying about only mixing 8 cups of flour. It was an infuriating conversation. In short, Kitchenaid markets the Professional 600 as a heavy duty mixer designed to knead bread dough knowing that 90% of their customers are going to be making cakes, cookies and meringues, which put no strain on the motor. It’s the 10% of us who do bake bread (or use the meat grinder) on a regular basis who are screwed because Kitchenaid won’t stand behind its products.

4 stars

My mom got the four quart tilt head a couple years ago. My sister got the five quart bowl lift. I thought I would splurge and go for the six quart. I love it I make cookies for every holiday including St. Patricks Day. I got mine in Buttercup on sale and payed a bigger price with free shipping. I only gave it four stars because it is so expensive but it is made in America so it is so worth it.

5 stars

I have been on target.com many times over the past 3 years checking out all the different kitchenaid stand mixers. I couldn't decide which size to get. Finally settled on the Professional 600 because I wanted to be sure it would handle my needs when the family get togethers are held at my home, and they usually are.
I was worried that this machine would be too big, too bulky. While it is big, it isn't near as big as I thought and I don't worry about weight b/c I never plan to move it. I use it almost every day. It's got the power, it's beautiful, very easy to clean and the first time I made meringue in it I was shocked! I can now make my favorite lemon/lime meringue pie with joy! It has taken the pain out of mashing large amounts of potatoes for potatoe salad, and my cheesecake pies are now a breeze!

5 stars

I stood in line at 6am Christmas Eve seven months pregnant waiting for the store to open to buy myself this mixer...Well, I've had it now for 3 years and it has been a joy! It makes double and triple batches of cookie dough with ease. I bought it at the end of 2006 so I don't know if it had the plastic gears or not. I have never really make bread with it, or really strained the motor grinding anything, just cake batter and cookies. The other posts stress the retooling of the gearbox after 2006, but mine has never given me a problem. I knew I had a gem when my mom was over and had brought her hand mixer to my cookie party...we made the same dough and mine was so beautiful and hers, well...not so... She bought the same one on sale for an insanely low price and loves it to death! It is a whole bunch of money, but if you use a mixer much I'd say drive the Cadillac!!! Ladies, we are worth it!