Best counter top beer machine in 2024

Out of interest - why won't they support them here? MUP?

I have a blade around 3 years, so do a couple of my mates, great system. I have a 2 line cooler system aswell but I never use that anymore since i got the blade as there is a lot of hassle with cleaning lines, balancing gas etc. I have never had any issues getting kegs… you can order directly from here https://www.mybooze.eu/ Kegs are €30 but with delivery comes in at roughly €40-€42 per keg. We used to get them from a few off licenses up the north (First and Last) but they are actually more expensive now than mybooze.. think the last time we looked at them up north they were about €45 a keg, mybooze deliver directly to your door.

I looked at perfect draft, but if your drink of preference is Heineken or Moretti then the blade is a no brainer, the pints out of the blade wont be beaten. The only small thing to think about is there have been some issues with some of the earlier blade models having issues with cooling so make sure you get a warranty with your machine.. i havent been affected by it but two of my mates had the same issue and from reading online it seems a common fault . It can be fixed by disassembling and replacing a cheap temp sensor on the machine but its advisable to buy the units from a reputable source with a warranty to save you the hassle. One of my friends bought his from donedeal second hand and it broke a few months after he got it, so he had to replace the sensor himself, took him about an hour and the sensors where €10 on amazon.

I have a PerfectDraft and it's brilliant, the quality of the pint coming out of it is great and it's good craic when you have a crowd over. Machine is less than half the price of the Blade also.

However, as noted above it is hampered by unpredictable availability of the kegs. There are a few suppliers here but they seem to get deliveries infrequently enough so sometimes there is a huge range and others times you might only have five or six beers to choose from.

A few places in Newry always seem to have good stock though.

Got a "like new" machine from Amazon Warehouse for about 240 euro.

There's an off-licence near me that sells the kegs, but i've also used;

https://busbyscellar.com/product-category/beer-cider/perfectdraft-kegs-machine/

https://www.thebeergals.com/collections/6l-perfectdraft-kegs

https://www.thecru.ie/c/perfectdraft-kegs/1516

I have the Perfectdraft Pro, and the beers are great. Good variety with different seasonal beers, Oktoberfest beers will be launching in a few weeks. The big downside is the running costs, I put a monitor on mine and it averages around €16 a month in electricity costs and the fans tends to run loud in the Summer when it gets into the mid to high 20's, especially when keeping beers at lower temps. So I end up keeping mine off a lot of the time because of this, and just transferring the keg from the fridge to the machine when having a few.