KitchenAid 600 Professional Series Review

I bought the KitchenAid Professional 600 series stand mixer from Amazon.com (they occasionally fall down into the $299-320 range), and I love it.  It has 10 speeds, a 575 watt motor, a 6 quart mixing bowl and comes with a dough hook, whisk, flat beater and pour shield, which is convenient for adding ingredients while avoiding splashes/flour clouds.  I also got mine while they were offering a rebate for a $40 gift card and a free cookbook, so I thought it was a good deal.  I'm pretty sure KitchenAid consistently offers some sort of rebate or extras, which is nice. 

I'm still getting used to how to scrape down the bowl properly, but that's the case with any stand mixer, I think.  Making bread was by far the biggest difference I noticed... super convenient not having to knead.

I think there are maybe a few cons (minimal, at best):  the motor is a bit noisy, and I have noticed a bit of "whining".  I wasn't doing anything strenuous at the time, so I think it must naturally just be that loud.  And again, scraping down the bowl to get everything mixed properly takes some learning... this model has a hand crank to raise and lower the bowl... I'm told the tilt-head with some of the other, less powerful models is a bit more easy to use in that respect. 

But all in all, I think it was totally worth the price and I love using it.