I have posted a couple of times recently saying that we prefer the non-Icon Electrolux ovens, and that the non-Icon racks are about 1" deeper (front to back) than the Icon racks. We took another look at the various Electrolux oven models side by side on the weekend, and I have to confess that we changed our minds about the looks, and I exaggerated the rack issue a tad.

The difference in the rack depths turns out to be only 1/2". Given that the E'lux ovens are a little smaller inside than some of their competitors, that may be an issue for some folks, but the biggest pan we use is a 1/2 sheet, so it really doesn't matter for us.

There is another difference in the racks: the Icon oven has three fixed (rivetted in place) roll-out racks, and two locations that can hold old-school slide-out racks, while the non_Icon's roll-out racks can be placed in any of the 5(?) available positions. At first we thought the Icon arrangement was crazy, because only having three positions for the roll-out racks would be very limiting, but after a while my eagle-eyed wife spotted that the main part of an Icon rack lifts off the rivetted-in roller slides, and there are two different types of racks - one flat and one that hangs down about 3cm. By mixing and matching the racks on the sliders, you can get intermediate positions.

On the looks: the non-Icon ovens have quite a big gap at the top of the doors. The Icon ovens are much neater, with very little gap showing. I don't know why we didn't notice that before, but now that we have, we really don't care for the big gap on the non-Icon ovens. More of an issue for us, though, is the horizontal trim piece at the bottom of the non-Icon ovens. This is about 1" high and slopes downwards; it looks like it might be there to deflect hot air away from cabinets below the oven door. The problem is that the slope makes it look to us as if it is bent. Thinking back, I have a feeling that this piece may not have been installed on the E'lux ovens we have seen previously.

While I hope the details above are useful to someone considering these ovens in future, this experience has really shown us how easy it is to miss things when trying to make a decision.