The juicer works great for green leafy vegetables, carrots, apples, celery, and a few others, but not so great with soft fruits like kiwi or mango. It was easy to clean. However, I have to give it a one star rating because I have only had it for 2 and a half months and the plastic strainer part has broken from a "Lime". I am one of those customers that believes that a product should just work and work for a long time without having to call the company for little annoyances like this. I hate plastic parts under stress. They just do not endure. If I could return it, I would. I will bite the bullet and buy a more expensive all metal juicer. Do your research and spend the money on some for your health that has quality!!!

I use this for everything. I use this for a very wide array so will break it down by each item below. Simply 5 stars because of the versatility of this.

1. Vegetable juice - Five Stars. This is unmatched. Gets the best juice, minimal foam, and highest yield. Also low speed is the best to extract juice vs. high speed which damages the juice.

2. Nut milk - Four Stars. I soak the almonds/cashews for 8 or so hours, dry them off, grind using the grinding accessory, and then I add purified water and put it back through using the juicing attachment. Removing 1 star because it doesn't remove all the nut pulp. It definitely saves a lot of time but I still have to use a nut bag after to make smooth milk. Having said that, it is delicious and the best ever almond/cashew milk I've ever had.

3. Coffee grinds - Five Stars. Use the grinding attachment. Done. Perfect and consistent. Works well with my Keurig reusable cup. I gave it 5 stars but others may dispute this based on their need for adjustable grinds. I don't...so 5 stars.

4. Ice Cream - Five Stars. This is my favorite. I put orange juice through, add a little sugar, and then I freeze it into popsicles. Send the popsicles through the grind attachment for instant sorbet. Nothing beats it when it's fresh out. Simply amazing. I even added some vanilla extract and almond milk to make Orange creamsicle sherbert. Also delicious

5. Ginger extract - I use this machine to extract ginger juice to make ginger tea. Does the job incredibly well and saves a massive headache of using the Vita Mix.

6. Long list of potential options with this machine. Seriously get it....you won't regret it!

Don't buy this if you plan on using it for wheatgrass. Within 4 uses I heard cracking sounds. After the 5th use, concerned about the cracking noises, I inspected the parts to find that the screen assembly was cracked and the auger was scored, which must have put plastic shavings in my juice. I called Omega and they will replace the parts, however, I fully expect the new parts to do the same.

I wish I had used it more when I first received it, because the return policy is only 30 days if purchased through Amazon.

Overall, an excellent juicer, as many have already noted. I have been using the refurbished version for about 3 months.

Pros:

--Strong motor! The only time it has jammed was when I was juicing carrot greens, which was probably my own fault for stuffing too much in. The only way it could be better if if it was a tiny, gasoline-powered V-8 engine.

--Slightly bigger feed tube in comparison to other juicers. Less slicing and dicing saves on prep-time, so I can get back to playing Warcraft.

--We have a worm-bin, and a compost bin, and the resultant pulp is great for feeding these. We feed the worms veggie-pulp (no citrus!) only once a month, but the worms gobble the stuff up! The rest goes into our giant, barrel-shaped compost bin (which we also got right here on Amazon!).

Cons:

--Not dishwasher safe! This is my chief complaint. There are 7 parts to hand wash, and I admit it is not too hard and only takes perhaps 5 minutes. The package comes with a horse-sized toothbrush for scrubbing the innards (note to self-get some more toothbrushes and toothpaste for our daughter's Shetland pony). For this price, you'd think they would make the parts with better, dishwasher-safe plastic! But, despite the parts not all that hard to hand wash, I am pretty lazy and would rather just toss them in the dishwasher along with everything else. For this, minus one star!

---It doesn't do a great job with softer, less-fibrous items, such as lemons, softer varieties of cucumbers and pineapple. As a result sometimes the mush backs up to the top of the feeding tube. I've since learned to mix things up by sending through a few carrots or celery stalks now and then when juicing the mushy stuff, to help push things through. No longer a big source of drama.

-- The juice-catcher could be designed a little better by having a properly shaped pour-spout. It is a little nerve-wracking pouring into small-mouth containers, or when I pour the uber-fresh juice directly into my mouth (especially carrot juice! Yum!).

--The collar where you lock in the feed-tube component can get a little difficult to open and close. I dribbled a few drops of vegetable oil behind the collar and worked it back and forth a few times, and it seems better now.

Overall, great quality, create great juice, and is a great value for the money! Highly recommended!

I had used my Breville Juice Fountain Plus for the last week, and was pretty disappointed in the way it handled leafy greens like kale and spinach. It pretty much extracted very little juice from the stems and chopped the leaves up and tossed them into the pulp bin without juicing them. I also did not like the way it leaked, the noise, and the difficulty of cleaning up after a glass of juice.

Years ago I had an Omega J8006 masticating juicer and had to sell it due to unemployment crisis. But I remembered that it did a great job on anything I juiced with it, and it was fast and easy to clean. I also made "sorbets" with it (based on frozen bananas) and nut butters, both yummy things the centrifugal juicers can't do.

I did research and watched comparative reviews on youtube. They all showed that the horizontal single auger juicers like the Omega do a better job on leafy greens. Since my upcoming reboots are going to feature lots of Mean Green (or my variation, Spicy Green), I wanted something that will do a great job on leafy greens, even if it takes longer to do the juicing.

I ordered the Omega NC800 (the NC900 is the same juicer but in a chromed plastic finish and costs more) in the silver finish. It arrived today. After unpacking it, setup was very easy and I decided to make one of my favorites, my "Spicy Green". It contains kale, carrots, ginger, celery, cucumber, 1/2 a lime and a serrano chili. Has a nice spicy bite.

I started with the kale, and the NC800 did a terrific job on it. It extracted a LOT of juice and the pulp that came out was completely pulverized and dry. It chewed up all the other ingredients as well. I ended up with a 16oz glass of the juice, and it only had about 1/8" of foam on top. The juice is much darker green, and does not have all that air beaten into it that you get from the centrifugal juicers. VERY tasty, better than any juice I have made with the Breville.

The machine only runs at 80 RPM so it is very quiet. Cleanup was probably a 2 minute deal, just rinsing the few parts under hot water. A lot of the extra time it takes to juice comes back in the short and easy cleanup phase.

So, the Omega stays, the Breville is going back. I got a pretty good deal on the Omega, because I bought a factory refurbished one. Can't tell it from new, packed the same as the new one with all the same accessories and manuals. Only difference is a 10 year warranty instead of the new one's 15 years.

UPDATE Feb 2016: The ring that holds the gasket on the juice strainer (cone-shaped thing) broke and the ring came off. Looking at the Omega site this is a common problem. Omega support asked me to email them a picture of the broken part and they will send another, but in the meantime my only juicer is not usable. Lowered to 3 stars due to this early failure.

UPDATE Mar 2016: Still have not received the replacement part or any further communications from Omega support, in spite of trying to contact them via phone, email, and website. Lowered to 1 star and will never buy Omega again. I have switched to the SlowStar vertical auger juicer and am very pleased with it. This Omega was a complete waste of money, failed after only a few weeks.