No hurdles to surmount with the oven
Kathy Hurdle had a lot to say:

I hate to dispute your opinion but I just bought that same GE-Wal-Mart halogen microwave oven and love it. It work great for me. True the first one I got did not work properly -- the bottom element did not come on so I carried it back to Wal-Mart and exchanged it for another one -- same model. This one is wonderful!

First of all -- every microwave oven I have ever been in contact with is HOT on the outside -- always paying attention not to touch nothing but the parts that were intended for you to touch while it is in operation. If you cannot get your hand around the pull bar without scorching your knuckles then you must really have some big hands -- the size of the Jolly Green Giant.

Second, the pastry you cooked got tough because you had the convection option on. As everybody knows when air blows over and around bread -- the bread becomes stale -- so the convection fans blowing air on the pastry only soed up the staling process causing it to be tough. Frankly I don't see what's so great about convection cooking anyway. I have a convection oven that I bought at least 15 or 20 years ago and didn't find it to be worth a hoot and so it wound up in my Dad's shop building out back behind our house and my Dad use it to heat water to make instant coffee in the winter when he was working inside his shop. I also currently have a Sharp microwave oven that I bought back in 1992 that is also a convection oven. Now that has come in handy when I had my regular oven tied up cooking something else and wanted to cook something else at the same time -- but not bread.

When I first tried out the new toaster oven -- I like well toasted "toast" so I hit the "TOAST" button 3 times -- and to my surprise it was really brown -- much browner than I really wanted it so I gave that to my cat (which she did eat some of it which surprised me much because she normally want eat breat at all) and tried for a second time. This time I only pusing the TOASTER button twice -- the toast was exactly toasted the way that I like it -- golden brown. I ate this slice of toast and it was so good. To further test the toaster oven I put a third slice of bread in the oven and pushed the TOAST button only 1 time -- expecting for it to not even be brown but the bread harden without browning. To my surprise when the oven "dinged" indicating that it was finished the toast was just slightly browned -- it had toasted it as anyone would want it to -- a slight brown but not golden -so the oven had done exactly as it should have -- exactly as anyone would want it to toast bread.

I did cook some other things in it -- trying it out and also trying to save energy by using it rather than my range and it always cooked each item I have put in it as I wanted it to. I have NOT used the convection open and really don't expect to.

Perhaps the oven that you got was not working properly either as the first one that I purchased from Wal-Mart's -- I had already read your review before I purchased my oven -- even though you had given it had "bad rep" I thought it try it out. Wal-Mart has always been very courteous when I have returned items -- so I didn't think I'd have any trouble if I returned it. I called the service number and to my surprise they answered as GE-Wal-Mart so GE & Wal-Marts much be in "co-hoots" as Wal-Mart will eventually take over the world -- out here in rural North Carolina they have run most of the little independent guys out of business -- they can't complete with Sam -- he buys in big lots and gets stuff for less than it cost the manufacturer to make it

Hmmm...ok, for the record, assuming I know anything about cooking anything that doesn't grill on my Weber is not safe. If it bleeds, I can cook it. If not, well, that's another story. I'm really glad Kathy likes the oven and I hope others who buy it enjoy it as well.