Technology

LG all the way. I have not had much in the way of positive results from GE since their acquisition by Haier. Their build quality took an immediate and noticeable nosedive. I have seen DOA, damaged, and defective units of all stripes from all brands over the years. But I have never seen any units arrive from the factory not fully assembled, but still packed up in a box and shipped in that state, except from GE. Multiple times.

I received a PFE28 refrigerator with no ice maker mechanism, just a hole in the door where it should have been installed. I also received a CGS700 range with the oven light door switch not installed, just rolling around in the bottom of the oven cavity where it was subsequently baked by the customer. I also received one CXE22 refrigerator with no face panel on the center drawer. There are other examples but those are just the recent ones I can remember off the top of my head.

Haier's management philosophy seems to be in lockstep with the Chinese Manufacturing Way, which is to steal whatever tech you can, do a slapdash job of making it, lie about everything, and when pressed about it just lie some more.

Honestly Whirlpool is not doing great these days, either, but they're better than Samsung or GE. Whirlpool has seemingly devolved into mostly competing with itself with all of its various sub-marquees: Amana, Maytag, KitchenAid, Gladiator, Jenn-Air, Roper, Affresh, etc. A better strategy might be to compete with their, you know, competitors. Whirlpool's warranty service network has also essentially evaporated over the last few years, so if you don't already know a repairman who is Whirlpool factory authorized to do warranty work you may as well just open a Youtube tab and figure that shit out yourself. Otherwise you'll just be told "there are no servicers or service dates in your area and the system only lets us look two weeks in advance" over and over again until your warranty runs out.

The less we say about Samsung the better. At one point we were experiencing a roughly 50/50 first-week failure rate of their laundry machines and dishwashers. A coin flip. That's worse odds than a first run XBox 360 not red ringing itself to put it into perspective. Don't buy a Samsung appliance no matter how shiny it is or how big of a touch screen it's got.