The slicer was delivered in good condition, on time and only took a short while to clean and get ready to use. Overall, the unit is a very good value. I did have to take a little time to fine tune the positioning of some of the interacting parts. As far as the cleaning, it does take a few extra minutes to take the blade off to thoroughly clean. The slicer had plenty of power to slice the slightly frozen bacon I had made. The blade also needed to be sharpened a little finer prior to doing this. I was able to slice cheese without much trouble. I just had to periodically wipe the blade clean. I see people write about slicing bread. My wife makes homemade bread all the time. She said this is not the right tool for that and she would know. The length of cut is a little shorter than I would have liked but that is the difference between a 12" machine and the 10". It is a little cumbersome for general home use but as a meat processing hobbyist, it fills the slot quite nicely without hurting the wallet to much. Thumbs up