Ice makers/dispensers in refrigerator doors are really, really nice.

They also malfunction and outright fail with annoying frequency. Among leaks, jams, and outright failures, probably the single most frequent refrig. repair complaint.

I've replaced four of them in family-owned refs in the last 12 years. At my own place I removed the last failed unit entirely rather than spend another $190.00. Bought a portable clear-ice machine instead (like the RVer's use) for the same price which makes better ice and makes it faster. I bag it, freeze it, and refill my ref. dispenser as-needed.

I acknowledge that my personal annoyance level is probably exceptional. Most folks repair/replace the things as needed and move on.

This post was edited by Gwarstong on Tue, Apr 29, 14 at 14:01

No way I'd get another in door deal after the last one failed in the open position, causing the wood floor to completely warp.

I am struggling with buying a refrigerator also. I am also looking at the LG and Samsung. I am branching out to other mfg. possibly Whirlpool, GE or Kitchenaid.

I do not need a counterdepth model. I just need a freestanding where it will be placed.

I think it's a mixed bag. Some love them. Some hate them...mostly seems to be those who have had a catastrophic failure who hate them. Personally, my family has had had a leak happen at the dishwasher...I find the convenience of having a dishwasher worth the potential leak issue. I feel the same way about an in-door icemaker.

We have the Kenmore Elite (has the same slim-in-door icemaker that you were describing). We've only had the icemaker running for a few months now and so far, I'm rather happy with it. A few little things that are slight annoyances - I wish that the ice cubes were just a bit larger. The formed ice cubes sometimes stick together, so you have to take out the ice hopper and break up the ice - nothing major and certainly not all the time, but an inconvenience to an extent - if you hope to never need to open the door to get ice, ours hasn't proven to be that way. But again, this has only happened a few times in the months that we've been using it.

And if you are a very heavy ice-using family, the ice maker may not make enough ice for your needs. There's two of us in our family, and there's always plenty of ice for us (I'm a "light-ice" user and my DH is moderate. I would expect that it could supply our ice needs two times over without issue if necessary.

we had a sxs kenmore ( whirlpool rebranded) and it was my first water ice in the door and i would never go back! my fav thing about it is our family started drinking a lot more water! plus kids can get it themselves so no mom needed to get a drink w/ice!
we would have some jams as the frig got older but we just took out the bin and unclogged the shute, no big deal. we never had a leak or major malfunction. we swapped to a lg french door for frig space and love the water ice feature. the lg doesn't make quite as much ice but that may keep it from clogging in the future. ps the kenmore french door frigs (at least the larger capacity) are lg. we looked at the samsung too but i hated the ice maker on the top shelf. we need all the shelf space we can get!