Oregon Scientific AW129 Wireless BBQ Thermometer with Probe Thermometer and Remote

The probe failed after probably four uses. I was careful with it, but obviously not careful enough. Whoever heard of being careful with BBQ tools anyway? As with so many other people who have posted here, it appears the probe on my unit has failed.

Interesting side note: I have been emailing back and forth with customer service, and they have me going through all these gyrations to try and get it to work. I finally looked here and diagnosed my own problem (and its lack of solution) in two minutes. You'd think they'd read their own reviews.

If you like to cook, a wireless thermometer is a MUST. I love this thermometer. The only reason for 4 starts is that you can't set the temp for whatever you want. Although, they do give you an array of preset options, I would like to have the ability to set the temp as the do on some other thermometers.

These things make cooking any meat easy. Whether its chicken, turkey, ham, roast beef, or pork this will make a perfect moist meat without wondering, guessing the time, or having to cut into it and check.

I know how to cook and am pretty good at it, but this makes it so much easier. Not only does the meat get to the perfect temperature with precise control, but you get to watch it while you are watching TV or doing something else.

So crack open a beer and set it on the stand, or clip it to your belt while you get some cleaning done and you are no longer tied to the kitchen.

These also make great house warming gifts.

I bought one of these in my quest to replace my old Radio Shack wireless barbecue thermometer after it "bit the big one" in a flareup.

I first bought one from Redi-check - those are made in China, expensive, and worst of all, useless and inaccurate. I reviewed it on its own page, and hope no one else wastes their money.

Then I found this one, and hey, they've taken the old Radio Shack design and gone a bit further with it. The cable has even better armor, and there are more possibilities for 'alarm temperature'.

One fault in it, but it has a workaround: Ignore the built-in settings for temperature. Those must have been created by the lawyers. If you're a good cook, you already know the temperature you want. Just click your way through each of the foods/temperatures until you find what you want; don't look at the headings like "Turkey" which wants 170° for "done." You and I both know that at that temperature, you've created turkey-flavored shoe leather.

This unit has great range. I can be inside, at the other end of the house, and it still gets a reliable readout. And if I go outside the range, it will beep to let me know it's out of range.

This is the strangest designed piece of equipment I have ever owned. Now here is the drill for turning this thing on.

1. Remove belt clip on temperature monitor
2. Remove the battery covers on both units.
3. Turn both units on.
4. Turn both units over so the back is facing up.
5. Use a bent paper clip (I am not making this up) to hit the tiny reset buttons which are located under the battery cover on each unit.
6. Replace battery covers on each unit
7. Wait for units to sync up.
8. Replace belt clip on the temperature monitor

OK, I'll admit I just could not believe this is how this unit is meant to operate (why not put finger sized reset buttons on the outside of the units or maybe incorporate the reset function into the "on" buttons?) so I called Oregon Scientific and they confirmed that it is supposed to operate the way I listed it above.

So if you buy this thing, keep your bent paper clip handy. Crazier yet, the temperature probe (pointy object, an obvious way to push the reset buttons) is not quite pointy enough to use on the temperature monitor unit. The reset button is recessed and the probe will not reach it.

Terrible design! No wonder it is inexpensive.

An update. It finally started to sync up by itself when you turn it on. Pretty weird, if you ask me since it didn't initially.

Another update: Now it doesn't sync no matter what I do. Junk, it is going back.

I have owned two of these products. Both worked well the first time I used them. However, the probes are the weak spot. They both went bad within the first three uses. I am trying to find a source for the replacement probes but have not found any in stock.